Dangerous Liaison

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[metta 0]

The New Republic

Dangerous Liaison by Isaac Chotiner

The pro-Obama case against MSNBC's pro-Obama political coverage.

Post Date Tuesday, May 27, 2008

Two weeks ago, on the night of Barack Obama's big win and narrow loss in the North Carolina and Indiana primaries, respectively, I turned my television set to MSNBC, as I normally do on election nights. It was early in the evening, and Chris Matthews and Keith Olbermann were discussing the first exit polls that were trickling in. Considering that the exit polls in these contests have been--to say the least--a bit unreliable, I assumed that they weren't going to put much stock in the numbers. Just two weeks earlier, I had watched MSNBC's coverage of the Pennsylvania primary, where an excited Matthews practically gave the state to Obama, only to acknowledge later that Clinton had easily won. Surely, Matthews and company were not going to make the same mistake again.They didn't--but only because the exit polls, predicting a good night for Obama, happened to be right; the coverage itself was exactly the same. And this was only the latest example of the network's undeniable Obama favoritism. David Shuster's

the Clintons' "pimping out" their daughter, Chelsea, was clearly boneheaded, but, as Clinton campaign spokesman Howard Wolfson pointed out, it caused such a stir among Clintonites because it highlighted the rest of the network's anti-Hillary coverage. Now, that's not to say that their slant has been bad for business; to the contrary. And it has certainly made for some enjoyable television--Matthews is often supremely engaging (who, after all, does not enjoy watching someone exclaim that seeing Obama speak gives him a "thrill going up my leg"), and however withering he can be, Olbermann is frequently hilarious. But the network's coverage has helped create a bubble around Obama supporters that in the end is neither healthy nor desirable.

In fact, MSNBC's bias has actually hurt the Illinois senator. After all, it was the Obama cheerleading from MSNBC (among others) that helped lead to Clinton's New Hampshire comeback. And even if you think (as I do) that the Clintons have made too big of a deal out of the "sexist" and "unfair" portrayal their candidate has received in the press, if you watch enough MSNBC, you realize that their claim isn't without truth. How could you believe otherwise when Olbermann, with his trademark hauteur, told Hillary that "voluntarily or inadvertently, you are still awash in this filth [of the campaign]," or when Matthews took such self-evident glee in trouncing Clinton in between the Iowa caucus and New Hampshire primary? Similarly now, by mocking Clinton's decision to stay in the race, Olbermann has only bolstered her argument that "the boys" are trying to push her out. And finally, on a number of primary nights, but most notably in Pennsylvania and Ohio/Texas, MSNBC has become so excited by early exit polls that it has raised expectations that Obama ultimately could not live up to.

Now, the question of whether the network's coverage is healthy for Obama supporters is a little more subjective. If you are someone who gets his international and "hard" news elsewhere, MSNBC is particularly appealing. I increasingly started watching the channel last year because of its political focus, and for the novelty of seeing outspoken liberals on television. How often does one hear a news anchor rant against the corruption of Bush's Washington, after all? As the campaign progressed, however, it became clear that neither Matthews nor Olbermann could stand Hillary Clinton. This, I must admit, I found appealing, too--especially because I agreed with the hosts that some of the Clinton campaign's tactics have been either ridiculous or dirty or both.

Still, a downside quickly surfaced. Shuster's "pimping" remark and Matthews's crude (even if somewhat accurate) comment about the Monica Lewinsky scandal being a boon for Hillary's political career were notable precisely because they had nothing to do with policy or ideology. It wasn't as if Shuster and Matthews and Olbermann were siding with Obama on the issue of individual mandates. Rather, by giving "the personal" precedence over "the political," the network was using Hillary Hatred to fuel its coverage in a similar fashion to how Fox News uses Democrat Hatred to excite its viewers. But there is a distinction here that makes MSNBC's agenda almost more disquieting than Fox's. With Fox, I have to believe that most people know they're watching something that approximates GOP talking points (seeing an analyst like Paul Begala spin for Hillary on CNN doesn't really stick, either; everyone knows he's an apparatchik). With MSNBC, however, the bias is much harder to pin down. Does it stem from a personal vendetta? Sexism? Corporate diktat? Who knows? If an Obama presidency were to bomb in a way similar to George W. Bush's (unlikely, sure, but I'm speaking hypothetically here), it's difficult to imagine that MSNBC would treat Obama as reverentially as Fox still does Bush. (In fact, I could see an issue like press access leading to a break between the channel and President Obama even if he thrives in office.) Conservatives have ably chipped away at the press's credibility these past few years, with disturbing results; now--consciously or not--with their aggressive, intra-Democrat side-taking, MSNBC is doing the same thing.

Dangerously, too, MSNBC's coverage can lead to a perverse sort of cognitive dissonance in viewers like, well, me. Throughout the primary process, I often found myself much more bullish on the Illinois Senator's chances after watching MSNBC than I had any reason to be. After Obama's Iowa victory, for instance, I remember hearing Matthews' description of a giant "wave" of Obamamania sweeping across the nation; surely, the race was over. Likewise, during the month of February, when Obama won eleven straight primaries, I recall watching the network and occasionally convincing myself that Clinton was certain to drop out before Texas and Ohio because her chances had become so diminished. The problem here is that when supposedly "straight" news anchors phrase questions in leading ways, and report one campaign's spin as if it were fact, it distorts what is actually going on in the campaign--even for those of us who make a living obsessing over and writing about politics. And when anchormen themselves shill for Obama, the distinction between his talking points and the truth grows even blurrier still. So, as much as I find MSNBC entertaining, their creation of a parallel, pro-Obama universe is the type of thing I'd expect of Fox. That's when I know it's time to change the channel.

Isaac Chotiner is a frequent contributor to The New Republic.

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i don't see any post? Edited May 28, 2008 by SHAPE OF MY HEART

[sara..... 371]

i don't see any post?

me either

[William33 110]

I merged the two threads.

[*JG* 2]

Good cause I thought I was going crazy. I didn't see anything either; but you never know on here.

[Nagishkaw 510]

That was thoughtful.

[metta 0]

I merged the two threads.

Thanks. I missed the dynamic images in the cut and paste and made the post come out empty.

[metta 0]

here's a complementary article by longtime Clinton critic..

A new low in Clinton bashing

The world is divided between people who consider Bill and Hillary Clinton monsters, and people who don't. It used to be that the monster faction was limited to Republicans and certain mainstream media fixtures like Maureen Dowd and much of the MSNBC lineup. Now, increasingly, it involves too many Obama-supporting Democrats -- and the Clinton-hate is in danger of damaging the Democratic Party.

I took the weekend off, really and truly off, because my daughter graduated from high school Saturday (yay!) and events got under way Thursday night. I did check e-mail briefly on Friday, and I learned then about Clinton's unfortunate reference to Robert F. Kennedy's assassination -- from an Obama campaign e-mail from spokesman Bill Burton. I took some time to look around at the coverage, and I followed a link to Clinton's actual interview with the Argus-Leader, and I had to say: Wow. I couldn't believe this became the weekend's hottest political issue. I couldn't believe Keith Olbermann did a special comment on it (which I really couldn't believe was also widely circulated via e-mail by the Obama campaign). I couldn't believe that only George Stephanopoulos took the time to scrutinize and question the judgment behind the Obama campaign's political use of what was at worst bad phrasing on Clinton's part.

Thanks to my long weekend, I could probably get away without addressing the controversy over Clinton's RFK remarks, which is finally dying down. But I think this is an important and disturbing issue for Democrats. Criticize Clinton's vote to authorize the Iraq war, her pandering on the gas tax holiday, her lame remarks about "hardworking Americans, white Americans," her response to Obama's "bitter" remarks, her lackluster campaign strategy coming into 2008. I've criticized all of that, and more. But to argue that she was suggesting she's staying in the race because Obama might be assassinated -- even after both Clinton, and the journalists who interviewed her, said her reference was to RFK's June campaign, not to his heartbreaking murder -- requires either a special kind of paranoia or venal political opportunism.

I understand the fears many people have about Obama's safety; given our country's tragic history, they are real and understandable. Suggesting Clinton was trying to play on such fears is different. Throughout this long campaign the Clintons have been turned into a vile caricature: amoral, power-mad narcissists who are not beyond using racism and even worries about Obama's safety to press their political cause. I've criticized both Clintons repeatedly in the pages of Salon for over 10 years, but it's really time to say: Enough.

For several months I've found myself bothered by a double standard in both the behavior and the media coverage of the Obama campaign, as supposedly representing a new kind of clean, post-partisan politics, by contrast with the dirty old win-at-any-cost Clintons. Hardball Obama campaign tactics -- David Axelrod partly blaming Clinton for Benazir Bhutto's death; the intimidation of Clinton voters by a pro-Obama union in Nevada (to be fair, some Obama supporters claimed intimidation by Clinton forces, too); the campaign's infamous South Carolina race memo (prepared before Bill Clinton made his dumb Jesse Jackson remark); the multiple "Harry and Louise" mailers distorting Clinton's healthcare proposal; not to mention ties between Obama, Axelrod and the Exelon Corp., even as Obama is touting his lobbyist-free campaign. Nothing seems to stick to Obama; he's Teflon.

This episode was worse than many but not entirely atypical: After his staff helped whip up a frenzy about Clinton's remarks, Obama himself said he accepted Clinton's statement that she had been misunderstood, and Axelrod tried to act gracious and insist that it's time to move on. But the damage had been done. Obama has run a better campaign than Clinton, there's no doubt about it, but he's had a lot of help from a fawning media. (Here's a great piece making a point I made months ago about how such coverage may ultimately hurt Obama.)

I'll be on MSNBC's "Hardball With Chris Matthews" today, debating this issue with talk show host and Obama supporter Joe Madison.

-- Joan Walsh

[Peikko 1,575]

I agree with a lot of what Joan, whoever, she is, has written here.