Posted on 07/27/2008 5:59:04 AM PDT by Kaslin
I came into the office the other day, wearing an "Obama 2008" cap, a "Yes We Can" button, a "Team Obama" T-shirt, carrying an "Obama for Change" tote bag filled with Obama bumper stickers, made a stop at the Obama altar in the newsroom, strewed some rose petals, chanted a few hosannas, lit a votive candle and had a sudden thought: Is the news media's love affair with Barack Obama getting out of hand?
John McCain and his campaign staffers have a sneaking suspicion it is. They put out a video with footage of journalists acting gooey about the Democratic candidate, to the strains of "Can't Take My Eyes Off of You." According to the campaign, "The media is in love with Barack Obama." McCain's people say that like it's a bad thing.
If there are some journalists who are taken with Obama, it's not surprising. One of the unfortunate things about the American press corps is that it is made up of people. Many people in other walks of life have been attracted to Obama, moved to vote for Obama, even enthralled by Obama. So you would expect some people wearing press badges to be susceptible to the same kind of reactions.
John McCain didn't always mind this tendency. In 2000, the crushes were all on him. Newsweek gushed about his courage, his candor, his "puckish charm" and his life story -- a saga "so overpowering and, at times, excruciating, that it has needed a fresh kind of human interaction to show that the hero isn't made of marble."
U.S. News and World Report said he "seems too good to be true," "a man of consistency, character and a few rough edges in a world of contradiction, lies and conformity." Cue the Four Seasons!
So, yes, reporters and commentators can sometimes be taken with a presidential candidate. Politicians who make serious runs for president usually have more than the average quota of charm and magnetism. Journalists, like McCain, are not made of marble, so they are not immune to those qualities.
Chris Matthews said of one Obama speech, "I felt this thrill going up my leg," which invited ridicule. But his mistake was an excess of honesty. Obama is by anyone's standard a powerful orator, and powerful orators are good at eliciting emotions. Being affected by a speech, however, is not the same thing as worshipping the speechgiver.
I'm probably not the only journalist in America who shed tears when Ronald Reagan spoke at Omaha Beach on the 40th anniversary of D-Day. I felt a few chills when New York Gov. Mario Cuomo delivered the keynote address at the 1984 Democratic national convention -- which didn't stop me from blasting his message.
You may assume Matthews is a shameless liberal. But the same Matthews was dazzled by the "star power" and masculinity of Republican Fred Thompson, fantasizing about the smell of "English Leather on this guy."
There are some journalists who openly favor Obama. There are also some who openly favor McCain. That's fine, because they are commentators, who are supposed to take sides.
But McCain supporters tend to discount the conservative commentators while assuming that the liberal speak for all journalists. They also assume that reporters, who are supposed to be objective, would rather help their favorite candidate win than do their jobs in a professional way.
Is that plausible? Not really. In 2004, journalists voted overwhelmingly for John Kerry over George W. Bush. Kerry got plenty of unflattering news coverage anyway. I'd bet that in 2000, most media people voted for Al Gore, who thought he got a raw deal from the press.
Obama is getting more congenial coverage, but not because he's ideologically compatible with most scribes. The real reasons are that he vanquished the formidable Hillary Clinton, his race gives him huge historical significance and he has exceptional political talents that even his critics acknowledge.
But those attributes will grow stale. Obama will make mistakes. His flaws will become more noticeable. Presidential campaigns are like baseball seasons: Today's hero is tomorrow's goat.
With three months to go, there will be plenty of chances for McCain to shine and Obama to stumble -- and the news coverage will shift accordingly. By Election Day, Obama may feel like he's been worked over by the Hells Angels.
Who knows? That newsroom altar might even start gathering dust.
It is when the press controls the main flow of information.
Things haven’t worked out that way in any past campaigns.But there is always this campaign. So long as he is talking about future developments he can say what he wants. Nobody can point to future facts in rebuttal.
It’s not a crush. It’s journalistic priapism.
Reminds me of something I always told my kinds as they were growing up: "Better to be the goat in the beginning and the hero at the end than to be the hero at the beginning and the goat at the end."
At the rate things are going, I heavily doubt the press’s love affair with the NOBAMASEIAH will ever end.
President Bush is a better speaker then Obama
This election will be remembered as the first time the MSM dropped all pretense of objectivity.
ABCBSNBCNNPRPBS’ answer is......”the Republicans have Rush and Fox......
The MSM LOVES Barry.
There is nothing subtle about the MSM desire to have the false messiah as our next president. Bias is dripping out of each and every broadcast. You would almost have to be brain dead not to see the implications of this. Not all, but a lot of Americans don’t like being told who their next president is with over three months to the election. The problem with the media is that they’re not the only ones who vote. There could very easily be a backlash against the pundits and prognosticators.
Everyone is a better speaker than BO. He is so so boring.
I would rather listen to a child screaming for the next four years than listen to him. Maybe I should try listening to rap or whatever its called.
The MSM has always been in the tank for liberal Democrats, it’s just that this time they are being blatant about it.
Did you notice that on Obama's recent tour of the Middle East ... how many network news anchors went along for the ride, providing Obama free campaign advertising? And how many went along with McCain when he went overseas?
You would almost have to be brain dead not to see the implications of this. Not all, but a lot of Americans don’t like being told who their next president is with over three months to the election. The problem with the media is that they’re not the only ones who vote. There could very easily be a backlash against the pundits and prognosticators.
Sorry, but I don't see that happening. They're not called "the sheeple" for nothing. The only way to beat Obama is to portray him exactly as he is: a typical Chicago Democrat who owes it all to the Daley political machine. Conservatives are playing right into his hands by talking about Jeremiah Wright and William Ayers, who aren't really that important. I must admit that for a time,I was distracted by the Wright kerfuffle. No Longer.
Tony Rezko.
Tony Rezko.
Tony Rezko.
We need to chant that until Election Day.
Unlike the great orators of the past, who can deliver great lines extemporaneously, Obama needs a telemprompter.
Without one, he sounds just like my old boss: elitist, contrived, condescending.
Today’s hero is tomorrow’s goat.
Reminds me of something I always told my kinds as they were growing up: “Better to be the goat in the beginning and the hero at the end than to be the hero at the beginning and the goat at the end.”
Perhaps the line refers to his father being a goat-herder. I don’t know if he was or not. All I know from what I have read is he was a typical Muslim of multiple wives and illegitimate offsprings.
Obama’s father wasn’t a goat herder. He was an arab-african Muslim opportunist who found his way to the University of Hawaii (presumably on some sort of boondoggle grant) where he found an impressionable left-leaning seventeen year-old coed all too willing to support the proletariat and sshow how worldly and open minded she was by sleeping with the resident Kenyan.
In other words, his mother was an impressionable idiot and his father was an amoral rake, who left this girl pregnant and alone.
He wasn’t a goatherder, he was just a goat.
From Wiki: "Jumping the shark is a colloquialism used by U.S. TV critics and fans to denote the point in a TV or movie series at which the characters or plot veer into a ridiculous, out-of-the-ordinary storyline. Shows that have "jumped the shark" are typically deemed to have passed their peak, since they have undergone too many changes to retain their original appeal, and after this point critical fans often sense a noticeable decline in the show's quality."
"The term is an allusion to a scene in a 1977 episode of the TV series Happy Days when the popular character Arthur "Fonzie" Fonzarelli literally jumps over a shark while water skiing. The scene was considered so preposterous that many believed it to be an attempt at reviving the declining ratings of the flagging show. Ironically, not only was Happy Days reflecting the superstardom of real-life shark-jumper Evel Knievel in the episode….."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jump_the_shark
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