A Tale of Two Chattering Classes

The American Press is smitten with President Obama. His coverage across a range of media is glowing. Coverage of his wife reminds one of the media's infatuation with Lady Di. Robert Samuelson has some details:

A study by the Pew Research Center's Project for Excellence in Journalism… examined 1,261 stores by The Washington Post, The New York Times, ABC, CBS and NBC, Newsweek magazine and the "News Hour" on PBS. Favorable stories (42 percent) were double the unfavorable (20 percent) , while the rest were "neutral" or "mixed." Obama's treatment contrasts sharply with coverage in the first two months of the presidencies of Bush (22 percent of stories favorable) and Clinton (27 percent).

Unlike Bush and Clinton, Obama received favorable coverage in both news columns and opinion pages. The nature of stories also changed. "Roughly twice as much of the coverage of Obama (44 percent) has concerned his personal and leadership qualities than was the case for Bush (22 percent) or Clinton (26 percent)," the report said. "Less of the coverage, meanwhile, has focused on his policy agenda."

That's a bit of a problem. As Samuelson notes, Presidents need an opposition press, at least in a real democracy. This President especially needs one, because

Obama's ambitions are so grand. He wants to expand health care subsidies, tightly control energy use and overhaul immigration. He envisions the greatest growth of government since Lyndon Johnson.

In fact Obama's policy statements have been short of detail, long on promises, and shot through with contradictions. An honest and responsible press would be bringing this to the front. Instead, you have to go to Fox News, or this blog.

Contrast all this with the British Press's treatment of Prime Minister Gordon Brown. From Simon Heffer at the London Telegraph:

We all have moments where we feel we have lost the will to live, and mine came on Monday evening when, just before retiring, I looked at the Telegraph website and saw that Gordon Brown was promising to remain Prime Minister. What, I asked myself, has any of us done to deserve that?

Brown's Labor Party, God bless 'em, are about to be baked in a pie, if polls are correct. It's only local elections, so Labor will wake up the next morning just alive enough to have to explain.

Okay, so the Telegraph is a bit to the right. But it doesn't get better on the left. A London Times piece has this title:

We MPs are fungi, in the dark, covered in manure

Wow. It's hard to top that. Or get below it. And here is the left-wing British Guardian:

The blunt reality is that, even if [Gordon Brown] set out a grand programme of reform now, his association with it would doom its prospects. Proportional representation would transform parliament, but if Mr Brown put a referendum on the ballot, it would be defeated because he backed it. A draft constitutional renewal bill was published more than 12 months ago - but what has come of it? This week Mr Brown announced a national democratic council that might (to see it in a generous light) form the basis of the sort of constitutional convention that led to Scotland's modern parliament. But it is too late. The chance for him has passed.

Ouch! Of course is PM Brown is really smart, he has the tools to govern effectively. Just oppose whatever policy you want to see enacted.

Barack Obama is in charge of a fresh new day. Gordon Brown is the butt end of a once glowing cigar. But I think the former could use a bit of the British Press approach. Sooner or later all the stuff he has been stuffing into the attic is going to come crashing down on him. Sooner would be better than later.

Comments

[Mac]

Well, KB...at least our President is accomplishing something productive. You are jealous of him because, unlike our President, you have accomplished very little in the sphere of politics. All you have managed to do these past several years is gripe and complain and gripe some more about people who do not ascribe to your world-view and that has result in accomplishing nothing that really counts. If you want to have a positive impact on the world, may I suggest actually doing something that goes beyond your comfort zone of ridicule on this blog. I bet you can't do it. Meanwhile, our President and his wife will go about their business of working for our great nation.

[Canard]

Just on a point of order: The Times is not a left-wing paper. It's center right and, in fact, like Fox News is owned by News Corp.

However, I agree with the overall thrust of your argument. The US mainstream media outlets show undue deference to politicians, and many newspapers maintain the pretense of political neutrality while pushing a political viewpoint. I don't think there's anything particularly wrong with a newspaper being partisan if they're open about it - they're private companies, after all, and consumers are free to stop buying them. (Also, not every article or columnist is slanted in the same direction - but you can generally pick up a trend).

In this respect, I think the alternating cynicism and enthusiasm of the UK press is preferable to the current "don't ask, don't tell" arrangement in the US. Apart from anything else, political writing with opinion stripped out is so mealy-mouthed! To acknowledge the other side of this, John Lloyd (an editor and longtime journalist at the FT who is a slight acquaintance of mine) in his book "What the Media are Doing to Our Politics" a few years ago said that the UK media's skepticism is having a corrosive effect on British politics. (But I don't agree with him and think that's shooting the messenger. I mean, let's look at what's happened in the last couple of weeks: MPs charging moat-cleaning expenses to the taxpayer! I think they're already pretty cynical before they read the morning paper.

Every political faction complains about media bias against them, whoever they are. But yes, Obama has been long on rhetoric and general statements, and short on the specific, and his treatment by the media has been unduly sympathetic. Personally I thought Obama was the superior candidate in the last election - but that doesn't mean I have to be all starry-eyed about him and want to read fawning commentary/analysis!

[Mac]

Canard, the President is actually accomplishing alot on behalf of this nation and the greater global community at large. You just do not realize it yet.

[Mac]

...and what that accomplishment is toward is one more crucial step in securing the New World Order that George Herbert Walker Bush so famously mentioned in his 1991 to our nation. President Obama has been successful. KB, you need to be patient because these matters take time and you have to have the long-term vision, and not the short-term political vision that comes across frequently in your blog post ramblings. KB, the President knows full well what he is doing and he has the long term vision you can not even begin to comprehend because you are not privy to much of the information he is to, and I will admit I am not privy to it either. However, because I know that he has much more valuable info. than we have, I get the sense that he and our World Leaders will be successful.

[Canard]

"the President knows full well what he is doing and he has the long term vision you can not even begin to comprehend because you are not privy to much of the information he is to, and I will admit I am not privy to it either."

Sorry - this is just a bit too quasi-religious ("Obama moves in mysterious ways that us mere mortals can never understand"?) and starstruck for my taste. President Obama is certainly preferable to President McCain but no politician gets a free pass from criticism. Bush and Cheney also had access to plenty of "information" that the voters didn't have (cough*absence of WMD*cough) but I don't think even their strongest supporters would argue the "trust them, they know better than we do" line any more.

[KB]

Thanks to Mac and Canard for the exchange. I seem to be attracting some very articulate and interesting interlocutors.

Mac: I have to agree with Canard on this one. Your have faith in Obama seems quasi-religious to me. It also seems altogether inconsistent with the spirit of republican government. Presidents are supposed to be subject to criticism. That was the point of my comparison. What I produce here is evidence combined with arguments. You are more than welcome to take issue with either. If you want to reduce my opinions to psychological analysis of character flaws, be my guest. But I would be more grateful for more reason and less mysterious faith.

Canard: You are right, of course, about the London Times. It is center-right. I write my posts on the fly, and sometimes comments get shifted to the wrong side of a distinction. On everything else, it seems, we are in agreement. How disappointing. But I certainly think you are right that the British press does a better job of shining a light under the refrigerator than the American Press does.

[Miranda]

Mac - if these things take time and we can't judge them yet, then how is it you
have judged already that the president is productive? Your belief that somehow the president's plan will just work out for the good of the country is nicely optimistic, but it is not proof.

Do you have any political accomplishments to boast of yourself, or were you just hoping to ride on Obama's coattails?