It’s less than one month until the most pivotal presidential election in recent memory, all you Joe Six-Packs, Change-oholics and coveted ones in between.
With an economy on the brink of a dark recession, with Social Security and Medicare costs guaranteed to skyrocket as the boomers retire (leaving today’s twentysomethings to pick up the tab), with a damaged reputation on the world stage, why is it that our first reflex when digesting political TV news is to grab the popcorn and not the thinking cap?
As a former newspaper reporter, I will admit that I am harder on my journalistic brethren. But we all should be. They shape our opinions of the candidates. What they talk about on camera is what we talk about around the water cooler. And it seems they are more interested in provoking fights, massaging their egos and selling their brands rather then informing voters. TV journalists need to press the candidates on the tough issues, such as how they will afford what they effortlessly promise, not wave poms-poms or hoist high-fives.
When Fox News personality Sean Hannity sat down with John McCain and Sarah Palin recently, the anchor acted like he was shooting a campaign ad:
HANNITY: But think of how this war has been politicized through the prism of your experience in Vietnam. The leader in the Senate, Harry Reid, said, “the surge has failed, the war is lost.” Dick Durbin compared our troops to Nazis. John Kerry said our troops are invading Iraqis’ homes in the dark of night, you know, terrorizing women and children. These are verbatim quotes. And Barack Obama said they are “air-raiding villages and killing civilians.” My question is, you know, what does that — that’s poisonous rhetoric, but it goes on, what does it mean? How do you stop that if you’re elected president and vice president?
The war has been politicized, Mr. Hannity, because you and other biased cable news “reporters” keep framing questions with an “us versus them,” “I know the answer before I ask it” attitude. It’s like crediting a home run to candidates before they have even stepped up to home plate. How does that make them better or keep them accountable?
MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann, who fluctuates between Jon Stewart fake journalism and Tim Russertism based on his mood, is just as guilty of brownnosing with certain candidates and fostering a toxic perception that journalism divides along political party lines.
OLBERMANN lollipop question to Obama: Let me switch over to Iraq and people's reaction to you and Iraq and Iraq as a subject in general. Your predictions about the surge, your language about the surge, seem to have turned out to be just about 100 percent on the spot. Simple facts: whatever is done to lessen violence against American troops and others in portions of that country, the Iraqis are still not paying for this war fully, either with money or personnel. And Mr. Bush has just been advised not to bring any more of our troops home this year…If you are right, why have the Republicans and the conservative media been so effective in suggesting that you were wrong and somehow you need to atone for that?
Journalists’ mission is not to be chummy or accommodating, but Olbermann and Hannity are among the best at it. How do they even introduce their careers at dinner parties? They’re too newsy to be entertainers, yet not objective enough to be journalists.
Helpful political journalism does not need to wow with intellectualism or amaze with theatrics. Journalists should be persistent and cut through the memorized stump speeches, but they don’t need to quote Socrates or sprinkle in SAT words to do it.
Rob Caldwell of WCSH-TV in Portland, Maine, would not let McCain escape with clichés during the candidate's reasoning for selecting Sarah Palin as his running mate.
NBC’s Matt Lauer proved he is not only good at preparing turkeys and petting kittens when he pushed Obama to be honest about how he is going to pay for improvements to health care, education and energy with an economy spiraling toward Great Depression severity.
To sum it up, valuable journalism that you can take to the voting booth involves firm, common-sense questions. Are they sexy? No. Will they get your face festooned on a Times Square billboard? Unlikely. But they will send the right candidate to the Oval Office.
With an economy on the brink of a dark recession, with Social Security and Medicare costs guaranteed to skyrocket as the boomers retire (leaving today’s twentysomethings to pick up the tab), with a damaged reputation on the world stage, why is it that our first reflex when digesting political TV news is to grab the popcorn and not the thinking cap?
As a former newspaper reporter, I will admit that I am harder on my journalistic brethren. But we all should be. They shape our opinions of the candidates. What they talk about on camera is what we talk about around the water cooler. And it seems they are more interested in provoking fights, massaging their egos and selling their brands rather then informing voters. TV journalists need to press the candidates on the tough issues, such as how they will afford what they effortlessly promise, not wave poms-poms or hoist high-fives.
When Fox News personality Sean Hannity sat down with John McCain and Sarah Palin recently, the anchor acted like he was shooting a campaign ad:
HANNITY: But think of how this war has been politicized through the prism of your experience in Vietnam. The leader in the Senate, Harry Reid, said, “the surge has failed, the war is lost.” Dick Durbin compared our troops to Nazis. John Kerry said our troops are invading Iraqis’ homes in the dark of night, you know, terrorizing women and children. These are verbatim quotes. And Barack Obama said they are “air-raiding villages and killing civilians.” My question is, you know, what does that — that’s poisonous rhetoric, but it goes on, what does it mean? How do you stop that if you’re elected president and vice president?
The war has been politicized, Mr. Hannity, because you and other biased cable news “reporters” keep framing questions with an “us versus them,” “I know the answer before I ask it” attitude. It’s like crediting a home run to candidates before they have even stepped up to home plate. How does that make them better or keep them accountable?
MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann, who fluctuates between Jon Stewart fake journalism and Tim Russertism based on his mood, is just as guilty of brownnosing with certain candidates and fostering a toxic perception that journalism divides along political party lines.
OLBERMANN lollipop question to Obama: Let me switch over to Iraq and people's reaction to you and Iraq and Iraq as a subject in general. Your predictions about the surge, your language about the surge, seem to have turned out to be just about 100 percent on the spot. Simple facts: whatever is done to lessen violence against American troops and others in portions of that country, the Iraqis are still not paying for this war fully, either with money or personnel. And Mr. Bush has just been advised not to bring any more of our troops home this year…If you are right, why have the Republicans and the conservative media been so effective in suggesting that you were wrong and somehow you need to atone for that?Journalists’ mission is not to be chummy or accommodating, but Olbermann and Hannity are among the best at it. How do they even introduce their careers at dinner parties? They’re too newsy to be entertainers, yet not objective enough to be journalists.
Helpful political journalism does not need to wow with intellectualism or amaze with theatrics. Journalists should be persistent and cut through the memorized stump speeches, but they don’t need to quote Socrates or sprinkle in SAT words to do it.
Rob Caldwell of WCSH-TV in Portland, Maine, would not let McCain escape with clichés during the candidate's reasoning for selecting Sarah Palin as his running mate.
NBC’s Matt Lauer proved he is not only good at preparing turkeys and petting kittens when he pushed Obama to be honest about how he is going to pay for improvements to health care, education and energy with an economy spiraling toward Great Depression severity.
To sum it up, valuable journalism that you can take to the voting booth involves firm, common-sense questions. Are they sexy? No. Will they get your face festooned on a Times Square billboard? Unlikely. But they will send the right candidate to the Oval Office.
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