Don’t miss today’s Paul Krugman column in the New York Times. For me, all of his columns are must-reads, but today’s was particularly good.
Krugman was, like so many of us, disgusted by the media’s coverage during the 2000 campaign, in which many reporters “journalists deluded themselves and their audience into believing that there weren’t many policy differences between the major candidates, and focused on personalities (or, rather, perceptions of personalities) instead.”
To that end, Krugman has proposed a series of proposed rules for covering the 2004 race. Though Krugman is far more sympathetic to Dean than I am, journalists would be wise to follow Krugman’s rules.
The proposal includes such radical suggestions as:
* Actually look at the candidates’ policy proposals.
* Look at the candidates’ records.
* Don’t fall for political histrionics.
It’s Krugman at his best. Go read it. You’ll be glad you did.
Here’s one of my favorite of Krugman’s rues:
* Beware of personal anecdotes. Anecdotes that supposedly reveal a candidate’s character are a staple of political reporting, but they should carry warning labels.
For one thing, there are lots of anecdotes, and it’s much too easy to report only those that reinforce the reporter’s prejudices. The approved story line about Mr. Bush is that he’s a bluff, honest, plain-spoken guy, and anecdotes that fit that story get reported. But if the conventional wisdom were instead that he’s a phony, a silver-spoon baby who pretends to be a cowboy, journalists would have plenty of material to work with.
If a reporter must use anecdotes, they’d better be true. After the Dean endorsement, innumerable reporters cracked jokes about Al Gore’s inventing the Internet. Guys, he never said that: it’s a malicious distortion of a true statement, and no self-respecting journalist would repeat it.