"Gandalf Grey" <valinor20@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote in message
news:47a9fc1d$0$14078$9a6e19ea@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> The press seethes over Bill Clinton, shrugs at George Bush
>
> By Eric Boehlert
>
> Created Feb 5 2008 - 2:34pm
>
>
> Two presidents made headlines last week: The current one, for delivering
> [1]
> his final State of the Union Address, and the former one, for making
> miscues
> on the campaign trail.
>
> Which was deemed more newsworthy? For the press, the choice was obvious:
> Bill Clinton garnered an extraordinary amount of press attention -- more
> so,
> in fact, than any of the Republican candidates running for president,
> according to one news survey [2].
>
> That simply highlights the media's over-the-top [3] obsession with
> Clinton.
> What really struck me was the difference in tone from the recent Bush
and
> Clinton coverage. The sitting president was delivering his final State
of
> the Union, capping off his failed presidency, which has provoked [4]
deep
> despair among most Americans [5] about the future of the country. And
for
> that, Bush has been tagged the most consistently unpopular president in
> modern history.
>
> Yet the reaction from the press and pundits last week when marking the
> final
> chapter of the Bush decline was mostly to shrug their shoulders and look
> away. The media has, throughout Bush's gruesome political collapse,
shown
> very little interest in taking part in the usual Beltway pastime of
> dissecting the miscues, assigning blame, and yes, doing a little bit of
> grave-dancing.
>
> When it comes to Bush's two-year decline, the press has remained oddly
> detached. By contrast, the recent coverage of Clinton has been dripping
> with
> emotion; with disdain and contempt that bordered on vitriol.
>
> Bush literally drives the country into a ditch while erecting new
> standards
> for secrecy and incompetence (Iraq [6], Abu Ghraib [7], Walter Reed
> Hospital
> [8], Hurricane Katrina [9], staggering national debt [10], etc.), and
the
> press yawns. But Clinton makes ill-advised and insensitive [11]
unscripted
> comments on the campaign trail, and that's what really gets the Beltway
> press upset -- enrages them, really, as they scramble to find just the
> right
> adjective to describe Clinton's allegedly deceitful, abhorrent behavior.
>
> Am I the only one struck by the disconnect here?
>
> I'm not suggesting Clinton is immune from criticism or that he didn't
> screw
> up. His comments obviously upset many people who in the past sup****ted
him
> politically. But it sure would have been nice, over the previous eight
> years, if the same press corps that today has trouble controlling its
> roiling contempt for Clinton would just once or twice flash the same
> passion
> and anger towards Bush for what he's done in the White House and what
he's
> done to this country.
>
> Not only won't the press get angry about Bush, the press won't even
dwell
> on
> the topic. The recent State of the Union would have been the perfect
> op****tunity for journalists to put Bush's sad legacy in context, to
> do***ent
> the extraordinary political and public opinion failure that his
presidency
> has become, and the deep, lasting damage he has done to the Republican
> Party, which is viewed dismally by the public and now faces an epidemic
> [12]
> of congressional retirements. The traditional press, however, has little
> interest in focusing on the unpleasantness.
>
> In a sense, we're witnessing the logical conclusion to the media's
lapdog
> [13] approach to covering Bush. When the president was flying high
during
> the glory years of 2002-2005, the press eagerly played the role of
> star-maker, while walking away from its traditional oversight duties.
But
> when the Bush presidency collapsed and the American people abandoned the
> administration, the press quietly turned away, not wanting to dwell on
the
> unpleasantness.
>
> One of the likely reasons for that is that the press understands its
own,
> almost monumental failure [14] in covering this presidency, especially
> during the defining moment -- the run-up to the war in Iraq. And
remember,
> this is the same political press corps that had a gut feeling about Bush
> in
> 2000; just liked the guy. They vouched for him. Said he was a real,
> authentic politician who would restore bipartisan****p to Wa****ngton
again.
>
> So, today, journalists aren't interested in dissecting what went wrong
> with
> Bush because then journalists would have to dissect what they did wrong,
> and
> that's not where they want the spotlight to be. I think there's a
> collective
> embarrassment -- a collective shame -- within the industry for being de
> facto sponsors of the Bush fiasco in the first place. After all, the
> Beltway
> press prides itself on being able to spot a winner.
>
> And that's why the press tried for so long to buck Bush up during his
> slide.
> Last year, right about the time that Gallup announced Bush's approval
> ratings had dropped to a new low of just 29 percent, which ranked "in
the
> bottom 3% of more than 1,300 Gallup presidential approval ratings since
> 1938" (ouch!), The Wa****ngton Post published [15] a long, Page One mash
> note
> about how, despite his travails, Bush remained steadfast in his beliefs:
>
> At the nadir of his presidency, George W. Bush is looking for answers.
> One
> at a time or in small groups, he summons leading authors, historians,
> philosophers and theologians to the White House to join him in the
search.
>
> Over sodas and sparkling water, he asks his questions: What is the
nature
> of good and evil in the post-Sept. 11 world? What lessons does history
> have
> for a president facing the turmoil I'm facing? How will history judge
what
> we've done? Why does the rest of the world seem to hate America? Or is
it
> just me they hate?
>
> These are the questions of a president who has endured the most drastic
> political collapse in a generation. Not generally known for intellectual
> curiosity, Bush is seeking out those who are, engaging in a
philosophical
> exploration of the currents of history that have swept up his
> administration. For all the setbacks, he remains unflinching, rarely
> expressing doubt in his direction, yet trying to understand how he got
off
> course.
>
> Good grief.
>
> For most of the last year, round after round of dismal poll ratings [16]
> for
> Bush have been met with a sort of quiet resign among the press corps.
> Context has been sorely lacking.
>
> For instance, in the last half-century, the only other second-term
> collapse
> that compares to Bush's belongs to Richard Nixon, whose fall was fueled
by
> the revelation that a criminal enterprise had been operating from inside
> the
> Oval Office. Yet Bush's second-term performance is rarely mentioned in
the
> same breath as Nixon's. And there's virtually no mention of the fact
that
> Bush is currently running between 20 and 30 points behind where his
> predecessor was during his final year in office.
>
> In fact, some are still passing along the tired White House spin that
> Bush's
> public approval rebound is just around the corner. (All the way up to 45
> percent!) From [17] U.S. News & World Re****t, January 10:
>
> George W. Bush and some congressional backers see happy days for the
prez
> this year. His fans have dubbed it his "legacy year," when they hope to
> lock
> in his achievements on the domestic front.
>
> Good luck with that.
>
> Compare that to the eager newsroom crowds who used to gather around
fresh
> polling data back in 1998 and 1999 as journalists parsed the latest
> results
> [18] in search of the slightest dip in public sup****t for Clinton that
> would
> finally confirm the media's long-held belief that the public would
> eventually turn on Clinton, especially during the Monica Lewinsky
scandal.
>
> And think back to the 2000 presidential campaign. Did a single day pass
> when
> a re****ter or pundit did not ask out loud what effect Clinton's legacy
> would
> have on the Democratic candidate for president? The laundry list of
> unknowns
> was endless: Was Clinton hogging the spotlight? Was he doing enough for
> Vice
> President Al Gore's campaign? Was Hillary Clinton's Senate campaign
> siphoning off Gore's campaign donations? Would voters punish Gore for
> impeachment?
>
> By contrast, in 2008, Bush does not exist as a political story. Instead,
> he's been politely assigned the role of a non-entity for the upcoming
> White
> House race. But why?
>
> Despite an avalanche of campaign coverage produced, so far I have not
seen
> any media speculation about how the GOP is going to handle the opening
> night
> of its nominating convention this summer when the party will almost
> certainly have to feature Bush and allow him to give a prime-time speech
> to
> the nation. Politically, that is going to be a disaster for Republicans
as
> they try desperately, in front of a national television audience, to
turn
> the page on Bush's tenure of failure. For the somnambulant press though,
> none of that is of any interest.
>
> Two recently published Beltway essays perfectly captured the media's
> schizophrenic and patently dishonest approach to covering Bush and
> Clinton.
>
> The first was by Slate editor Jacob Weisberg, who wrote a January 28
op-ed
> [19] for The New York Times. Weisberg looked back at Bush's first State
of
> the Union address and its "compassionate conservative" theme and noted
how
> Bush "intended to marry the liberal desire for more federal money to the
> conservative demand for higher standards."
>
> Weisberg assured readers that "Mr. Bush seemed genuinely to want to be
the
> kind of president indicated by that first address."
>
> Of course, none of that came to be. The "compassionate conservative"
> routine
> turned out to be mostly empty rhetoric. Why? According to Weisberg's
> friendly interpretation, it was because Bush "was too distracted by war
> and
> foreign policy, and too bored by the processes of government to know if
> the
> people working for him were following through on his proposals."
>
> See, Bush is not duplicitous or immoral. And nothing he has done in
office
> would cause a CW scout like Weisberg to get angry or level charges about
> Bush's character. The president simply became misguided and lost
interest.
> What's the big fuss, people? That's what presidents sometimes do -- they
> fail miserably and cause all sorts of pain and discomfort for millions
of
> citizens. That's no reason to get excited.
>
> But go out on the campaign trail these days as a Democratic ex-president
> and
> be charged with taking an opponent's comments out of context? Now that's
> reason for re****ters to raise holy hell. That's why the pundits could
> barely
> keep their laptops steady -- their rage at Clinton was building so
rapidly
> inside them. Clinton was guilty of "lying and cheating," of being
> "glaringly
> dishonest," and promoting an "idiotic, lowest-common-denominator
political
> discourse." And that was just from one recent wa****ngtonpost.com column
> [20].
>
> According to Newsweek [21], Clinton's campaign attacks "insult[ed]
voters'
> intelligence." Struck by that harsh rhetoric, I did a search of Nexis to
> see
> if during Bush's entire tenure Newsweek had ever claimed that any of the
> misinformation that routinely flowed from the Bush White House (WMD's,
for
> instance) had "insulted the intelligence" of Americans. I could not find
a
> single Newsweek example.
>
> The other recent essay that (inadvertently) highlighted the media's
> Bush/Clinton double standard came from John Harris at the Politico, who
> wrote [22]
>
> about how the "liberal establishment" was abandoning the Clintons. (The
> only
> actual "liberal" referenced in the long piece was Sen. Ted Kennedy, but
> who's counting?) Harris was struck by the contemptuous,
inside-the-Beltway
> vibe he was picking up about Bill Clinton:
>
> From Wa****ngton's perspective, to judge by the most common criticism
> heard
> over the years and again in recent days, the problem is not that Bill
> Clinton is Bubba but that he is Eddie Haskell -- smug, smarmy,
> self-absorbed.
>
> Bush has been on the national political scene for nearly a decade, and I
> doubt I have ever read a mainstream re****ter so flippantly pass along
> anonymous insults about Bush's character the way Harris did regarding
> Clinton. Of course, Harris did it with ease -- and nobody flinched --
> because that's how the press has treated Clinton for years, even when he
> was
> in office; no insult or personal dig was considered off limits by the
> press.
> (Blogger Atrios once dubbed [23] it the "Clinton Rules of Journalism,"
> i.e.
> anything goes.)
>
> For the media, it's simple: The suggestion that Bill Clinton has an
> oversized ego is far more upsetting and newsworthy than George Bush's
> proven
> track record of incompetence.
> _______
>
>
>
> --
> NOTICE: This post contains copyrighted material the use of which has not
> always been authorized by the copyright owner. I am making such material
> available to advance understanding of
> political, human rights, democracy, scientific, and social justice
issues.
> I
> believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of such copyrighted material as
> provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright
> Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107
>
> "A little patience and we shall see the reign of witches pass over,
their
> spells dissolve, and the people recovering their true sight, restore
their
> government to its true principles. It is true that in the meantime we
are
> suffering deeply in spirit,
> and incurring the horrors of a war and long oppressions of enormous
public
> debt. But if the game runs sometimes against us at home we must have
> patience till luck turns, and then we shall have an op****tunity of
winning
> back the principles we have lost, for this is a game where principles
are
> at
> stake."
> -Thomas Jefferson
The press 40 years ago - re****ters made about $40k a year for a network.
Today, they are overpaid tax dodging traitors who make upward to $250k a
year to start.
Remember Peter Jennings, the 4 time married adulterewr who hammered
Clinton's bj, daily?
It wasn't about the bj. It was about Clinton's taxes.
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