"Strategy" and policy. Jay Rosen is as fed up with campaign-strategy coverage in the Times as I am. His post is a good read. Rosen's explanation for the tendency of campaign reporting to devolve into stragedy mode centers on what he calls (in a nice turn of phrase) "the seductions of the form," the seductive thing being that

journalists doing strategy stories get to be more evaluative, more like critics at a performance. They can bring in more knowledge on their own authority, and show how well they understand the game. They are "allowed" more room by their own codes.

I think this is an apt assessment of the sociology of the phenomenon. What it doesn't speak to, though, is what use the news organization itself makes of the strategy-coverage form: and this is where, in the case of the Times, we have to do a little Kremlinology.

If you want to get a measure of the bad faith in the Times' 2004 campaign coverage to date, you can't do much better than a compare-and-contrast between today's inner-page Political Memo by David Halbfinger and Adam Nagourney ("Some Democrats Say Kerry Must Get Back on the Trail"—even the headline writers are using Kerry's ski vacation for snarky puns now) and Jim Rutenberg's A1 piece yesterday ("90-Day Media Strategy by Bush's Aides to Define Kerry"), or the Wednesday strategy article before it ("Bush's Campaign Emphasizes Role of Leader in War"). As I've been suggesting for a while, the Times political staff routinely uses the strategy-coverage form as a license to dish up what amounts to raw, dripping hunks of RNC oppo fresh, freely printing smears and outright lies that straight reporting would prudentially have to at least place in context, if not actively critique. So is there a parallel when, as today, the strategy piece comes to us from the Democratic side? Are we going to get a round of unfiltered DNC oppo? Far from it.

Democrats were wondering if even Mr. Kerry had underestimated the ferocity of the White House attack. In particular, they expressed concern about the potency of the Republicans' use of his Senate voting record to lampoon him as vacillating and indecisive ...

"He has to come out forcefully and defend his record, because clearly the Republicans are trying to label him as a flip-flopper," said Gordon Fischer, the Democratic chairman in Iowa. ...

Senator John B. Breaux, Democrat of Louisiana, added: "He clearly is going to have to deal with that. But more important, he is going to have to talk about his positions ... When you get into Washington-speak, it's a dangerous business. You've got to keep it simple."

Democrats conceded that the past two weeks have highlighted some of Mr. Kerry's vulnerabilities, like his penchant for making politically unwise statements.

"This is a very important period, because it frames the candidates and the issues of the campaign," said Art Torres, the California Democratic chairman. "And I think that some of John's offhanded comments about foreign leaders are becoming a caricature for cartoonists and others. Once people start making fun of you, you're in real trouble and it's hard to move forward."

And that's the whole article: a parade of Democratic hand-wringers. (Except, that is, for the "senior Bush aide"—hello, anonymity policy?—who gets to tell us about the "treasure chest" of Kerry votes that the White House plans to pull smears out of all year.) Not only does nobody say a word about the other side, for good or ill—every Democrat quoted expressly repeats the anti-Kerry memes that the Times has been flogging at the RNC's behest for the last several weeks.

This goes beyond the Times' insistent stereotyping of Republicans as tough attackers and Democrats as self-conflicted whiners. I think it's fair to say, at this point, that we're looking at bias, and that this bias is something like a matter of Times policy.

[As an aside: Yesterday, Jim Rutenberg told us that the Bush campaign's strategy for this phase of the campaign "was planned weeks ago." Today, Halbfinger and Nagourney assure us that the White House "has devoted six months to preparing for this moment." In a couple of weeks, at this rate, we'll learn that Karl Rove knew by the end of 2000 that Dubya'd be facing John Kerry this year. Remember the alien-amnesty initiative? Remember going to Mars? Those weren't Bush campaign missteps, not on your life, and besides they never happened. We've always been in control!]

[Aside II: Given that Adam Nagourney is the Times' designated Representative to the Democratic Establishment, and knowing how much he loves telling Dem candidates how to behave, it's obvious that most of today's article is his work. Still, you can bet that that's David's Halbfinger thrusting up jauntily from these early grafs:

As the White House greeted Mr. Kerry's claim on the Democratic nomination with an avalanche of advertisements and attacks, the challenger seemed at least a little spent as he faced the challenges of raising money, building a staff, responding to all of what his aides called the "incoming," and retooling his campaign to appeal to a general election audience.

Après ski, of course.

Honestly, the depths of resentment here ... Does nothing embarrass this guy?]

posted by michael  4:32:42 PM  
tell me about it []  

 

Free speech zone. A day of worldwide, coordinated antiwar protests in roughly 250 cities. More than half a million marchers in Europe, by news organization estimates. As Michelle Goldberg summarizes in Salon ("A day of grim vindication"):

Spain hosted some of the largest of the day's antiwar rallies, with the BBC reporting that 100,000 marched in Madrid and the AP estimating that 150,000 demonstrated in Barcelona. Even larger protests were held in Italy, a country that, like Spain, went to war against the will of the vast majority of its people. According to the BBC, 300,000 marched in Rome. Twenty-five thousand marched in London and 30,000 in Tokyo. There were protests in Thailand, Greece, Pakistan and Egypt. In Iraq on Friday, thousands of Shiites and Sunnis joined together to demonstrate against the occupation, a mordant tribute to the liberation touted by the Bush administration.

All this with no more urgent occasion than the first anniversary of Bush's assault on Iraq. And in New York, at least 30,000 demonstrators (in the estimate of a Republican mayor with reason to minimize turnout) marching for hours through midtown Manhattan, filling a dozen city blocks. Quick test of your editorial judgement: what position do you think such an event rates on the front page of the NY Times?

OK, that was a trick question. It doesn't rate a position on the front page. In fact, it doesn't rate a position anywhere near the front of the paper. Alan Feuer's story ("From Midtown to Madrid, Tens of Thousands Peacefully Protest War") barely makes it onto A20, the very last news page in today's A section, tucked there under the obits. A clearer signal of its attitude toward antiwar sentiment I don't think the Times could send.

Of course, there's also the fact that space needed to be cleared on A1 today for Dexter Filkin's hagiographic study of the Iraq proconsulship of Jerry Bremer ("Bremer Pushes Iraq on Difficult Path to Self-Rule")—a much more appropriate way to treat the Iraq war anniversary. (Did you know that Bremer is "a polished diplomat who does not want for self-assurance," that "many Iraqis" regard him as "earnest and hard-working, the benevolent despot they never had"—and that he's also a natty dresser whose combat-boots-with-suit look has "inspired something of a fad" in the Green Zone? Hard-hitting stuff, Dexter.) And besides, there's always a chance (O hope against hope!) that Dear Leader will see A1 with his morning coffee—and as we all know, it's a matter of high policy that the Happy Warrior is never, never to see the face of protest. Welcome to the Times front page, an official BushCoTM free speech zone.

posted by michael  1:54:03 PM  
tell me about it []