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Beat the Media, Win the White House (Greenfield)
Sultan Knish blog ^ | Monday, February 09, 2015 | Daniel Greenfield

Posted on 02/10/2015 3:53:55 AM PST by Louis Foxwell

Monday, February 09, 2015

Beat the Media, Win the White House

Posted by Daniel Greenfield @ the Sultan Knish blog

One of the reasons that Romney lost is that he failed to take on the media. The ultimate lost opportunity came when CNN’s debate moderator Candy Crowley directly inserted herself into the argument between Obama and Romney to declare her favorite right and Romney wrong.

Romney had won the Republican primaries, but had failed to absorb the lesson of his most tenacious opponent. Newt Gingrich did not treat the media as a neutral moderator, but as a debate opponent, challenging its premises and agendas. And so Romney was left unprepared for Crowley’s attack.

On the road to 2016, the latest crop of candidates appears to have learned nothing from Romney’s failure. In response to the media blowing up his vaccine comment, Christie issued a sensible clarification that provided more fuel for the media narrative. And the media narrative is what most people know.

They know that Christie was behind Bridgegate even though the Democrats pushing the story provided zero evidence of it. They know that Congressman Steve Scalise spoke at a Neo-Nazi event even though that never actually happened. But what they know is the story that the media tells them. Not the facts.

The media is using Christie to churn out stories framing the GOP race as a debate over vaccines while painting Republicans as opponents of vaccination. Media attacks on Republicans come in three stages. The first stage reports on an individual Republican’s action or statement. The second stage projects that on Republicans in general as part of a “Culture of X”. The third stage asks whether Republicans will ever be able to break free of the “Culture of X” with “X” being anything from racism to hatred of science.

By now we’re in the third stage. Republican opposition to vaccination has become a media meme.

In response, conservative blogs and outlets have shown that Obama and Hillary Clinton both linked vaccines to autism and that parents who don’t vaccinate tend to be wealthy Democrats.

But the media won’t report that unless the actual candidates stop debating vaccines and start using those facts to challenge its lies and hypocrisy.

A media smear campaign can’t be met with sensible clarifications. They only strengthen the smear. Christie’s clarification that he believes in measles vaccinations has allowed the media to begin spinning him as flip-flopping on vaccines. Any further statements explaining his views will be used to continue reporting on the manufactured story of the “Republican vaccine controversy.”

The only way to break the cycle is for Republicans to stop explaining themselves and to challenge the narrative. The narrative is a lie, but no one will ever know that if the candidates don’t challenge it.

Sensible clarifications might have worked in 1955. They might have even worked in 1985. But they’re completely useless today. No doubt the fact that Obama and Hillary were vaccine skeptics will be acknowledged somewhere near the bottom of a Washington Post fact check of a Hillary commercial that blames her opponent for spreading disease and killing children. Maybe as many as five people will read it.

Today’s media has less respect for the truth than an elevator full of con artists. As bad as it is most of the time, it gets worse during national campaigns when it begins manufacturing scandals and then reporting on them and then demanding that the candidates respond to its narratives as if they were real issues.

And Republicans keep falling for it

The road to the White House is over the crushed and mangled narratives of the media. A Republican candidate who fails to take on the media will fall wrapped head to toe in lies and scandals. He will go on issuing clarifications and sensible statements while the media accuses him of murdering small children.

The media is not impartial. It is not even a forum. The national media is the political opponent of every Republican running for the White House.

It needs to be treated that way.

When CNN’s John King tried to drag Newt Gingrich through the dirt in a primary debate, Gingrich dragged the media through the dirt instead, describing it as “destructive”, “vicious” and “negative”. He turned the tables by putting the media and its motives up on the stage. He refused to treat John King as a journalist who had the right to hold him accountable. Instead he fought to hold King accountable.

And that’s something that any Republican candidate can do.

The public doesn’t like the media. Poll after poll shows that they don’t trust the media. They listen to what the media tells them because Republicans meekly play out their parts in the media’s smear campaigns the way that ISIS hostages do what they’re told even while their heads are being cut off.

When the media attacks, the issue should never be the credibility of a Republican candidate. The issue must always be the credibility of the media. It must be the credibility of the politicians being protected by the press. If Christie and Paul had based all of their replies around the fact that their positions are basically the same as those of Obama and Hillary, the media’s entire story would have collapsed.

The media would have been unable to move forward with the story without quoting the candidates, relegating the whole thing to the backwaters of the left in places like Salon and Slate. Instead the story is everywhere. And the only people who can kill it are the Republican targets of the smear campaign.

Conservative media outlets do their part, but they need Republicans to do theirs. The media buried Romney’s dog story when Republicans tepidly picked on the conservative media’s response that Obama had eaten dog. But when Republicans sit and take it, then they become the victims of the media.

The media counts on Republicans playing defense. When Republicans go on the attack, when they challenge premises and the moral authority of the press, then phony scandals suddenly fizzle out.

Republicans wouldn’t roll over and play dead for their opponents. Why do they do it for the media?

Obama understood that being able to control your message and your brand is the most important element of modern politics. He shut out the media by using a small clique of influential friendly journalists for heavy interviews while doing light chats with everyone from YouTube celebrities to late night talk show hosts. He has his own photographer who distributes photos for the press to use.

When there’s a controversy, the White House leaks an anonymous response. Its spokesmen divert and delay. They make fools of themselves to protect Obama. Their main goal is to deny the press a useable quote and they accomplish their real purpose of making the press briefings a waste of the press’ time.

If Obama distrusts and shuts out the press even though it licks his boots, why do Republicans play ball with it only to get a kick in the teeth?

The media was Obama’s messaging machine. It is becoming Hillary’s spin system. If Republicans passively submit to it, then the media will define them and 2016 will become a rerun of 2012.

2016 won’t just be a race against Hillary, but against the media. The media needs Republicans to tie the noose around their own necks by acknowledging the media’s credibility as investigators and reporters.

When Republicans provide the media with credibility, they lose.



TOPICS: Government; History; Politics; Religion
KEYWORDS: greenfield; sultanknish

Sultan Knish/Daniel Greenfield Ping List notification of new articles.

FReepmail or drop me a comment to get on or off the Sultan Knish ping list. I highly recommend an occasional look at the Sultan Knish blog. It is a rich source of materials, links and more from one of the preeminent writers of our age.

We are uniquely privileged to be able to enjoy DG from our perch at FR.
Lou

1 posted on 02/10/2015 3:53:55 AM PST by Louis Foxwell
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To: daisy mae for the usa; AdvisorB; wizardoz; free-in-nyc; Vendome; Georgia Girl 2; blaveda; ...
FYI - Just posted at KNISH Daniel refines his articles from other sites for his blog. Enoy
2 posted on 02/10/2015 3:56:03 AM PST by Louis Foxwell (This is a wake up call. Join the Sultan Knish ping list.)
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To: Louis Foxwell
Republicans wouldn’t roll over and play dead for their opponents. Why do they do it for the media?

But they DO roll over and play dead for their opponents!

The only people the Republicans fight against are the Conservatives in their own party. They roll over for absolutely everyone else.

3 posted on 02/10/2015 4:07:41 AM PST by ClearCase_guy (The dog days are over /The dog days are done/Can you hear the horses? /'Cause here they come)
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To: ClearCase_guy

The media will filter out any negative points on Dems, while pushing those of Republicans ad nauseum. Without control of part of the mass media, Republicans fight an uphill battle every time (see Obama’s re-election). The recent Republican victories were encouraging, but look how bad things had to get for them to occur; we shouldn’t be taking one step ahead for every three steps back.


4 posted on 02/10/2015 4:18:27 AM PST by kearnyirish2 (Affirmative action is economic warfare against white males (and therefore white families).)
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To: ClearCase_guy

DITTO


5 posted on 02/10/2015 4:18:40 AM PST by SMARTY ("When you blame others, you give up your power to change." Robert Anthony)
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To: kearnyirish2

Also, don’t forget the recent GOP victories were mid-term elections. A big chunk of the socialist base in this country have no interest in mid-terms. Many cannot even tell you who their senators and House rep are. They only care about the presidential race, and you can bet many millions of them will be out in force in 2016 to vote for Hillary!


6 posted on 02/10/2015 4:27:03 AM PST by Dan in Wichita
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To: Louis Foxwell

Excellent article. If Romney had immediately called Candy Crowley out on being nothing more than a Democrat activist reading off White House talking points and demanded she leave the debate stage immediately, we might have seen a different result. The usual suspects would have shrieked for days, but the public would have responded.


7 posted on 02/10/2015 4:30:53 AM PST by Mr. Jeeves (Heteropatriarchal Capitalist)
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To: Louis Foxwell

This article should be SOP for every conservative candidate. I think Walker and Cruz already get it.


8 posted on 02/10/2015 4:32:09 AM PST by bigtoona
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To: Mr. Jeeves

Now that the Brian Williams story is viral, candidates should compare others in the media to him every chance they get. Keep that meme alive.


9 posted on 02/10/2015 4:36:54 AM PST by bigtoona
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To: bigtoona

Yes. Brian is a great opportunity. I hope it is not squandered.


10 posted on 02/10/2015 4:46:47 AM PST by left that other site (You shall know the Truth, and The Truth Shall Set You Free.)
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To: Louis Foxwell

“The media is not impartial.... The national media is the political opponent of every Republican running for the White House.”

This is EXACTLY what I’ve been saying for YEARS.


11 posted on 02/10/2015 5:01:39 AM PST by Em and Brets Mum ("Lips that speak knowledge are a rare jewel." - Proverbs 20:15)
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To: Louis Foxwell
When CNN’s John King tried to drag Newt Gingrich through the dirt in a primary debate, Gingrich dragged the media through the dirt instead

I became a Newt supporter that night. Long before Jim Robinson or the rest of FR did.

The candidate (if any) who best counterpunches the MSM will get my vote. (I don't think I have to worry about it being Bush or Christie....)

12 posted on 02/10/2015 5:12:00 AM PST by Eric Pode of Croydon (I wish someone would tell me what "diddy wah diddy" means.....)
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To: Louis Foxwell

Posting duplicates again I see.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/3254936/posts


13 posted on 02/10/2015 5:24:38 AM PST by humblegunner
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To: Louis Foxwell

This latest NBC dust up gives the GOP field an opportunity.


14 posted on 02/10/2015 8:09:06 AM PST by Mike Darancette (Not deniable = Not falsifiable = Not science.)
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To: Dan in Wichita
... millions of them will be out in force in 2016 to vote for Hillary!

I doubt Hillary's running... it looks like she's padding her 'foundation'... also known as ' the Clinton retirement and vacation slush fund'...

15 posted on 02/10/2015 8:11:18 AM PST by GOPJ (If you can't get on the high horse for men burned alive and children raped, what's the horse for?)
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To: humblegunner
"Duplicates?"

We don' have to show you any steenking DUPLICATES!!



16 posted on 02/10/2015 8:38:42 AM PST by Reverend Saltine (Don't say, "the administration," or "the EPA"--say "OBAMA." Give him full credit)
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To: humblegunner
Posting duplicates again I see.

This Greenfield guy is so prolific that it is overwhelming.
How can one man write so many insightful articles so quickly? He must have a huge staff of great researchers because he is always spot on with his analysis.

17 posted on 02/10/2015 11:23:07 AM PST by oldbrowser (We have a rogue government in Washington)
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