When ‘Meet the Press’ gives us an excuse not to watch

April 14, 2008

Every Saturday night, I check in on the “Meet the Press” homepage to see who’s going to be on Sunday morning. Most of the time, it’s a panel of political reporters, political spin doctors, and occasionally some combination therein. I’m invariably relieved, knowing I can safely skip the episode and do something else with my Sunday morning.

Yesterday, for example, Tim Russert hosted a panel of James Carville, Bob Shrum, Mary Matalin, and Mike Murphy — two Democratic consultants, two Republican consultants — which was the same lineup the show featured on March 2 and February 3. Like Robert Reich, I’m not even sure what the point of such a show is supposed to be.

Political consultants are paid huge sums to help politicians spin words and avoid real talk. They’re part of the problem. And what do Russert and these four consultants talk about? The potential damage to Barack Obama from saying that lots of people in Pennsylvania are bitter that the economy has left them behind; about HRC’s spin on Obama’s words (he’s an “elitist,” she said); and John McCain’s similarly puerile attack.

Does Russert really believe he’s doing the nation a service for this parade of spin doctors talking about potential spins and the spin-offs from the words Obama used to state what everyone knows is true? Or is Russert merely in the business of selling TV airtime for a network that doesn’t give a hoot about its supposed commitment to the public interest but wants to up its ratings by pandering to the nation’s ongoing desire for gladiator entertainment instead of real talk about real problems.

Quite right. It got me thinking a bit about the point of the show.

As I understand it, the name is supposed to be descriptive — people of political and/or international significance are supposed to “meet the press.” I’ve noticed, though, that this is rarely the case.

Since, say, Super Tuesday, Russert has spoken to two presidential candidates, one who was in the process of failing (Huckabee), and one who has no serious chance at winning (Nader). He’s spoken to one person of policy significance, director of the CIA, Gen. Michael Hayden, director of the CIA. He’s had several campaign surrogates on to tell us, well, whatever it is that the campaigns tell them to say.

And in just about every other instance, Russert has chatted with other journalists. But doesn’t that turn the point of the show on its head? The point isn’t for us to meet the press, it’s for some high-profile guest to meet the press.

Just sayin’.

[laughing]

You’re right, as I’m reading the post I’m actually thinking “Where’s Steve going with this? The show is ‘Meet the Press‘ and that’s who Russert’s giving us… I’m sure Steve’s going to call for more columnists and fewer strategists…”

Then you clapped your hands, and I awoke.

  • Well, I guess I’m dopey. I thought the original thrust of the show was for the teleivision audience to meet the press. Put faces and body language to the words that shape public opinions. But in an increasingly televised words, MTP is just another place where people who are already ON television get a chance to be on television. Add to that the fact that the guests frequently aren’t the press, and you have conflict of interest upon conflict of interest where getting the political big shots on the show becomes more important the discussing the political big shots because they’re NOT on the show. I never thought I’d have occasion to accuratley quote out stupid president, but this has become yet another venue to “catalpult the propaganda.”

    I’m starting to think MTP should be handled like a Survivor-esque reality-competition show. Get 4 actual journalists on the air who know their stuff (if 4 of them actually exist anymore) and let ’em go at it. Let people vote on who made valid points, and who at defended themselves in the face of unpopular points, and who just plain old looked like Shinola. Shinola gets the boot and another journalist takes his/her place the following week.

    Of course, that’s just a pipe dream. A-holes with agendas and gushy fan geeks will keep their faves on the show regardless of how well he or she performed on the show, until you get something akin to 4 Limbaugh/Hannity WATB loudmouths braying at each other to the delight of their flock of brain-damaged sheep.

    So I guess the only solution is to turn off the drivel and see what people are saying on the blogs. best idea I’ve heard all week.

  • The original purpose of the show was for government officials to “Meet the Press” — that purpose is loooooong gone.

  • When a show has been on TV as long as “Meet the Press,” you gotta expect the mission statement to evolve. Happens all the time: “ER” used to be about an emergency room, now it’s about horny doctors. “Sesame Street” used to be about teaching basic pre-school concepts, now it’s about horny doctors. And when Jay Leno leaves “The Tonight Show,” they’ll probably change that by having it on in the daytime.

  • It used to be known as Meet The Press, after Timmeh took over, it became Meet the Press With Tim Russert. Enough said.

  • MTP is the neocons’ “best venue”.

    They don’t call him Timmy the Tool for nothing.

  • I stopped watching the Sunday spin shows a long time ago. If anything relevant happens on any of them, they will be replayed (over and over) on their respective networks, so why should I have to sit through that crap.

    Thanks for filling me in on MTP’s topics…tell me, did they even mention the Yoo memo? Petraeus/Crocker testilying? Bush’s plummeting ratings? Iran?

    You would think with Paris and Britney laying low, they would have a few extra minutes for some “news”…..

  • slappy: I’ve previously thought about something like your “survivor-esque” idea, but as something more akin to a group form of “Iron Chef”. Any pundit, reporter, or other personality could challenge a member of the panel for their place, with the winner judged maybe by an expert panel (experts on the issues, that is), or in real-time by a studio audience of ordinary people. Quality of the argument, calling other panelists out on lies or spin, bringing in high profile guests and probing them with real questions would all matter in “scoring”, and we’d presumably see these all improved. Ego and competition would keep the challengers coming; kinda like what we see with blogs.

  • Jon Stewart made waves a few years back on Crossfire (?) for expressing the exact same sentiment directly to Tucker Carlson and the other guys whose name escapes me at the moment. IT’s just plain sick that these shows allow these people a forum. Their JOB is to slant the facts to support whoever they work for. What purpose does giving them a national forum serve? Does anyone really think that Mary Matalin is going to say “Barack’s a bright guy, he goofed saying what he said the way he said it but the idea he expresses is essentially true” ? There’s no point. Unless Russert put them on the air as an observational exercise he so could turn to the audience at the end of the segment and say “And THAT, folks, is why you shouldn’t listen to a single thing that any of these people say.” TV news and many news papers and magazines may as well be on the payroll along with Matalin and Carville. Russert is a particular frustration because every once in a while he’ll display a bit of grit and hold some feet to the fire. Then he goes back to crap like this week end’s Meet The Press.

  • At one time, in the pre-Russert era, Meet the Press was a program well worth the attention of the serious follower of national and international events. Real journalists interviewed real officials and newsmakers. Now it has become “Meet Tim Russert” and it’s a whole different broadcast. Tim Russert is no journalist and has no credentials as a journalist. Gatherings of political consultants such as the program presented this past Sunday are an utter waste of time. Instead of doing honest reporting, Russert continues to inflate his ego by fostering the pretense that he is a qualified icon of the news media. But if you watch closely what he actually does whenever he’s on TV, it is evident that his qualifications to be there are completely non-existent.

  • MLE, that’s not a bad idea for a show. “Iron Pundit” appeals to the networks’ desire for gladiatorial combat while leaving open the possibilty for actual discourse on the issues.

    I would also suggest “Political Idol,” where non-pundits audition to be America’s next boneheaded commentator. How low can they go??

  • The notion that my point of view is being represented by the likes of Carville and Shrum would be hilarious if it weren’t so frakking hideous.

    I do remember the days of yore when MTP worked as named – some muckey-muck would come on and be questioned by a panel of (nearly always print) journalists. It was stiff but generally serious. These days we have some of the stupider villagers on to throw stale and dishonest sound bites at each other. You can see essentially similar confrontations (albeit with slightly more entertaining protagonists) by watching the feces-fights among zoo primates.

    I read blogs to avoid the concentrated idiocy of these encounters.

  • I wasn’t aware Tim Russert had no credentials as a journalist. His entry in Wikipedia indicates he graduated from law school.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Russert

    “Meet The Press”. Yeah, what press? I have no background into what the show used to be before he became it’s host. Sounds like it had quite a reputable history before he took over.

    Good advice, don’t bother with this show. He reminds me not of a journalist but rather more like that guy James Lipton.

  • Ah for the days of Lawrence Spivak! Remember when it was just a press panel asking an official important questions? Then sometime in the 80s, as “news” started to become a profit center for the networks, MTP and the copycat shows started to add a segment after the interviews where the “journalists” sat around and commented on the just finished interview. That grew into the monstrosities that we have now.

    The even sadder thing is that some very good liberals like my 77-year old mother think they’re still getting well informed by these shows. So while she admits she disagrees with McCain about a lot of things, she thinks he’s a good guy. Drives me crazy!

  • When ‘Meet the Press’ gives us an excuse not to watch

    Uh, like every Sunday? JimBOB’s use of the word “hideous” is particularly apt. I tuned in yesterday morning and a more hideous line-up could not have been put forth – unless perhaps both Bob Schrum and Mark Penn had been part of the panel. Tim Russert is odious.

  • Perhaps the name should be changed to “The Press Meets?”

    I seem to remember a bit in Linda Ellerbee’s And So it Goes… (still a very worthwhile read after 20+ years, IMO, although Ellerbee does fall into the false-equivalency trap once or twice) about a young reporter who, for her very first MTP invitation, prepped meticulously so as not to make a fool of herself, only to be pulled aside afterwards & advised to not ask such hard questions if she wanted to be invited back. And this would have been in the seventies, early eighties at latest.

  • James Carville, Bob Shrum, Mary Matalin, and Mike Murphy

    Not “two Democrats and two Repulbicans,” but rather two Clinton supporters and two Republicans – all virtually indistinguishable in their inside-the-beltway disconnectedness from reality.

    This is like Larry Moron, er, I mean Larry Mantle, out here at NPR station KPCC having a “debate” about the war in Iraq last week with a war supporter from the Heritage Foundation and a war supporter from the Brookings Institution. Hey, they were a Republican and a “Democrat,” right????

  • I… like you, check out the guests on MTP before viewing. Whenever I see Matalin and Carville are appearing I wonder what these two have on Russert and pass. These two political hacks just turn my stomach. (ouch)
    Now Tim has a great desire to be liked so he couches his questions in a harmless fashion even when his they are accusatory. Yet, is infuriating to see his guests evade without answering his queries. Case in point, two weeks ago when Robert Gates was appearing on the show, he rarely responded directly nor did he answer. Also, review the telecasts of the then Attorney General Gonzales’s interview on Jan. 8, 2007, or Dick Cheney’s interview on Sept.10,2006 and catch the stance of Russert’s approach. First the question, with the facts, and then allowing his guest to slip out of direct response to said question asked.

  • MTP should stand for “Meet the Personalities.” None of these people are that smart, that insightful or that observant, they just have caustic enough personalities that it makes show with them a rather morbid form of entertainment.

    This crew of politicians, ex-politicians, pundits and reporters have become far too incestuous and for them politics is not about governing a nation of millions, but about what these guys want in their cozy little realm.

  • But, what other msm outlets are available that even approximate Keith and Rachel? The issue is more like them rather than none at all! It’s a start and yes, there must be more. Rachel is an example of progressive web power.

  • If you didn’t catch the Daily Show tonight, you missed Jon Stewart at his best. His take on the whole so-called “people in small towns are bitter” by Sen. Obama (that was taken completely out of context) was hillarious.

    Jon said that “what is wrong with being an elitist? Being elite is a good thing, it means a person is above the fray, is smarter” He went on to say, “if you are not an elitist, why the ….are you running for president?” The entire audience erupted into applause and cheers.

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