This may be the most succinct description of press behavior this campaign season that I’ve seen. Although it may have been an inadvertent effort in a live chat, Michael Kinsley nutshells the 2008 campaign press coverage in four paragraphs:
Athens, Tenn.: Is there, in your opinion, a media bias toward or against a particular candidate in general? It seems that during Sen. McCain’s first run he was the media darling. That of course did not help him. Now many assume that Sen. Obama is the de facto media favorate.
Michael Kinsley: I guess I share the conventional wisdom on both of these points. McCain has always been a media darling. At a magazine editors convention a few years ago, he started a speech by saying he was happy to be there addressing "my base." He gets and deserves points for jokes like that.
And the SNL take on Obama is also correct. He is a media darling now. Hillary is rightly bitter. I am puzzled–something happened about six weeks ago that was like a light switch turning off, or on: all of a sudden, she became "the Clintons" and every resentment of her and her husband came to the surface among the media, liberals, everybody.
That said, I am not the best person to explain the media Obama swoon, since I have been a swooner myself.
No doubt we’ll all turn on him at some point, faithless bastards that we are.
Doesn’t that just sum up the whole koo-koo-ka-choo infotainment presidential horserace blather and buddy-buddy media bonanza in a nutshell?
Eric Boehlert has more, as does Somerby and Digby. Apparently skepticism is still too much to ask…
Related posts:
- GRITtv Live: Jeremy Scahill and Glenn Greenwald – Who’s Afraid of the Independent Press?
- Meet the Press STILL Lets Guests “Control the Message”
- Bill Press: Lou Dobbs’ Birther Lunacy is Killing CNN’s Credibility
- A New Mission for the White House Press Corps: Which Health Care Execs Visited Obama?
- The Nobel is Great, but the Press Release is Even Better
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Good post,Christy.
Christy — you should stay up all night more often.
I didn’t mean with a sick child, though.
I have more than skepticism. Barak, at best, may be able to engage many people who have not been involved in the political process. That is good IMO. I also think of the Atlanta Olympics when I am worried that the repubs can’t wait for Obama to be prez so they can do all they can to cripple his administration so they can say “see, what happens when one of THEM” gets in power. Probably not that much different that if Hil gets elected. The ability of either of them to really get anything done will be, in many ways, outside of their control.
The reporters covering candidates routinely ride on the bus or fly on the airplane with the candidates they should be covering for the public’s benefit. It is no wonder they give up any semblance of skepticism. Maybe it’s time we ask all the news media to start paying the way of their reporters so they won’t be so beholden to those they cover.
And while we’re at it, lets disband the WH Press Corps. Those reporters can still live and work in DC, lets just not have them serving at the pleasure of the President.
So, if the press turns on him , let’s say in September/October how are we, Dems, going to make sure that it does not translate into October surprise?
I just don’t believe that the Rovians will go down without at least a few tricks yet to play out.
It’s going to take a lot of grassroots work to overcome the media’s coronation of McCain – we’ve seen how they propped him up while they pushed Edwards under.
The Republican calculation is, as much as they’d love to take Hillary on, they’re just itching to turn the base loose against the black guy.
he has tricks but his tricks are from an old playbook that we have read
he has proven to be a moron, he took the republicans from their unasailable seat of power, generals in the war of polictics and turned them into snivelling soldiers
he is a failure, is proven a failure, his strategy is the moronic strategy of a child
so we know what he will pull, all we have to do is have at the ready the canned response
It will be worse than you say. There will be a D tsunami in Congress, so that Ds will hold supermajorities, perhaps even 60 seats in the Senate. But the Blue Dogs will join with the really mean Rs, who will develop more & worser bad tricks, to prevent anything meaningful from being done. The Ds will get slaughtered in the press and with the voters.
I agree ecahn, power corupts, absolute power, absolutely
Hillary got PRESSED- and it wasn’t pretty. Seemed as if every media outlet in the nation turned against her at the same time. I don’t really care which of them wins the nomination- but I didn’t like this and I’m suspicious of the reasons for it.
Good post, Christy – depressing as it is.
If it takes a village to make a child …
How many of our children will die from poverty and want of health care before The Village is razed?
We had a little post-o-rama going there — Swopa’s will be back in a bit. Sorry about that gang. We had a backstage glitch…
My screen says a new post has been published, but the link leads to a 404 Not Found error message.
I assume that by your metaphor above, you meant no slight to “real” soldiers…
Pelosi asking for grand jury investigation of Bolten and Meirs. Breaking news on CNN. Details pending.
It has been a really bizarre thing to watch. The weird thing is that you could see that leading edge of the wave with folks like MoDo making it a-ok to take it way beyond the point of journamalism to what Digby calls The Heathers. And then that trickle of nasty turned into a tidal wave.
Yeah — it was a glitch on our part — that post will be back in a bit. We had a little posting traffic jam there for a sec…
Swopa’s post covered some of the issues raised here! I hope my Zed is intact… *g*
And of course, our hero Marcy has it next door.
It’s still there — comments are saved until it goes up again. It was our fault — this post went up early somehow, and we had to juggle a bit. Sorry about that gang…
Perhaps what’s needed is some sort of V chip for biased media coverage. However, I found an easier technique to deal with mainstream news. I change the channel or turn off the tube. Works everytime.
Now here’s some news. Oh Lord, I feel so much better, Mr. Prez.
AP – President Bush said Thursday the country is not recession-bound and, despite expressing concern about slowing economic growth, rejected for now any additional stimulus efforts. “We acted robustly,” he said.
George W. Bush. There he goes again.
President Bush on Thursday pressed Congress to give telecommunications companies legal immunity for helping the government eavesdrop after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
Shorter GWB: Four dollar gallon of gas?! I don’t know nuthin bout no four dollar gallon of gas.
Handicapping the senate..
It’s very early- but Cook shows 10 gooper seats in some degree of trouble and two dem seats…
If one assumes that goopers grab one of the two dem seats- and dems get five of the two gooper seats, then you end up with a four seat swing- so rather than linin up 51-49—dems would get a 55-45 advantage- assuming Liebervurst votes dem on leadership.
Put it on the table Speaker Pelosi.
-G
Coming into this election season I thought America was ready to elect a woman to be President, but was not ready to elect an African American.
To this point and in the universe of the Democratic party nomination process, I have been proven wrong. Of course, I recognize that much of what has occurred is a result of the fact that Obama has proven to be an extraordinary candidate, but to some degree this result has been impacted by the relative virulence of these two malignant forces-sexism and racism.
Franken has taken the lead in Minnsesota.
Quirky folks up there, voted for a wrestler and are now leaning towards and old SNL writer.
-G
Perhaps put the Speaker’s future on the table.
al will be an AMAZING politician and might well be president one day
Ask the Clintons, our dependence on foreign oil, now reported at 66%, had the greatest increase in our history under the Clintons. Oh sorry, did the Clintons provide us with great economic times based on fossil fuels? The Clintons, I assume, would not have us overlook that Mark Cuban got to sell a non-existent dot com business to Yahoo for 400 million and buy a basketball team.
At least Congress will be a lot more fun. :)
And as to former boxer Harry Reid? As far as I’m concerned this political light weight is down for the count. Time to clean house.
I think that’s Michigan, Minnesota and Wisconsin in general. *grin* Very odd area that doesn’t do things just because politicians say so. I distinctly remember the voters telling Engler to Suck IT here in Michigan back in 2000.
I take it you don’t care for the Clintons.
I am a total bore when it comes to the Clintons
And his boy says this:
Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke testifies on Capitol Hill in Washington, Wednesday before the House Financial Services Committee hearing. In his second day of testimony Thursday, the chief said he is not concerned that prices will keep rising if the economy continues to slow down.
Kinsley is a notorious liar, he played the part of the “liberal” weenie
for the conservative establishment for years and did a bang up job a la
Morton Kondracke… be careful how you read him, his eyes are full of
tears for Buckley right now.
Oh yeah, my blood pressure spiked, my better judgment got thrown out the window, my eyes glazed over and my inner potty mouth ran wild over that one.
I wonder if my doctor could get in trouble for medicating me against Bush derangement Syndrome, he makes me deranged.
I better make plans to get that second job now. Jeez i hate this crap. (No one’s hiring in my chosen specialty currently, so i need stop gap measures.)
Greedy bastards.
I hear people in my area every day saying they can’t vote for a Muslim.
Of course he’s not a Muslim, but I think they say this so they don’t have to say they won’t vote for a Black candidate.
Did you miss the part where I said “Although it may have been an inadvertent effort in a live chat” on Kinsley’s part with this? Even a blind hog finds an acorn once in a while…intentionally or not.
Bernanke obviously never buys anything.
Neither does Shrub. (Someone should tell him that his father tried telling the country that it wasn’t a recession, back in 90/91/92. Didn’t work then, either. Look what happened to his father’s job.)
I try to focus all my negative feelings on the current corrupt administration.
Bingo…I’ve thought that more than once myself. And either way, it’s appalling.
Press covering McBush can’t avoid noticing that every time he says something lately, he takes it back the next day…
This, I think, is part of his “ready,fire, aim” personality and badly needs to be reported- hope it gets noticed. This man cannot be trusted to carefully think things through before he acts or speaks.
why is it that neither clinton nor obama seem to notice that they shared ALL of the media attention even when dodd, kucinich, edwards and richardson were in the race.
The Presnident Decider Guy ™ wants you to crap your pants
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E7X8u5IEEBc
Alright, I gotta ask, it’s killing me with curiosity.
How do you make that little ‘TM’ trademark thingy?
They truly believe that he’s muslim. Spoke to a couple of R friends of mine and the told me that Obama was going to swear in on the Koran and one holds a terminal degree.
Clintons plus Bushes=two for one.
I heard mccain is a muslim…could this be true?
Franken vs Coleman debates. Now that would be something to look forward to. I would love to see Wienie Norm try to outdo Al.
The six MN republicans who voted to override Gov Pawlenty’s veto of gas tax raise are being severely punished by the R’s. All have been stripped of their leadership roles & replaced with more loyal minions. Meanwhile, Pawlenty has been barely home in MN, too busy traveling with McCain among other pressing engagements to tend to gov duties.
& trade ;
Without the spaces. The second thingy is a semi colon ;-)
Uh-oh…..
http://www.cqpolitics.com/wmsp…..0002678676
crap in our pants? why? does he have stock in depends?
Ah, but Molnau’s had her Dept of Transportation hat yanked away.
&;
What is this ‘trade’ thing?
a key on the keyboard?
Now I AM confused!
Lol
Sort of doubt it, but on the other hand has anyone seen any mention of his Christian credentials in the news? I haven’t. It would seem that he hasn’t been subjected to scrutiny as much on this issue as other presidential candidates.
Thing of it is, I’d have no problem at all voting for a rainbow colored, woman, man or transgender for president. It’s the message that counts with me. Of course I realize full well some might call me eccentric.
Wish they’d take FISA to a conference committee and just serve up the house version.
The economy will be in the tank and get worse under the next President. The Dems will get the blame, even though the real culprit is the failure to regulate the financial markets – a Rethug failure.
Never mind John, there are some things not worth trying to explain.
Maybe we should start a rumor that McCain is a Druid. He sure has a mystical relationship with W. (It’s a mystery why anyone would want a relationship with W.)
Not bad. Not bad at all, Tex. ;0)
Some might even call you a DFH ! Imagine…
Have the telecoms applied for a presidential pardon?
Charlie Rose had an interesting hour on Tuesday, February 26 focusing on how the europeans are watching the election in the US, with Timothy Garton Ash, Alistair Horne, and John Burns. Timothy Garton Ash, of Oxford, described all of europe being taken over with Obamamania. Ash said europeans are watching the election very closely and the talk in every pub, cafe, and street corner is about Obama and nothing else. The europeans are very excited about the possibility of Obama as the next american president.
Being the media darling can be hazardous but the good thing is, if Obama ends up winning the presidency, he will already be familiar to the rest of the world from the press he is getting and could change much of the anti-american sentiment overnight.
Druid? Is President Clusterfuck a tree?
Prairie Sunshine@54: Wha hoppen to Molnau?? I’ve been out of the loop for a couple of days. I hope she lost her leadership (cough) role.
Don’t you mean Drut? (spell it backwords)
He’s dumber than a stump.
McBush is, by all accounts, substantially dumber than the curren prez. Great!!!
Here’s a nice one that just popped in my mailbox:
Whisper campaigns…you have to start them just right. And “McCain is a Muslim” is not one that would work.
Saying Obama is a Muslim doesn’t work too well when they’re simultaneously investigating his Christian church.
lovely raven . got anything good to send back?
Neither did the one saying he is batshit insane either, unfortunately.
I wonder sometimes if he doesn’t have a rather tenuous grasp, his actions and his words don’t always match the situation.
Hoyer says FISA up next week. Is this the sell-out, or will our people hold firm? Curious mind wants to know.
Let them investigate Obama’s alma mater, Punahou School… The top private school in the Isles, and the church he attended with his mother all the while… Methodist, IIRC…
Yea, this was sent by a shipmate of my father from WWII. It had two Navy officers at Weber State University on the list. I wrote them that this kind of stupidity and racism is not what my father fought for in WWII nor I in Vietnam. I didn’t swear even once!
I still say mccain is muslim, I don’t care if they say he’s not, I think he is
I hope to hell that when the Democrats “organize” in Jan. 09, Hoyer is out of a job. He is a slimeball, but he’ll never be defeated in his district. We just have to hope that “more” and “better” Democrats have more sense than the ones in this Congress did.
And attended on a scholarship. They want to throw that out that it is a high priced PRIVATE school which is OK if you a repug but not for ANY Democrat.
Just spell out trade
& trade ; (without spaces)
™
—
TexBetsy @ 57 – who knows? ;-)
—
Leftin DC @ 68 – who needs one when the Att. Gen. won’t do anything anyway
Raven@75: I get very discouraged when I get those, not from R’s, but normal, decent friends. Today I got a racist one that Andy Rooney supposedly said-False. I spend a lot of time sending them the debunkers from snopes, etc. I have no idea why they are not more skeptical, they’re not stupid. The erosion of critical thinking in this country is truly frightening.
Yea, this guy is a lawyer. and according to my stepmother, a phony!
*darn it*
The best theory I have is that there’s a finite amount of intelligence and a near-infinite amount of teh stoopids. The consequences are left as an exercise for people who don’t get headaches when they think (which should include everyone here).
Vicki Iseman is a Muslim — pass it on.
The committee with oversight refused to reappoint her as Dept of Trans. chair. Course she’s still next in line to Paw-lenty.
As usual the Rethugs whined it was a partisan vote. Yeah, channeling Jane, the Rethugs chose party loyalty over competence and a fresh start for MnDOT after the 35W bridge
He does have that vacation place up in by Sedona, doesn’t he. Ooooohhhh-whooo–whoooo. New Age hippie anyone?
his friend is an ignoramus and an a**hole– and I am being kind.
I really, really despise the denigration of any religion/faith and am getting really steamed at the bigoted targeting of Islam and the billions that are adherents to that faith.
Just how much farther will Americans be diminished in the eyes of the rest of the humans on this small planet ???
trade™
™
Neat trick!
The horrible beauty, if you can call it that, of a whisper campaign is just that people are usually more prone to believe something bad about a person than something good. That’s it. And they do not like to be disabused of their false belief, not at all. They react with resentment and so on.
Sen. Inouye had to publish a retraction “…for suggesting that Obama’s private HS in Hawaii was elitist.” He’s an ardent Hill supporter and the only member of my Congressional Delegation for her, the other three are Obama supporters…
meant to say:
Just how much farther will America slide and continue to be diminished in the eyes of the rest of the humans on this small planet ???
Grin. Makes just as much sense as the email making the rounds that Raven posted.
All I can say is that I have been truly shocked to get those awful chain emails from people I know well & know how they have conducted their lives. They should know better & I am mystified.
Pssssst (whispers and points) Look! Reagan was a Muslim too
http://www.theseminal.com/wp-c…..reagan.jpg
Bush is too…
If and when Hillary is elected, it will be in support of specific policies that she will have a mandate to translate into law.
If and when Obama is elected, he will have a mandate for optimism. The optimism is that members of Congress will have read everything on his website and found it in line with their political ideologies. Is hope enough to turn policies 180 degrees? If Obama gets the nod, let’s pray that it is.
This is exactly correct. Obama is going to get a rude awakening….Of course he can then get his wife to defend him….Just like Hillary did for which she is so villified. Democrats doing to the Clintons in six months what the Republican slime machine couldn’t do in almost twenty years! Dick Morris is humbled in your presence!
With the primary turnout so preponderously weighing in favor of the Democrats, I think it may be a no-brainer to suggest that the real camapign is for the Democratic nomination.
Which might explain the tepid response and bridled ndignation towards McCain, people recognize Hillary as the last trainstop in a forgettable place in history, and they do not want to get back on that old track.
Mccain is the next Bob Dole… the always-ran and never-won conservative alternative to whoever the Dems field as the next winner.
And if he doesn’t win the presidency, McCain can get some of those pharmie endorsements that Dole was famous for. (Libby wasn’t running for Pres in 200o, she was running from Bob.)
Sorry, I didn’t mean to be satyrical…
I prefer Homer Simpson’s phrase used to describe Bush, “President Koo Koo Bananas”.