Each of these candidates deals with the press, they have to, and each of them do it in their own way. I’m not at all suggesting that the treatment they have received has been equitable, it has not. The Clintons have been subject to relentless smear and innuendo far outside what we in America consider fair treatment, although it would be everyday journalism in the rest of the free world. McCain, on the other hand, has been given a pretty free ride his whole life and like other press favorites including, to be fair, FDR and JFK, gets to skate along while his inconsistencies and foibles are only briefly mentioned if at all.
This isn’t fair, it isn’t reasonable, and it isn’t right, but it is reality. For Hillary to succeed, either as a candidate or as President, she will have to find a way to manage her relationship with the press in a manner that improves her coverage. I suggest that there are things she could be doing better than she is, and that while she is certainly not responsible for the behavior of the press, she is responsible for her own behavior. As examples, here are a couple of recent occurrences.
The John McCain Approach
John McCain recently had himself a problem with press coverage over being a little too, ah, cozy with lobbyists. But after a couple of days of snappish pushback only made things worse, McCain cast around for a way to make up and decided to invite his press gaggle down to his country place outside Sedona for a low-key chat-up and some home-cooked food.
The press folks were lodged in a spectacularly indulgent resort called Enchantment and bussed over to McCain’s place where they kicked back with a cold one while their good buddy John slaved over flames for an hour and a half, putting out a feed of ribs and chicken with all the trimmings.
Not all that complicated as a strategy - bring people to a beautiful place, make sure they’re comfortable and relaxed, and then fuss over them and show that you care by cooking them a meal with your own hands - but an effective one. Reporters’ impressions:
– “McCain stood over not one, but two gas grills, cooking up ribs and chicken for his guests.”
– “So how did they taste? Objectivity prohibits a good reporter from passing judgment, but let’s put it this way: everyone wants to come back.”
Not suggesting that our famously free press would ever be inhibited in their sacred duty to critically and objectively examine a presidential candidate because they are too busy licking grease and barbeque sauce off their fingers to be able to type, but if while they chose their words they are also remembering delicious aromas and full bellies they may indeed come up with softer descriptors than they otherwise would.
The Hillary Clinton Approach
Hillary Clinton, unlike McCain, has had nothing but trouble and hostility from the press for forever, and at this point even a barbeque where she cooked and stepped and fetched for them would more than likely do nothing but draw sneering comments about how she is using an apron to try and soften her shrieking harpy image. Still, if she can’t effectively woo them you would think she at least ought to be looking to avoid being blatantly offensive.
How’s that going? Not so well.
At the end of a long, long day at the end of the long, long Texas primary campaign, the Clinton entourage arrived in Austen for a major rally at the Convention Center. Instead of stashing the weary up-since-5AM press in one of the many rooms there, the Clinton campaign advance team parked them at a nearby community center –
Now, one might argue this was nothing more than a staff error, some inexperienced junior local agent who doesn’t have the sense Goddess gave a gnat, but that doesn’t really excuse a gaffe of this magnitude. At the very least, it says that Hillary Clinton has not sent out orders that the press is to be treated with simple respect, or bothered herself to set minimum acceptable specifications for selecting a press room; if she had, something like this could never have happened. At the very least, this insult is the consequence of neglectfulness on her part on a scale that boggles the imagination.
The Clintons’ dissonance with the press goes back to Arkansas days, and right from the start in DC their relationship with the national media was tense. While there is no question that in allocating fault the media gets a double helping, it also must be said that the Clintons have done much to undermine their own cause. Only a fool believes that you can win an election in the face of an antagonized press corps, and it takes a greater fool to believe that you can govern effectively without at least reasonable media neutrality. It is in Clinton’s own self-interest to find ways to either genuinely reach out to the press or callously manipulate them into greater compliance – or both. The attitude conveyed by this toilet behavior – literal toilet behavior – is not helpful to her cause.
While most of the press did not make a big deal out of the slight it does not take a great student of human behavior to suss out that when it comes time to chose an approach to a story or select adjectives and adverbs, reporters who have as an associated memory the sight of urinals will be likely to lean in one direction while those remembering the savory aroma and lip-smacking taste of roasted meats will lean another. How much common sense does it require, and why do the Clintons not possess it? I have no ready answer.
[Speculative Addendum: Another possibility, of course, is that this did not occur by accident but rather as a deliberate act. Not by the Clinton loyalists, to be sure, nobody is that dumb, but by a stealth Obama or RNC operative who has penetrated Hillary’s advance team. I’m not much on claiming these kinds of black-ops speculations, the evidence has to be pretty overwhelming, but this boondoggle is the sort of thing that would have made Dick Tuck so very, very proud.]
[Cautionary Addendum: Obama backers, no need to pile on; there is no good news here for you. As soon as the Clintons are safely buried the press will turn on Obama, and there is no end of real dirt – Rezko is just one of several Chicago living skeletons – plus lots and lots of false but eminently spinnable smears about his African and Indonesian background and relatives, his mother and father and step-father’s political leanings, and multiple intemperate quotes from Michelle and her family. Should he emerge as the Democratic nominee the VRWC
-MSM cabal will relentlessly paint him as a stealth terrorist, an American-hating son of a long line of America-haters who married an America-hater, and they will do it no matter how much press butt he kisses. Enjoy this brief moment in the sunshine, it won’t last.]
Front page
Screw the media
When Clinton becomes president, she should just say “screw the media.” Once a week, she should hold a town hall in which a “lottery” is used to determine which 50 people attend, and answer real people’s questions for a hour.
Forget about press conferences, and the daily “press gaggle” — hand out press releases, and have administration spokespeople make statement, without answering question.
I love the lottery idea
Goes all the way back to ancient Athens.
Put it on C-Span, too. Why give those assholes any revenue? Then blast the vids.
[x] Any (D) in the general. [ ] Any mullah-sucking billionaire-teabagging torture-loving pus-encrusted spawn of Cthulhu, bless his (R) heart.
Bringiton -- a home-cooked meal from Hillary would be singularly
ill-considered given what she’s trying to achieve.
I agree, though — sticking the press in a men’s room was gauche.
Delicious poetic justice, but still gauche.
And you better believe there wasn’t a message in that act, too.
I happen to like it. Hillary’s feisty. That’s a good thing.
"When Clinton becomes President"
Well, one hopes as much, given what choices are left to sort through. I would be more pleased if once in office she were to seek reform where it hurts and in a structural way; reinstitute the Fairness Doctrine so it is meaningful and statutory, fund the hell out of PBS and demand diversity, reverse media consolidation not just a little but a lot, break ownership down so the media titans have to go elsewhere to bleed and destroy.
The Clintons should have learned from his presidency and have had eight years to court and redirect the MSM; they have not been as effective as they could have been, and it is hard to interpret that as anything other than a failure to learn. Sad. It may be that the only option that will work for her is to crush the media heirarchy; in the end it may be the best option for all of us.
Should she pull this off, and I put her at no worse that 50/50 for both races, hopefully she will use her power to do what Bill did not and that is break up and suppress the unreasonable power of media conglomerates. More independent voices, please.
Bringiton, I'm right with you on this
and not just because, more and more, newspapers can’t hold a candle to what they ought to be!
We can admit that we’re killers … but we’re not going to kill today. That’s all it takes! Knowing that we’re not going to kill today! ~ Captain James T. Kirk, Stardate 3193.0
Sarah, If Hillary brought Russert some homemade chili
would he have the courage to eat it?
Agreed, home cookin’ should not be her gig. I was just working compare/contrast with what the material provided.
Notice the empty brown chair in the press-loo photo? That was where Tina Brown got shunted, she was the last to arrive and apparently none of the guys were willing to fall on the grenade. Lambert apparently has the hots for Tina but I can’t stand her, loath her actually and no, no forgiveness for the New Yorker destruction, never never never.
Bringiton, I can't say I'd eat it -- I'm particular about chili
so for all I know Little Tim is too.
On the other hand, after the “iron my shirt” catcalls and the (remember this?) “cookie bake-off” between HRC and some GOP candidate-wife (was it Liddy Dole? Can’t remember, must be getting old) during a White House campaign when Bill ran, I’d be real, real wary, if I were Hillary, of risking anything on culinary arts, skills, presentations or similar items.
We can admit that we’re killers … but we’re not going to kill today. That’s all it takes! Knowing that we’re not going to kill today! ~ Captain James T. Kirk, Stardate 3193.0
"Little" Timmeh doesn't appear to have been too particular
about his eats, but that’s probably an unfair comment so let’s pretend I didn’t say it.
Your chili is what I’d call chili con carne. Not knocking TexMex, not at all, lots of different styles of Mexican and most of them damn good. My chili is Oahacan style, with beans only; simmer the chilis and onions and everything but the beans in one pot for a couple of hours, then drop in the soaked and washed beans and perk until tender. No olive oil, shudder. Tablespoon of lard; good for the flavor, and the digestion.
I’m not particular about chili; put anything close in front of me and I’ll eat it. I’m easy, kind of a chili slut.
spoiled
…sorry but I’m not a big fan of chili. I’ve never understood food whose origin lies in the use of hot peppers to hide the taste of tainted meat.
Isn't the spice to hide tainted meat idea a canard?
I know it’s been running around for years, but I thought it was debunked. Plus, tainted’s tainted; we mammals are designed to detect that stuff no matter what (I’m picturing prey animals evolving to spice themselves here…)
See Here (“one of the great myths of history of food”), or users at Snopes, check here:
Maybe they just really, really liked the taste of spicy food back then? And why not?
[x] Any (D) in the general. [ ] Any mullah-sucking billionaire-teabagging torture-loving pus-encrusted spawn of Cthulhu, bless his (R) heart.
Spicy Is Delicious
In Chili and people, IMO.
When speaking about the presses’ relationship with Hillary Clinton, I think it’s important to draw a distinction between the press corps traveling with her and the pundits. Early on, her press corps had a very frosty relationship with her (see this Glenn Greenwald column, Greenwald).
More recently, as she’s continued to give them access, it appears to have improved. There was a video posted recently on The Left Coaster, I’ll try to find it, that showed her joking with the press corps on the plane about comments she’s gotten about her clothing. I’m sure there is still some tension, but it seems a lot more relaxed and comfortable than those early reports.
The pundits, however, are another story. Pumpkinhead and Tweety will always hate
her. There’s nothing she can do about that so long as 1) she’s a woman, 2) she’s married to Bill Clinton, and 3) she won’t have the good grace to go away like they told her to almost ten years ago. She’s a reminder of the limits of their influence and will always be unacceptable to them.
Which I think is a good thing, if she can survive their hostility, because the pundit-idiocy that has taken over in the place of actual reporting is one of the most destructive influences on politics today. Changing that is worth much more than finding the Unity
Pony
, IMO.
Paul, your idea for regular town halls, cutting out the evil punditry middlemen, is a great one. I suspect that Clinton will continue to cut out the media wherever possible. Again, I think that’s a good thing for all of us.
One last note on Clinton’s press strategy, while it’s true that she’s gotten harsher press, I don’t think that means she has a worse strategy than Obama for the GE. Obama’s press strategy seems to consist of not being Hillary Clinton. A brilliant strategy for the primaries to be sure, but somewhat less useful in a general election. It appears based on reports that Obama gives the press less access than Clinton currently does and nowhere near McCain levels. That’s going to hurt him in any GE because access is everything to the traveling press corps. While I don’t like that and think reporters shouldn’t let it affect their coverage, it is somewhat understandable in human terms, who doesn’t prefer the guy who makes their job easier.
No it t'aint...
I take a break from finishing this article on the eating of roses as food to address this matter.
First off the definition of “taint” was a good bit different then. We get one whiff of offitude and blanch and wrap the offending item up in hazmat-quality swaddlings and treat it like nuclear waste. They regarded meat (depending on type) as unfit to eat until it had aged, which of course involves the breakdown of tissues by bacterial action. Poultry was to be killed and, ideally, hung by nailing a tail feather to a suitable structure. When the bird fell to the ground (usually at least 3 days later in hot weather) it was time to pluck and cook.
Historical sources like cookbooks, you have to remember the background. These were written by, and for, a tiny class of the wealthy, usually nobility, high-ranking military (aka younger sons of nobility), upper levels of the clergy (aka even younger sons of nobility who were not cut out for military careers) and…a very small merchant class.
These were the only people who could (a) read and (b) afford this hideously expensive imported shit like peppers, lemons, sugar etc. (We are talking medieval to, oh, 1800s or so. And in great generalities so don’t give me no shit.)
But some people were just fussy. From Hanna Glasse’s The Art of Cookery Made Plain and Easy…, 1747 (first British edition, stayed in print and common use for half a century and more) we find
There are also directions for what to do to meat which has become “fly-specked” because you live at the end of the butcher’s delivery route and the meat has been exposed to insects while he was dealing with other customers or traveling, but I have not got time to look it up right now.
Mass quantities of food tend to involve spoilage. Armies dined on salt beef and salt pork, but let’s just say that when they said they were eating “salt horse” it was not in fact from an equine source.
As far as your British example...
… wouldn’t it be better to use evidence from a civlization that could actually cook? Rimshot, laughter.
I’ve also seen the argument that in the Middle Ages people stored their meat on the hoof, that is, not having freezers, they didn’t kill all the chickens at once and then wrap them in plastic.
I accept the evidence that indeed (as common sense would indicate) spices can be used to sophisticate tainted meat to make it edible, but I’m still not sure that this was the primary driver. I just don’t buy that. I think taste was the primary driver, and the rotten meat thing is an evolutionary spandrel.
[x] Any (D) in the general. [ ] Any mullah-sucking billionaire-teabagging torture-loving pus-encrusted spawn of Cthulhu, bless his (R) heart.
One person’s taint is another’s delight
Wild game, in contrast, shows a reduction of flavor intensity with aging. The strongest flavored meats, such as bear and wild boar, are almost inedible when fresh; best to let them hang until they develop a rind of green mold, three to four weeks. For pure putrescent pleasure the Icelandic custom of burying Greenland shark carcasses in the sand for several months provides an exquisite ripeness, but nothing compares to the magnificent aroma and texture of surstromming, the fermented herring of the Swedes. I am so proud of my cultural cuisine heritage.
Brave BD Blue, thanks for trying to get back on topic but once the foodies invade a thread I fear it is lost. :-)
Agreed the gaggle and the studio talking heads are not the same people, but culturally I’m not sure I agree they are so different. From Candy Crowley to Tim Russert, the only difference is that one wears a dress. Hillary would IMHO be well advised to find somewhere in the studio crowd to start making nice. CNN with Wolf Blitzer and Anderson Cooper would be safe; neither of them could hit a fly with a baseball bat. Without ever saying a word, favoring the gentler heads with interviews while “not having the time” to appear with Russert would take the wind out and keep him in line when an interview was finally granted. What these people want, need, is legitimacy and that is defined by access; they can be played, if someone wants to take the trouble to do it. With the Clintons my sense is that they have become as vested in the conflict as is the press; only the Clintons can change that dynamic, by changing their own behaviors. Toughest thing there is to do but necessary, or it will be endless war.
Obama has a lot to learn about the press and he is stiff and uncomfortable with them; smells like fear to me. Whether he improves we’ll just have to wait and see. As to strategy in the general I think both he and Clinton would try to tie McCain to Bush and campaign on “I am not them.” Worked for Carter against Ford and for Bush against Gore so why not?
Here’s another look at McCain’s BBQ presser, presented as a video diary from daughter Meghan. (I’m sure she’s a fine person but the faux-Valley Girl rising terminal inflection and delayed adolescence gigglyness grates on my nerves; others may find it charming.) Guests received a copy of the video along with a photo album as keepsakes. I rather doubt that Clinton’s flock would equally prize a similar memento of their time in the loo. She needs to do better.
So, did McCain barbecue rotten meat for the press?
Say, it’s a shame nobody asked him about his national finance chair helping to barbecue a dog, while drunk, back in college. Now that’s tainted!
[x] Any (D) in the general. [ ] Any mullah-sucking billionaire-teabagging torture-loving pus-encrusted spawn of Cthulhu, bless his (R) heart.
Cultural prejudice
Put another pup on the barbie!
(Not safe for the faint of heart - if you click on the link, don’t blame me.)
Read the details, though, at the link
We’re not talking normal foodstuffs here, even given cultural differences. Search on “the men’s car was saturated with blood and they gave conflicting stories”….
[x] Any (D) in the general. [ ] Any mullah-sucking billionaire-teabagging torture-loving pus-encrusted spawn of Cthulhu, bless his (R) heart.
Gently teasing you I was
No excuse for wanton slaughter, ever, anywhere, any time.
Oh, me too...
I just didn’t think the Korean scene was wanton. And after having tagged Huckabee very successfully with his son killing a dog, I’d very much like to tag Fred Malek, that slippery little scut, with the same thing.
[ ] Any mullah-sucking billionaire-teabagging torture-loving pus-encrusted spawn of Cthulhu, bless his (R) heart.
Hah!...
I can just see Andrea Mitchell now..”Hey Russert..is that a real dog on the grill there”?
and Nora O’Donnel would give that deep throaty chortle of hers as she spit out a mouthful of fur.
and Tweety and Olberman would breathlessly report that this was nothing compared to the live kittens served by the Clintons.
Joebasic
Recovered DU member
Cultural Prejudice, Revisited
Tsk, tsk. Korean, you say? That photo was taken at the Fuji Market in Yangshuo, China.
This one was taken at a Crawford BBQ, or so my sources tell me.