War, schmar, there’s Edwards gossip to obsess over

August 10, 2008

Media interest in John Edwards’ adultery controversy is probably inevitable. He’s not a sitting lawmaker or candidate for anything anymore, but he’s a well-known political figure caught up in a sex scandal. News outlets are going to cover this; it’s unavoidable.

But some reporters want to keep the story in perspective, and want cable news networks to cover the war between Russia and Georgia with at least as much intensity as an extramarital affair between a retired senator and a woman who was largely anonymous up until fairly recently.

Take this hilarious Fox News segment that Satyam at ThinkProgress found, during which Bonnie Erbe of PBS and U.S. News tried to expand the Edwards discussion, and faced resistance from FNC’s Gregg Jarrett.

After noting why the Edwards affair will probably have no bearing on the presidential race, Erbe said, “On the other hand, we have these huge stories going on like the one you’re reporting in Georgia, where you have both candidates, McCain and Obama, taking positions that the American public wants to know more about.”

Jarrett ignores Erbe’s response, and starts bashing Edwards again, asking Erbe to note whether Edwards might still be lying about the circumstances of his affair. Ebre said it was possible, and suggested Edwards could go on Maury Povich’s trashy daytime talk show to talk about it. “The American public have told pollsters, this political season they want substance,” Erbe insisted. “Both these candidates have expressed support for allowing Georgia into NATO, for example. We are bound by treaty to attack anybody who attacks a NATO member. We could have been on the verge of nuclear war. Those are the kinds of the things that the American public wants to see discussed.”

At that point, Fox News’ Jarrett responded, “Right. You know, but getting back to Edwards, during the Monica Lewinsky affair, Edwards absolutely ripped into Bill Clinton….”

Now, there are a couple of angles to this. First, a lot of political blogs, including this one, have offered more coverage of the Edwards affair than the growing conflict in Georgia, so I’m aware of the possibility of hypocrisy here. The difference, though, is that a political blog is not an international cable news network with an enormous staff. Fox News claims to be every bit as credible and serious a news outlet as, say, CNN. It’s “journalistic” standards and responsibilities are, therefore, considerably different.

Second, it may seem like taking one three-minute segment out of context may not be fair to the Republican network. For all we know, Fox News offered extensive coverage of international events, including the Russian-Georgian conflict, both before and after this brief segment on Edwards.

I don’t watch Fox News, so I can’t say for sure, but I have a pretty strong hunch that isn’t the case. It’s a safe bet that the Republican network has spent vastly more time on Edwards over the last 48 hours than any other topic. The only real question is what the Edwards-to-war ratio is. Five to one? Ten to one? Twenty to one?

The reason this is such a safe bet is because Fox News has already proven itself as the “news” network that loves trivia most. Last March, Fox News was faced with a choice: cover Anna Nicole Smith or cover the Walter Reed scandal. FNC chose the prior — by a factor of 12.

Indeed, even the war in Iraq, which ostensibly Fox News supports enthusiastically, gets the short shrift from the party network.

Given this, it shouldn’t be too big a surprise when, confronted with the possibility of a massive East-vs.-West international crisis, one of Fox News’ media personalities says, “Right. You know, but getting back to Edwards….”

At that point, Fox News’ Jarrett responded, “Right. You know, but getting back to Edwards, during the Monica Lewinsky affair, Edwards absolutely ripped into Bill Clinton….”

He did? Edwards was a nobody running for election in a very conservative state in 1998, what else would he have done? I doubt he was ever really that conservative just as much as I doubt he really is the progressive champion he portrayed himself as this election cycle.

Fox News claims to be every bit as credible and serious a news outlet as, say, CNN.

Not much of a standard. CNN and MSNBC are horrifically unserious too, though not as blatantly partisan as Fox News.

  • Of course, let us not let up for a moment on the absolutely shamless affair of McCain. For every time the right wing media and the other McCain shills in the press core bring up Edwards, then immediately interject with a quick history lesson about how McCain was screwing a young, rodeo queen, trust fund baby behind the back of his crippled wife.
    The press core has done everything it could to bury or, at least, downplay J.McC.’s most shamless contradictions. Going after anyone who would bring this almost totally unbelievable hipocrite to the surface.
    Well, every word on Edwards or even Clinton in the context of marriage infidelity should be countered with comments on McC.
    The press core should be dared to explain how politicians personal lives either matter or don’t.

  • John Edwards other mistake was that he is not a Republican who likes little boys or the guy in the next stall. That’s the only way you get Fox News to avoid the conversation.

  • This makes a point that I was trying to about the myth that ‘the MSM is making the race look close so they can pull in the big advertising bucks.’ The myth is the italicized portion. If the idea is true to any extent, it is upside-down. If they are trying to make the race close, it is so they won’t lose as many viewers.

    We — political junkies that we are — are not like most Americans — like most people in general — who may agree that politics (and ‘world affairs’) is important, but who find it boring, and find world affairs even more so. (This has been changing some over the years, but there are still a lot of people who would quote the Chamberlain line “a quarrel in a far away country between people of whom we know nothing.” And Chamberlain was talking about Czechoslovakia.)

    And I’m not calling them ‘idiots’ at all. Many of them are capable of being as intelligent as we are about subjects they are interested in. But, whether they carry a briefcase or a lunchbox, when they come home, they are looking for escape, for relaxation. Maybe they find it in sports (I can’t complain about that if you haven’t noticed) or reality tv, or drama, or just getting sloshed.

    But they don’t usually find it in the news, unless they get it from someone who is entertaining as well — and Keith, no less than Limbaugh, benefits from that. But still, for Keith and O’Reilly, and all the rest, their biggest demographics are the retired or the shut-ins, or the like.

    This — the Edwards scandal — is a godsend for them, not because Edwards is a Democrat, but because he’s an attractive celebrity, and yes, a lot of the viewers may be ‘tsk,tsk’ing like crazy, but they still are thinking, as they look across the room to their boring spouses, ‘gee what must it be like to be in a position to get away with that’ before they start condemning him. (In fact, if they spent a week as a celebrity, and discovered the amount of hard, boring work needed to be an actor, an athlete, or a politician — and to do it well — they’d go running back to their old jobs fast.)

    (The likelihood of a political sex scandal of the type that would catch their attention would involve Democrats is high, because there just aren’t that many attractive Republicans. Using the Iseman scandal in reply won’t work, because a scandal needs the viewer to be able to picture it. Who the hell wants to think about John McCain having sex — any more than people want to imagine their grandparents in bed together?)

    As for the war, I think most people might have seen the headlines, gasped, looked closely, went “Oh, THAT Georgia” and tuned out once they realized that Atlanta was safe.

  • Any excuse to bring up Clinton/Lewinsky, though. And don’t forget, in the minds of these boneheads, if Obama agreed with Jeremiah Wright simply by virtue of the fact that he knew the guy, doesn’t it necessarily follow that Obama is an adulterer because he knows Edwards?

    And he’s too skinny to be President, and an elitist for visiting his grandmother in the state of his birth.

    And he gets a free pass from the liberal media.

  • Scopulus, we ‘cross-posted’ but my comment is why we don’t want to use the McCain sex stories as a response. To repeat the key point:

    People found Bill and Edwards attractive, and therefore found their sex lives interesting, but who the hell wants to be pushed to think about John McCain having sex?

  • I can’t find it in the transcripts, but I was watching CNN the other week and they had just done a (rather jejune) segment on the campaigns’ flip-flips, or incorrect statements of some such, and the two anchors were commenting on how they could probably spend hours in this exercise. I was stunned; a 24/7 news network, which usually whiles away its hours on trivia or repeats of previously reported trivia, laments that there’s just too much substantive information to cover.

  • I think Fox News should have paid commentator Newt Gingrich on to purvey his viewpoint of what it’s like to cheat on a spouse who has cancer.

  • RE: South Ossetia, Georgia, Russia, USofA and NATO:

    Readers should so some background reading about the long history and the tangled web of nationalities that have occupied this region of the world for thousands of years. from the website: http://www.angelfire.com/ga/georgian/history.html, The population of the Republic of Georgia is: “According to the sources of 1993 – 5 462 800 people live in Georgia. The main ethnic groups living in Georgia: Kartleli, Imereli, Megreli, Kakheli, Guruli, Achareli, Rachveli, Svani are united under one name Kartveli. Other nationalistic in Georgia:
    Kartveli – 70,13% (includes: Kartleli, Imereli, Megreli, Kakheli, Guruli, Achareli, Rachveli, and Svani )
    Armenian – 8,10%
    Russia – 6,32%
    Azerbaijanian – 5,69%
    Ossetian – 3,04%
    Greek – 1,86%
    Abkhazi – 1,77%
    Ukrainians – 0,97%
    Kurts – 0,62%
    Jews – 0,27%
    Others – 1,2%”
    This is a very tangled mixture of many different ethnic groups and several different religions. We should best stay out. Get the U.S. military forces out of the Republic of Georgia. Get the Georgian military forces out of Iraq. And finally, get all the U. S. military forces out of Iraq.
    South Ossetia for the South Ossetians. Georgia for the Georgians. Iraq for the Iraqis…

    What exactly is wrong with the rulers of the Republic of Georgia? They are trying to join NATO. NATO stands for the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. How far is the Republic of Georgia from the “north atlantic” (ocean)? A few thousand miles. This is both stupid and dangerous, trying to encircle Russia with little outposts of western imperial power… Georgia should give it up before they end up totally under the domination of Russia (again).

  • Left-wing blogs were in total denial about the Edwards affair from the beginning right up until Friday when he made his admission. Too beneath them to talk about a sexual affair, besides, it was coming from the National Enquirer. See Baseless Edwards rumors: when the silly season gets stupid.

    Fox News did some work on it when practically the entire MSM shied away from it. Most other outlets; CNN, MSNBC, NY Times, LAT are now trying to feverishly make up for lost time. Fox really hasn’t been overdoing it on the Edwards coverage, aside from this one incident. But it’s amazing to me that this blog and Think Progress do no coverage of the story, but the first story after his admission, an admission that only begs for more answers, is one of an imbalanced report from Fox News. Like that’s the real story here. Never mind the NY Times embarrassing excuse for not covering it vs. the Vicki Iseman story. Never mind the LA Times telling all bloggers to disregard the story when it unfolded right in their back yard.

    Totally irresponsible. Putting blame on Fox in this case is just being weaselly.

  • “For all we know, Fox News offered extensive coverage of international events, including the Russian-Georgian conflict, both before and after this brief segment on Edwards.”

    That is exactly the case:

    http://tinyurl.com/5lwvzr

  • Dennis: At least read the blog before you criticize it. There was a long piece on the Edwards stupidity — one of the few entries that hit 100 comments — as soon as it came out. And when an earlier thread started discussing ‘the stupidest politicians’ Edwards was immediately nominated — so early that, since I hadn’t checked the news, I didn’t know what they meant.

    C’mon, RacerX, in harmony:

    Better trolls, please!

  • Why let John Edwards define himself as a narcissist? How is he different from any other cheating husband? Seems to me that he’s just a grade A (and stupid) Adulterer.

    If John Edwards is a narcissist, then lets compare this to the DSM psychiatric criteria for his personality disorder:

    Narcissistic Personality Disorder (NPD) is a personality disorder defined by the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM IV-R), the diagnostic classification system used in the United States, as “a pervasive pattern of grandiosity, need for admiration, and a lack of empathy.”

    A pervasive pattern of grandiosity (in fantasy or behavior), need for admiration, and lack of empathy, beginning by early adulthood and present in a variety of contexts, as indicated by five (or more) of the following[1]:

    1. has a grandiose sense of self-importance (John Edward wants to be president)
    2. is preoccupied with fantasies of unlimited success, power, brilliance, beauty, or ideal love (Admits self-love and seems to loving to preen)
    3. believes that he or she is “special” and unique (obviously)
    4. requires excessive admiration (obviously)
    5. has a sense of entitlement (ran again after losing with Kerry, believes he DESERVES to be VP)
    6. is interpersonally exploitative (used his wife’s cancer and love to gain sympathy while destroying her love with adultery)
    7. lacks empathy (doesn’t care that he has forever defined his children’s lives with his adultery)
    8. is often envious of others or believes others are envious of him or her (everybody want to be me!)
    9. shows arrogant, haughty behaviors or attitudes (claimed he was 99% honest if Enquirer was 99% wrong!)

    So, let John Edwards call himself a narcissist. Obviously, someone has told him this in the past. So, if you voted for Edwards, then you have to ask yourself why you would put the United States in the hands of such a person?

    Of course, if John Edwards was smart, he’d have claimed that Rielle was simply a surrogate holding his baby (from artificial insemination). Elizabeth had full knowledge and expected the child to be turned over, but John was meeting with Rielle after she reconsidered. This explanation even covers the money payments. Well, seems like John really ain’t too bright!! Just a poor liar and a cheat!

  • Funny how the Obama supporters seem obsessed with a 30 year old fling McCain had, but quickly are ready to ignore a democrat favorite scandal that was handily swept under the rug by the liberal media.

    The media in this country has reached a level of dishonesty and corruption unrivaled in the history of this great country. The lying and cover-ups for the democrats and vise-versa needs to stop if the public is ever to know the truth about what and why things happen in our country.

  • Well, I’d hate to be “in total denial” so let’s start discussing “in depth” just how bad Edward’s behavior is (for a guy not running for anything) and compare it “in depth” to just how bad McCain’s behavior MUST BE since he’s recently committed adultery as covered in the NYT and played around on his previous wife. In fact, I believe he married his second wife weeks after divorcing his first wife (or was it while he was still married – it’s pretty confusing) and was still living with his first wife. It is all rather messy and vague, so let’s just dig in and find out what the heck was going on there, since, after all, he is RUNNING for President.

  • To Dennis and anybody else who wishes to find out what people living in other countries see when watching our news outlets.

    here’s the link to the The Guardian article called Why TV news in the US is utter rubbish

    It is worth a read for anybody who wonders ‘why’ we’re frustrated with the MSM. The pre-occupation with trivial events is astounding.

    We already knew that, but it is nice to put in words from a different perspective.

  • Bruno @ #17;

    Great piece. What the author does not point out is that British tv news is sliding down the same slippery slope, albeit much more slowly. The culprits are the need to fill 24 hours of airtime, and the proliferation of channels. Even the BBC, caught up in the need to compete with corporate tv, is not immune. I am a British national who has lived in the US for 13 years. I get back to the old country about every three years, and each time I notice the decline in standards.

    The other point the author misses is that the prototype for Fox was Murdoch’s British newsprint ancestor, the Sun. The technique of presenting opinion as fact was perfected in Thatcher’s Britain, by Murdoch, and found an enthusiastic audience among “low information” voters in the 1980’s. The author of the Guardian piece, while accurate in his assessment, is being a little disingenuous by ignoring the similarities between US tv news, and the bulk of the national print media in the UK. There isn’t much difference.

  • Furthermore, the story is called “Why TV News in the US is Utter Rubbish”. It doesn’t actually tell us “why” it’s rubbish, it just gives examples of the rubbish. Where is the analysis of who owns what? That would tell us more about the “why”.

  • Great comments. Love the comment section here.
    These people for the most part don’t have the knowledge or understanding of international affairs and couldn’t respond to the war crisis without being told what to say. They are not intelligent or well read or insightful. They are doomed to focus on trivia which requires no intelligence… only opinion.

  • Scropulus and Prup – yes, the John Edwards affair appears to be more titillating to the MSM, but we SHOULD be relentlessly hammering media outlets about the double standard. If an extramarital affair disqualifies someone from public office, then the MSM should have brought up John McCain’s record in that area.

    Can you imagine where Obama’s candidacy would be if his wife was a recovering drug addict who stole from a charity and has a criminal record? Edwards’ wife will no longer be treated as a credible spokesperson for health care – and she didn’t do anything.

    This morning on NPR’s Sunday talk show, a reporter referred to Barack Obama as “the rock star candidate,” in passing – the Republican talking point having been absorbed into the coverage as if it were fact, like “the Illinois candidate.”

    Words matter! There needs to be a full court press against the media’s irresponsible and unintelligent coverage of people, issues and events.

  • Well, what would you expect of a “news” station which caters to the members of the party which “takes pride in its ignorance” (Obama), aka the “party of stupidity” (Krugman)? I really think Repubs should change their mascot from an elephant to a peacock, which would fit them much better: “stupid, and proud of it” and “ignore the (small) head; pay attention to the tail”

  • In this case, IMHO, it’s a blessing we are spared jingoistic fanning of the flames of war from Fox or any other Republican outlet by whatever silly scandal they choose to salivate over.

  • On the subject of trash TV, I just got back from a trip overseas and had the opportunity to watch BBC News. They have some jerk who runs a program called HardTalk. He gets to interview people whose knowledge of important events would be good for the rest of us to know about, but instead he indulges in specious personal attacks that are foolish on the surface and deep down as well and ignores almost completely what they have to say about the subject under discussion. The particular instance was the opposition leader of Kenya who had just had the election stolen from him, and the aforementioned jerk criticized him because he didn’t complain to the election commission or the equivalent. This was after the former president had changed the commission to be composed of his followers. So it looks like the Fox model is being copied in the UK as well.

    As for the complaints of the trolls, Jose – the Edwards scandal has hardly been swept under the carpet as a quick check of the MSM will show you. And it is true that the lying of the MSM has reached a level rarely seen in this country. It started when the big corporations got ahold of the major news broadcasters and started getting out the Republican talking points and neglecting the needs of the citizenry for knowledge about the behavior of their government. This is NOT what Jefferson had in mind when he talked about a free press being necessary for the well-being of our country.

    Rose – Apparently you missed the part that Ms. Reille’s pregnancy has nothing to do with Mr. Edwards as she, the actual father and Mr. Edwards have all stated.

    Dennis – His hyperventilation is exactly the point that the post is making, that only the people with too much time on their hands and an inability to distinguish important from nonimportant would get bent out of shape about it. Notice that the only people who are commenting on McCain’s infidelity are doing so in the context of the rightwing’s total acceptance of it. I can understand that because the rightwingers I know are quite capable of being selfish enough to desert a woman who is poor and an accident victim for a younger trophy wife with mountains of money. Carol shows that she at least has class by refraining from badmouthing the jerk, merely pointing out that he was 40 and wanted to be 25 again.

  • Hey Folks, this is already a non news item. It’s yesterday’s headlines and nobody cared then or now.

  • I feel sorry for Elizabeth Edwards. This is the last thing she needs. This whole Edwards scandal will probably make the media dig up McCain’s affair with Cindy McCain and ask why McCain left his first wife. Washington is a sad place.

    ~*~*~*~*~*~

  • I’m glad you brought this up. Man…I was just mad as hell after last night watching CNN translate and cover the UN security council meeting…of course, hearing what the Russian ambassador said, brought up some points I hadn’t heard, and then France, then UK (but that is when they went to a talking head who would (in my opinion) sum up what was said, but from their viewpoint…why couldn’t I get to hear the ANSWERS from other countries to some of Russias points?
    But oh no, they summed up (innaccurately) what I had just heard, then breathtakingly went immidiately to Wolf Blitzer, talking about EDWARDS…for gods sake. He’s not a candidate, it’s personal between his family and him, but in any case is NOT PERTINENT.

    Man…it’s damned hard to learn, wiegh solutions, of complex problems when we gotta get bombarded with gossip and amped up moralistic bull…

  • I agree completely with Tom! Now if they want to give as much time to How Mccain cheated on his first wife with his present wife cindy and be fair about it , fine! But other wise get off the Edwards story! There is enough news with this war, and missing children and olympics and such! Edwards isn’t really worthy of this time! Mccain is a presidsential candidate who cheated on his wife, and edwards isn’t even in goverment! makes no sense at all to say their is a difference, because adultry is adultry! It’s all the same in the eyes of God, now isn’t it. Hannity brushed it aside when on of his guest brought it up, and he started to explain it away by saying that it was different , beacuase Mccain was a Pow, and it was years ago! No Mr. Hannity it’s not different! The first Mrs Mccain was injured just as bad as her Pow husband john was in a wreck, and their was children involved in it! It all adds up to exactly like the Edwards problems! So be fair and balance Fox, and give it equal time, or leave the edwards alone!

  • why are yall making such a deal out of the edwards case? if the truth was known every man in thte senate,house,congress, all have had affairs.why should they be an exception? they’re MEN! he hasn’t done any more than tne rest of the gang there.he did the right thing by his wife not being with him when he made the announcement on tv. what is the big deal? yall need to get a life, or have an affair and quit poking your nose where it doesn’t belong.
    mississippi

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