Recently, when asked about gas prices in a press conference, President Bush jokingly replied to a reporter “Strike one on the exclusive. Excuse me, strike two.” Here is one bullet in the long list of problems with our current media. A threat from the president that access will be denied if reported pursue questions that make the administration uncomfortable.
And it has been made painfully clear that smart reporters with smart questions will be punished thought the example of Helen Thomas. Thomas, a woman with more press corps experience than anyone else in the room was unceremoniously moved to the back of the class for asking tough questions.
After eight years of Bush, we have been left with a press corps trained to be obedient, non-confrontational, and shallow. Reporters are afraid that if they don’t have access, they won’t be able to do their jobs. Result, a media catch 22. We have a press corps that does not do its job for fear of not being able to do its job.
The irony is that the press is the camp with the power. They have the power to ruin a presidency with negative coverage, scrutiny, even scandals and distortion. The press has abdicated its power—and for what reason? A president plagued by negative press has no choice but to grant access in order to persuade and change the conversation.
So is it really access that the press covets? Or is it some other benefit?
Increasingly, the press corps has become part and partial of the Washington social set. Some media personalities, such as Chris Matthews, have come right out and talked about being invited to the good parties. John McCain is famous for inviting reporters to barbecues. Could it be that the reporters’ personal lives and wannabe quotients are taking precedent over the sacred responsibilities of the fourth estate?
Proximity to the Washington social circle creates a profound conflict of interest in people who want to be part of the elite and report on the elite. The press is supposed to be the scrappers, the freedom fighters, the disdainful. We are losing these characteristics in a press that increasingly appears on television in designer suits and makeup, who increasingly consider themselves celebrities rather than watchdogs.
This is not to say there are no more scrappers. They just don’t appear on commercial television, with the possible exception of Rachel Maddow, who has become a regular on MSNBC. Anyone interested in the finding the truth on TV knows to steer clear of the commercials in favor of C-Span and PBS. Print is still the best source of scrappy truth tellers, but even print needs to be scoured carefully to filter out propaganda.
For the public, the answer is to ignore the cocktail party set—whether the news makers or the news tellers—and instead seek out the scrappy truth tellers who don’t care about strike one and strike two, because they’re determined to hit the ball out of the park.
Filed under: media, strike two on the exclusive
