The mark where journalism changed was somewhere around 1969, after the US Presidential Election. A third-rate burglary at the Watergate Office and Apartments that was interrupted by a security guard became the moment where it all went in another direction.
The reason I pick that point, is that in the follow-on Watergate inquiry and cover-up, journalists learned, lead by Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein of the Washington Post, that the genteel relationship of Politician to Press was now over. The telling scene was a press conference of a younger Dan Rather asking a pointed question of Richard Nixon that was half rant and half question. Nixon asked if Rather was running for something. Rather replied, “No, are you running from something?” Nixon’s face turned the colour of a summer thunderstorm while the rest of the press just gasped: Nobody in the media ever talked to the President that way.
After Nixon did his last helicopter ride and the journalists were diagnosed with irritated rotator cuff injuries from patting themselves on the back so much, the media realized that asking pointed questions and always hunting for inconsistencies could bring down a President and a goodly chunk of the inner circle.
I am not a Nixon apologist either. Watching the whole Watergate thing unravel on TV, I became certain that Nixon was, to quote Hunter S. Thompson, “A cheap-jack hustler who needs his ass kicked and sprayed with Mace.” But the die had been recast for journalists.
As of that moment, anything a public figure said was instantly considered a bald-faced, self-serving lie. Every journo tried to get a statement that they could go and fact-check to death, uncovering every person or thing vaguely related to the public figure that might show the public figure was NOT telling the truth. Even if the counterpoint person was a their 4th grade teacher or the house garbage showed they used Fleecy not Bounce. Any tiny little inconsistency was a scandal, a -gate that could be worked to bring down the public figure, showering the journalist with the same heavenly light as Wood-Stein. Or so the journalist hoped.
The reaction from public figures was predictable. Only prepared statements that had been vetted by lawyers could be used. Only pre-prepared sound bites could be mouthed that always left ‘wiggle’ room could fill the airwaves.
As an example, ask a politician a question and the sound bite would be: “Currently we have information that shows today is Monday in much of the world.” A later question, of the same genre would elicit the answer of “Our estimation that today is Monday is under review at this time. We will have a media release at 2 pm regarding the day of the week issue and a contact person in my office will keep you informed of developments. Thank you.”
Plain speaking replaced with word dances: The journalist trying for a Pulitzer on every question and story. Everyone else not daring to speak like a human, for fear what they say getting twisted inside out. Consequently nothing actually gets communicated.
Harry S Truman, the US President, was known for “The Buck Stops Here”, meaning his chair was where decisions were made. Truman is vilified by history for Hiroshima and Nagasaki, but on further examination, was probably the last real holder of the office.
Eisenhower was a parade float from D-Day and WWII who was never let near the press for fear he’d open his mouth. Kennedy spoke purely in sound bites that made for snappy press clippings, while the press ignored him banging anything with an orifice.
LBJ, privately, had some great lines, (“Gerry Ford couldn’t fart and chew gum at the same time..”) but had outhouse trolls like Robert McNamara micro-managing the Viet Nam war and filling LBJ’s mouth with things LBJ couldn’t pronounce and didn’t understand.
Nixon, well, we’ve been there. Ford? LBJ was right. Carter might turn out to be one of the best since WWII, but the word dance shows in the classic line from the Playboy Interview: “I have lusted in my heart…”, meaning: “If Roslyn every finds out I got me some when I was in the Navy, she’d take a nail gun to my ballsack at a Habitat for Humanity project.”
Regan was the Warner Brothers’ Animation Department’s finest hour; classic cel animation that was almost lifelike. Chuck Jones did the drawing and Bob Clampett did the stories. Ink and Paint were still done in America then, rather than farmed out to Korea like The Simpsons.
Poppa Bush? He was a photocopy of a fax of the fifth carbon copy of Regan. The only one with Poppa who had a set was Colin Powell with the “First we cut off its’ head, then we kill it” comment from his days as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Clinton could make you feel guilty just by listening to him. Slick was a verbal trapeze artist so skilled, that he made the Flying Wallendas look like quadruple amputees dropped on a mat.
Dubya, despite his inability to say “Nuclear” (It’s New-KLEE-err, dammit…) which I can overlook because he was schooled in Texas, is the reason the “Axis of Evil” Drinking Game was invented. He gets a line stuck in the brain case and milks it until it becomes a parody of irony, satirized.
For those who don’t know the “Axis of Evil” drinking game, you would to watch a press conference with Dubya on the tube and a bottle to Jack Daniels’ in your hand. Every time he’d say “Axis of Evil”, you down a shot. If you passed out before the conference was over, it was a great day.
As shown now, with the responses to journalists’ questions being even longer and more convoluted, we wind up learning nothing of note. It becomes easier to just watch CNN with the sound off.
See Big Flash on the Al-Jazeera feed of Downtown Baghdad and turn up the sound. See Christinane Amanpour or Wolf Blitzer? Turn down the sound. See General Tommy Franks? Sound off again. See Ari Fleischer? Wait until he frowns, then down another shot of Jack Daniels’.
At this rate, you should wake up in 2005, around the May long weekend.
RoadDave 