Category Archives: Politics

July 20, 2012 · 9:35 am

Photo caption needed

By Christopher B. Daly 

When preparing to publish, post, or broadcast news, everything matters. In this recent case, someone failed to notice something:

In that photo, Romney is depicted in Bowling Green, Ohio, as speaking to a crowd of “supporters.” But what about those two signs. Does it mean anything that they appear to be in the same hand-writing? (According to NPR, the signs were made by Romney staffers and handed out to the crowd.)

The New York Times ran the photo on Thursday, crediting Evan Vucci/Associated Press. The caption read:

Mitt Romney focused Wednesday on President Obama’s remarks about running a business.

True enough. But what about those signs?

Here’s another one (same event, same hand-writing):

 

In this case, I cannot find the credit line or caption. I found it at a conservative website that supplied no information about the photo. If you know who took it (or if you took it yourself), please let me know.

 

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July 20, 2012 · 9:20 am

Inside the Meme Factory (cont.)

From TPM, here is another demonstration of the idea that “memes” don’t just happen.

 

 

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July 19, 2012 · 3:52 pm

Grammar for journalists

By Christopher B. Daly

One of the most popular “memes” of this week in politics has been the idea that Barack Obama hates business. The supposed evidence for this is something that the president said in a recent appearance in a fire station in Roanoke,Va. Here’s part of what he said:

“If you were successful, somebody along the line gave you some help. There was a great teacher somewhere in your life. Somebody helped to create this unbelievable American system that we have that allowed you to thrive. Somebody invested in roads and bridges. If you’ve got a business, you didn’t build that. Somebody else made that happen. The Internet didn’t get invented on its own. Government research created the Internet so that all the companies could make money off the Internet. The point is, that when we succeed, we succeed because of our individual initiative, but also because we do things together.”

Now, let’s examine that statement, shall we? At the risk of sounding like a university professor (oh, wait!), I feel compelled to point out that the problem in that passage arises, as so often happens, from a pronoun whose antecedent is not clear. The president was saying that before anyone can start a new business, the public has already invested tax dollars in an array of public goods that make that private enterprise possible. Public schools probably educated most of the workforce and customers. Police and fire departments provide a safe, orderly environment. Public roads bring supply trucks and customers to the new business. And so on. That is what Obama meant when he said, “If you’ve been successful, you didn’t get there on your own.” (Think, for a minute, about the chances of starting a business like Staples on a desert island, or in the tribal areas of NW Pakistan. Not gonna happen.)

The president went on to say, “Somebody invested in roads and bridges.” In other words, taxpayers funded the infrastructure.

In the very next sentence, the president said: “If you’ve got a business, you didn’t build that.”

Question is: in that last sentence, what does that refer to?

Does that refer to the noun that immediately precedes it? In that case, the president is saying: If you have a business, you didn’t build it. 

Or, does that refer to the previous concept of “roads and bridges” (in which case, grammatically speaking, the pronoun should be them not that) or the broader point of infrastructure?

Personally, I think the president’s meaning was plain: If you run a successful business today, your success is based on the earlier investment in infrastructure.

But that’s my personal conclusion. Fox News and Mitt Romney have come to a different conclusion (surprise!) and have chosen to lift one sentence out of context as “proof” that the president is hostile to business. People who use the English language in their professional lives should know how to parse it.

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July 19, 2012 · 3:29 pm

There’s journalism and then there’s advertising

By Christopher B. Daly

Trouble is, in politics, there are no rules. The very virtue that journalists try so hard to establish and protect — credibility — is just another tactical advantage to political ad-makers.

According to John Harwood in today’s Times,

More and more this election year, campaign ads include footage from television news programs, further blurring the fading lines separating modern journalism and politics. The trend bothers practitioners of journalism more than those in politics.

I’m afraid there is really no remedy.

As the veteran political Joe Klein of Time said on TV recently: there is no answer; journalists just have to get over it.

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July 16, 2012 · 1:13 pm

Not to be missed

By Christopher B. Daly

A few recent notable pieces:

—Ken Doctor at Nieman Journalism Lab summarizes some favorable trends in the business of news. Woo-hoo.

—Vanity Fair follows the money and takes a look at Mitt Romney’s decision to off-shore part of his personal finances.

—Vanity Fair scores again with a vivid remembrance of the late Marie Colvin, who was a real reporter.

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July 16, 2012 · 10:05 am

“Quote approval”: A new low in journalism?

By Christopher B. Daly 

When a journalist interviews someone (anyone), the normal ground rules that govern the interaction amount to this:

I am a journalist working on a story. I want to talk to you and use the things you say in my story, based on my judgment of what is important. I will use none, some, or all of what you say, as I choose, to further the pursuit of the truth. Whatever quotations I use will be verbatim — nothing added, nothing left out. I will also use your real name (and title, if you have one).

This is the essence of the standard known as “on the record.” Journalists prefer it because we believe that, on the whole, it holds people accountable for the things they say. In certain (ideally rare) situations, however, journalists will negotiate some lower standard. Almost always, these retreats from the “on the record” standard come at the initiative of the people we are speaking to. These other arrangements are known by a bewildering array of terms, which do not always mean the same thing in different cities or beats. The problem is that these departures usually serve the source rather than the audience.

Today comes word from the Times that political reporters for all the major news organizations have adopted a new — and, I think, pernicious — practice. They allow the people they are interviewing to get a look at their own quotes before publication and censor them. That is, the big shots around Obama and Romney routinely demand and get the power to edit themselves before their words appear in print or online.

Well, you can hardly blame them for trying. Who wouldn’t want that option?

But the journalists should never have agreed to it. These spokespeople, senior officials, and top aides get paid lots of money for their ability to think on their feet and choose their words carefully.

At the very least, having agreed to this arrangement, the journalists have a professional duty to reveal the terms. What about transparency? I, for one, could live without stories in which members of the political class get to “clean up” their quotes.

Another question: in what other fields does this practice apply? Sports reporting? Business news?

(Props to Jeremy Peters of the Times for blowing the whistle on this practice.)

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June 21, 2012 · 5:41 pm

Watergate: Lessons learned and un-learned

By Christopher B. Daly

The Boston Globe’s estimable, veteran political reporter Brian Mooney has a front-page story addressing the question: what has happened to the “Watergate reforms” in the 40 years since the Watergate break-in that began the fall of Republican President Richard Nixon.

Turns out, one of the great post-Watergate reforms — the public financing of elections — is all but dead.

Not only that, but the larger trend of political changes in recent years mark a move away from the lessons learned in Watergate.

One lesson was that power corrupts. Therefore, the power that comes from making big donations to a politician was limited by the caps placed on individual giving. The Supreme Court, however, decided to get rich people back into the business of financing elections, through the Citizens United ruling.

Another lesson was that sunlight is the best disinfectant. Therefore, Congress required all candidates for federal office to account publicly for every dollar raised and every dollar spent. Not so for the new Super-PACs.

Another lesson was that money corrupts. Therefore, Congress almost got up the courage to ban all private donations and institute a system of 100% publicly funded elections. But they blinked and created a hybrid by which politicians had to opt in or out. When the amounts available through public financing failed to keep pace with the amounts candidates could get through private fund-raising, almost every serious mainstream candidate rejected public financing and started holding fund-raisers with wealthy donors.

It appears that the past is prologue.

graphic/ Boston Globe

graphic/ Boston Globe

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June 18, 2012 · 10:43 pm

Questioning the President

By Christopher B. Daly 

Right-wing media are naturally having a field day over Neil Munro (not the Scottish writer and critic, but the person affiliated with the conservative website The Daily Caller who recently interrupted President Obama to shout questions about the president’s immigration policy). This part is really rich: What he shouted was something like, “Why do you favor foreigners over American workers?” [which is not only a loaded question, but one that sounds more like a provocation or a taunt than a question to which he seeks a real answer].

Turns out, Munro himself is a “foreigner” (born in Ireland) who is therefore enjoying a job that could be filled by an American.

The right-wing media say Bully for him! and take delight in anyone who disrespects this president (but god help anyone who disrespects the office, the flag, etc.). They say the rest of the media are a bunch of lapdogs who spend all day bowing down to the president.

I am actually of two minds about this one. My ambivalence is based on my experience. For a couple of years, I regularly took part in the state-level equivalent of the Rose Garden event. In fact, as the AP’s bureau chief, I usually asked the first question at the governor’s press conferences in Boston.

In that setting, pretty much everyone is a professional who is there to work. The chief executive has a message to convey, and reporters have questions to which they really need answers. Generally, there are ground rules that ensure that the working press can actually get its work done. Generally, those ground rules exclude grandstanding, taunting, heckling, and the rest, because those kind of activities are inimical to Q+A.

I have no objection to those activities, per se. I think our leaders need a good heckling from time to time. I just don’t see where this guy gets off breaking the ground rules and then acting as if he’s the injured party. There are reporters working at the White House who do not want to have to explain to their bosses that the reason they don’t have a story is that some bozo decided to turn the event into a shouting match.

I guess I come down this way:

If you want to heckle the president, go to a public event.

If you need to ask him a question, go to a press conference.

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June 11, 2012 · 4:44 pm

Media hypocrisy check

By Christopher B. Daly 

With gasoline prices dropping, here’s my question:

If conservative media personalities really love this country and if they are really rooting for America, then why don’t they hail the good news of lower gas prices if those prices drop under a Democrat?

Hmmm. . .

 

 

 

 

 

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June 8, 2012 · 4:23 pm

Update on leaks

At his press conference later in the day (June 8), Obama had this comment on the issue:

“The notion that my White House would purposely release classified national security information is offensive,” he said. “It’s wrong. And people, I think, need to have a better sense of how I approach this office.”

Without confirming the accuracy of the information — which was revealed in two articles in The New York Times last week — Mr. Obama said the such leaks deal with the safety of the American people, its military and its allies.

“We don’t play with that,” he said, vowing to investigate the leaks. “We consistently, whenever there is classified information that is put out into the public, we try to find out where that came from.”

 

Of course, what else would he (or any president) say?

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