Why aren't there more Byrd dogs?

Aberdeen American News ^ | 1/15/2003 | Art Marmorstein

[ancientart]

Why aren't there more Byrd dogs?

The nattering nabobs of negativism are back - and making up for lost time. The national press corps, Clinton's lap dogs for eight years, have all of a sudden decided to be watchdogs again - and their incessant barking just won't stop.

While Clinton's irresponsible and incoherent foreign policy decisions drew scarcely a yip from the "mainstream" press, every Bush move provokes a chorus of warning howls.

There's a good deal of inconsistency here - and more than a little hypocrisy.

Did Washington reporters ever demand that Clinton "make the case" for his war on Kosovo? Did they raise questions about Clinton's ulterior motives in pursuing the war? Did they wring their hands about a lack of consensus supporting American involvement in the Balkans? On the contrary, the national press printed little but anti-Serbian propaganda, making excuse after excuse for the most unjustified use of American military force in recent years. Genocide, they told us. A hundred thousand dead! We've got to stop it!

Of course, as it turned out, there was no genocide. Maybe two thousand Albanian deaths. And many of those after we began hostilities.

But the national press made no effort to get to the truth. Clinton said it. They believed it. And that settled it.

Bush gets no such deference. We get headline "news" and front page "stories" that are really no more than anti-Bush editorials: scarcely a shred of news in them. We get slanderous speculations on Bush's motives (he's headed to Iraq because of oil or to get revenge for his daddy or to distract as from a failing economy) masquerading as news.

And, speaking of the economy, there, too, the national press watchdogs seem at last ready to wake up. Negative economic news all but disappeared during the Clinton administration. Stocks were bid up to irrationally high levels, and an eventual crash was inevitable. The boom in retail sales was produced in part by overly optimistic consumers who were taking on way too much debt. Overly optimistic corporations likewise were borrowing too much and making too many risky investments. Corporate failures were just around the corner, but the press ignored the dangers. A Democrat was in the White House, and all was right with the economic world.

But, as soon as Bush was elected, positive economic news disappeared, and all the economic stories turned to gloom and doom. The week before Christmas, we get story after story about the "off year" for retailers. The New Year's Day headlines whimper about a third straight year of stock market declines and declines in consumer confidence.

Well, as it turns out, retailers did pretty well after all during the Christmas season. And, while investors and consumers have abandoned some of their "irrational exuberance" (a very good thing, by the way), most signs suggest that we're already going through a period of economic recovery.

And, ironically enough, the major obstacle to full recovery is the negativity of the press. If the nattering nabobs continue to ignore positive economic news and overplay the negative, they may very well talk us into an unnecessary recession.

Now the solution to all this in not that the press abandon its negativism. A healthy democracy needs skeptical reporters, reporters who don't take every pronouncement from business and political leaders at face value. But what's needed, and needed badly, is a bit more consistency and balance.

Reporters need to be as skeptical at the pronouncements of Sens. Daschle, Clinton and Lieberman as they are at the statements of Bush, Rumsfeld and Cheney.

And when they start hounding Democratic Sen. Robert Byrd (former Klan member and Prince of Pork) as relentlessly as they hounded Trent Lott, then we'll know we have watchdogs we can trust again.

Art Marmorstein, Aberdeen, is a professor of history at Northern State University. Write to him at the American News, P.O. Box 4430, Aberdeen, SD

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[genefromjersey]

" nattering nabobs of negatavism " ????

Why am I reminded of ol' Whatsiname - the Nixon VP who went to jail ? He was a great fan of alliteration !

[expatpat]

That was Spiro Agnew, and those were his exact words.

[weegee]

I wonder how the anti-war protesters would react if the troops accidently bombed an embassy (say, China) under President Bush's watch.

Clinton got a free pass on his offenses. Protesters, feminist activist groups, and watchdog journalists all have no bite now. They are irrelevant.

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

Reporters need to be as skeptical at the pronouncements of Sens. Daschle, Clinton and Lieberman as they are at the statements of Bush, Rumsfeld and Cheney.

Why? Journalism is the reporting of bad news which insinuates that the things which make the country work, ain't good enough. Sens. Daschle, Clinton and Lieberman don't make the country work; it's not really important to the country that they succeed. So their weaknesses are not news. In fact, their strength is what threatens to make the country fail, so their strength is newsworthy.

Journalists consider Republican "4 yards and a cloud of dust" movement to prosperity to be BORING.

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

" nattering nabobs of negatavism " ????

Why am I reminded of ol' Whatsiname - the Nixon VP who went to jail ? He was a great fan of alliteration !

According to Pat Buchannan, Spiro Agnew got that line from a Nixon White House speech writer--namely, Pat Buchannan.

[gundog]

...namely, Pat Buchannan.

I thought it was Safire.

[Imal]

It was Deep Throat.

[gundog]

William Safire is Deep Throat?