Category: media

Beck vs. O’Keefe

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

Glenn Beck was almost immediate in his criticism of James O’Keefe’s latest video adventure, and the media is picking up on it this week:

“The problem with this whole thing is does James O’Keefe have enough credibility to continue to do” undercover video journalism? Beck asked his listeners. That kind of journalism, he said, is “just really not something that you necessarily want to get into.

Beck, of course, is a media trailblazer himself, who rose to national prominence through his revolutionary and original radio program.  He created a similarly original television program and online magazine.

With others from the right falling all over each other with admiration for O’Keefe’s NPR sting, Beck stands out as a rare dissenting voice.

But more than that, O’Keefe’s brand of activist journalism is simply more interesting than Beck’s platitudes from behind a microphone.  For months, critics have been crowing about Beck’s flagging ratings.  O’Keefe is a threat to Beck from a pure business standpoint.

After all, if you were Fox News, what would be more likely to get ratings – Glenn Beck’s chalkboard with notes about the GDP or James O’Keefe sending someone with a hidden camera into a government office?

Getting O’Keefed is more than just a camera trick

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

James O’Keefe will be lauded on the right this week for forcing the resignation of NPR’s CEO; you’ll hear talk about how creative and bold he is to go undercover with hidden cameras to expose left-wing organizations in their own words.  It actually isn’t that simple, though:  O’Keefe does more than simple hide cameras and wait for people to say dumb things.  This week, for example, O’Keefe released his initial video on Tuesday – the one where a former NPR staffer demonstrates outright hostility toward tea partiers and the conservative movement.  It appeared to be a basic case of organizational media bias, though it could have been explained away as a donor relations executive saying whatever he could to raise a donation.

Then came the second video yesterday – where another NPR official discusses ways to “hide” donations from a fictional Muslim Brotherhood front group.  This is much more damning; and combined with the other one creates the perception of a trend.  At the very least, it kept a one-day story going for multiple days.

Erstwhile CEO Vivian Schiller didn’t make it to the second video; in the 48 hours between the releases she resigned.  Jon Stewart couldn’t believe NPR didn’t fight back.  But maybe NPR had been paying attention to O’Keefe’s history of takedowns.

ACORN didn’t collapse under the weight of a single video; O’Keefe released several over time to keep the issue alive through several news cycles.  The same happened with his expose of the teachers unions in New Jersey and other work his organization, Project Veritas, have undertaken.

Rather than try to bash O’Keefe’s reporting, NPR allies have been quick to decry the comments heard on the tapes.  That’s significant – not only do they recognize what what was said was bad, they know that there may be even more to come.

Honoring the code

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

My daily drive into Your Nation’s Capital is usually spent listening to sports talk radio, splitting time between the national (ESPN’s Mike and Mike) and the local (106.7’s Sports Junkies).  Today, both dealt with the first bracket-buster of March Madness: the news that Brigham Young University’s Brandon Davies was kicked off the team for having consensual premarital sex.

If you talk to most Division I coaches, their second best player shtupping some coed when the team is on the verge of a national title run might would likely be a fine violation.  In the realm of athletic transgressions, it certainly beats having some booster offer a nuclear surfboard or whatever it is that John Calipari’s Kentucky Wildcats will get accused of the year after he leaves.  But Davies chose BYU and its strict rules – and when he misstepped, he admitted it and suffered the consequences.

In the interest of giving credit where due, the tone of the coverage has been surprisingly exceptional thus far.  Mike Greenberg in particular lauded BYU for sticking to their guns.  Even commentary that falls short of glowing praise for BYU at least understand that, though the merits of BYU’s code may be debatable, the code itself irrelevant to the discussion.  Davies opted to hold himself to that standard when he chose BYU (and even more so when he honorably chose to fess up).  In fact, BYU alums have pointed out that the honor code is far from fine print.

Davies is an important player, and dropping him from the team will impact BYU’s chances in the NCAA Tournament.  One wonders if other colleges – including religious schools with renowned athletic programs – would do the same.

Deflecting an ambush

~ Jim Eltringham ~ 1 Comment

CPAC has always been fertile ground for hidden camera hijinks – like any gathering where like-minded people get together, the attendees tend to let their guard down and speak a little more openly among what they think are their fellow travelers on the right.  So it’s now surprise that Think Progress sent someone in with a camera, looking to get right-of-center people to say some dumb things.

Jesse Watters of Fox News was ready, though.  Check out this video:

In this confrontation, Watters isn’t just a clear winner.  He puts on a clinic on how to handle an unexpected question from a grassroots videographer:

1.  “A smile usually helps.”

Remember Bob Etheridge?  College-aged Republican activists hijacked the North Carolina Congressman with a video ambush last summer, only to have the Congressman rough them up and bark at them a little.  Etheridge couldn’t have looked more like a curmudgeon if he had used the term “dagnabbit” and told the neighborhood kids he was keeping their baseball.

Watters is the opposite, and clearly knows how to be on camera.  When the ambusher, Ben Armbruster, first accosts him, he demands, “Who are you?”  As soon as Watters understands the situation, he warms up, enthusiastically asking, “Is this an ambush?” and playing along to a point.  He jokes with Armbruster but is not openly hostile, understanding how that would look to the audience on the other side of the camera.

2.  Watters gives his answer – regardless of the question.

Even though CPAC is a political event, Watters is not a political figure.  He is a journalist, and as such clearly does not want to get into a discussion about media bias.  That’s why his redirected conversation about the technique of investigative journalism is smart.  Criticizing Armbruster’s equipment, technique, and line of questioning, Watters maintains a conversation that would make as much sense in a journalism department classroom as it does at CPAC (and perhaps more).

3.  “You’re hands are shaking…”

Watters puts down Armbruster frequently, but never the style of interview.  He tells Armbruster he isn’t conducting the interview correctly (“The question is very important.  I just don’t think you’re bringing it with that question”), insults his camera phone, points out that Armbruster looks nervous – but Watters smartly never once complains about having a camera shoved in his face.  In doing so, Watters avoids the hypocrisy of being an ambush journalists decrying ambush journalism – but more important, he avoids a David vs. Goliath media moment pitting Fox News against bloggers.

Because Watters has been on the other side of these questions, he knows exactly what it looks like – and he didn’t succumb to the line of “gotcha” questioning.  If Armbruster’s frustration wasn’t evident enough at the end of the video, his contrived and weak headline – “Jesse Waters Won’t Deny Fox ‘Makes Stuff Up’” – drives it home.   Maybe he should have tried to ambush someone who doesn’t ambush people for a living.

Boehner rejects technology. Good for him.

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

In a minor story this week, Speaker John Boehner rejected CSPAN’s request to install robotic cameras in the House of Representatives.  In doing so, Boehner follows in the footsteps of previous Speakers – and makes the right decision.

CSPAN wanted the cameras to spice up their coverage of the US House – capturing wide shots of the arena and getting reaction shots from Members of Congress who aren’t speaking at a certain time.

If you want an example of what such a broadcast might look like, the Super Bowl kicks off in a few hours.  If Aaron Rodgers or Ben Roethlisberger throws an interception, Fox’s cameras will capture them on the sideline, shaking their heads or talking to coaches.  If a kicker – whatever their names are – misses a field goal, you’ll see the typical lingering shot of them staring at the goalposts and shaking their heads, followed (or preceded) by a shot of the coach looking at the kick, preparing to raise his arms before dejectedly slumping his shoulders.  When a defensive player blows a coverage, you’ll see his coach glaring at him from the sideline.

Fox isn’t just broadcasting the game, they are telling a story.  It’s one reason why sports is interesting to watch, and CSPAN wants to do the same.

But if CSPAN is telling a story about Congressional debate, who gets to write it?  And why stop at jumping around during floor debates?  Why not give individual Representative theme music and bring in Jim Ross and Jerry “The King” Lawler to add commentary, WWE style?

The extra cameras that Boehner rejected would have allowed CSPAN to create their own filter of the coverage, instead of simply showing the debate.  Yes, it’s dull, but CSPAN isn’t supposed to be engaging all the time – it’s supposed to be a stream of raw information.

Anderson Cooper’s unsurprising scuffle

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

If you have followed the career of Anderson Cooper, he and his crew getting roughed up by Egyptian protesters is not surprising.

Back in the early-to-mid-1990s, Cooper was a star reporter for Channel One News, a 15-minute news program that gave advertisers a way into the classroom in exchange for free TVs.  (It sounds nefarious, but it wasn’t such a bad trade-off.)  Much of the show dealt with “serious teen issues” in the way one would expect such a show to deal with them – in a way that virtually guaranteed no credibility with the target audience.

The silver lining was Cooper’s reporting, which often put him in harm’s way:

Cooper dodged bullets to bring places like the Balkan peninsula into the classroom in a way history and social studies teachers could not, and he did this for a 15-minute show for a target audience that was probably ignoring the show to do the math homework I was supposed to do the night before.  (I mean they…  the math homework they were supposed to… aw, forget it.)

So it’s not all that shocking that, when the American news media finally got in the middle of the scrum in Egypt, it would be Cooper jumping in.

 

Olbermann, Maddow, and the new faces of MSNBC

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

Keith Olbermann’s final “good night, and good luck” on Friday makes for an interesting media interest story.

Olbermann was a key voice of the left during the 2006 and 2008 election cycles, so he surely could have been fired for being “too liberal.”  With the Comcast/NBC merger complete, several corners of the internet were abuzz with gossip that the new parent company had something to do with the iconoclastic Olbermann being showed the door.  Or, he could just be a jerk who has a history of being fired for not getting along with coworkers.  That’s probably the most likely answer.

For years, Keith Olbermann was the face of the new MSNBC’s left-oriented opinion programming; his aggressive style countered the conservative and populist voices of Fox News with something a bit punchier than CNN’s vanilla lineup.

MSNBC hasn’t shied away from that.  They’re keeping the “Lean Forward” campaign, and their evening lineup still boasts Ed Schultz, Lawrence O’Donnell, and Rachel Maddow.  Maddow will be the lineup’s new cleanup hitter – and for MSNBC, that seems to be the best motivation for the move.

This is unscientific, but do a Google image search for Olbermann and another for Maddow.  Sure, as a liberal lightning rod, there are plenty of pictures of Olbermann designed to make him look dumb.  But as you scroll through, a pattern becomes obvious: few of his pictures, even official ones, include him smiling.  Much like the “special comments” he delivered on his program, Olbermann frequently looks stern, as if the next words out of his mouth might just be the most important in the history of the universe. (See picture above.)

Maddow, on the other hand, is smiling in most of her search results.  When delivering opinions on her show, Maddow is smug and smart-alecky, but clearly enjoys poking fun at her targets.  It’s not necessarily good-natured humor, but it’s humor.  Much like the gruff Bill O’Reilly, one can picture a calmer, non-political side of Maddow, as if she understands that the topics on her show are important, but not likely to mean the end of the world any time soon.

Public relations 101 for anyone who wants to be on TV is to smile… and keep smiling… and smile some more.  It helps the speaker relate to the viewer.  Even when discussing difficult or contentious topics, smiles go further than furrowed brows.  Maddow seems to know this, and thus is a more effective host – and, by extension, messenger of liberal ideas.

That means that the real winners in Olbermann’s dismissal are the far left activists for whom the erstwhile Countdown host was a beacon in the night of the Bush administration.  While he created a place for overt leftist thought on cable news outside the guise of objectivity, Maddow is now the better caretaker of that tradition.

Whatever the real motivations were, the result of the decision is that Maddow, and not Olbermann, is the signature voice of MSNBC as they move (or lean) forward.  That’s pretty good news for MSNBC, but it’s even better news for left-leaning activists.

Be vewy quiet; the FCC is hunting wabbit ears

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

Over the weekend, Outside the Beltway had an excellent critique of a New York Times op-ed from Helen Rubenstein, who was suddenly upset that she couldn’t siphon internet from her neighbors.  Rubenstein is a Brooklyn college professor (thankfully of writing and not ethics), and apparently feels that she should get a service for free that other suckers pay hundreds each year for; OTB rightly calls her out for her self-centered attitude.

Buried in her complaint letter to no one in particular, though, is a hint that his is more than simply an op-ed from a spoiled academic who demands everything for free:

In an ideal world, the Internet would be universally available to anyone able to receive it. Promisingly, the Federal Communications Commission in September announced that it would open up unused analog airwaves for high-speed public wireless use, which could lead to gratis hotspots spreading across cities and through many rural areas.

In 2011, there may be similar announcements to the one Rubenstein references.  The Obama FCC makes no secret that they like the idea of pushing broadcasters off the airwaves to make sure there’s more room for the internet.  Their vision of the future would keep traditional TV stations on cable, but would limit their ability to broadcast over the air.  (If you don’t use rabbit ears, you might not notice; if you do use rabbit ears, it would be time to call Comcast.)  Wireless internet providers and cable companies would win; traditional over-the-air broadcasters would lose.

The sales pitch to the consumers will likely be similar in tone to Rubenstein’s op-ed: Wouldn’t you love for the internet to be everywhere, like TV is now?

Notably, the FCC’s goal of replacing over-the-air TV signals with internet signals isn’t due to a lack of available bandwidth, but because the segments used by television is the prime segment of the broadcast spectrum (or, as a former FCC official once described it to me, the broadcasting equivalent of “beachfront property”).

This is a Washington, D.C. policy battle where a five-member panel will determine winners and losers.  Voters can expect both sides trying to drag them in – and whether or not she was recruited by the proponents of re-allocation to pen her op-ed last week, Professor Rubenstein has kicked off the fun.

(Disclosure: I previously worked at a public affairs firm that represented the National Association of Broadcasters – who, as you might expect, were and are very concerned about this issue.  I don’t work for that firm anymore and NAB is not a current client. Sure, I sympathize with them… but they haven’t paid me to do so.)

While you were sleeping…

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

There hasn’t been any political news in about a week, since most of the pundits on the left and right have been shamelessly and wrongly hammering each other over an atrocity in Arizona that had nothing to do with politics.

Meanwhile, there are some actual political issues going on.  Did you know the Obama Administration is set to authorize the Commerce Department to regulate an online identification system?  It’s not the National ID Card that has been proposed in the past – the current plan sounds like an opt-in system, like an enhanced version of Facebook Connect or Twitter’s @Anywhere.  Anonymous blog posting and other fun parts of the internet would theoretically remain unchanged.

Not to sound conspiratorial, but things like this almost never wind up being implemented in the same way they were drawn up.  Scrutiny and review would be absolutely necessary.

So, if you’re done with the mindless drivel and demagoguery as politicians climb all over themselves to find a way to make last Saturday’s shooting all about them, there’s work to be done.

 

Sarah Palin ought to shut up for a while

~ Jim Eltringham ~ Leave a comment

There’s no good defense to the charge leveled by many on the left (and, unfortunately, the media) over the past few days that the shooting of Congresswoman Giffords was the result of Sarah Palin’s PAC website.  Similar to “Senator, when did you stop beating your wife?”, it’s a Kobayashi Maru question – there’s simply no way to answer without appearing defensive.

Sometimes, ridiculous charges speak for themselves.  The sick, twisted people who look at what happened in Arizona and see something that could only come from politics speak for themselves too.  Why sink to their level?

Unfortunately, some on the right have done just that, answering the shrill accusations of Keith Olbermann by pointing out that the alleged shooter Jared Loughner loved the Communist Manifesto.  No matter who starts a mudslinging fight, both parties get their hands dirty.

Pundit League blogger Brian Lehman has had the best response so far: indignation.  The charges that excited participation in the political process created an environment of violence only serves as a distraction – and thus cheapens the gravity of the atrocity.  Trying to mount a defense elevates the nonsense.