{"id":15958,"date":"2008-06-22T11:15:44","date_gmt":"2008-06-22T15:15:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/archives\/15958.html"},"modified":"2008-06-22T11:15:44","modified_gmt":"2008-06-22T15:15:44","slug":"for-obama-and-the-media-there-have-been-a-lot-of-turning-points","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/for-obama-and-the-media-there-have-been-a-lot-of-turning-points\/","title":{"rendered":"For Obama and the media, there have been a lot of ‘turning points’"},"content":{"rendered":"

Barack Obama’s decision to skip the public financing system has really<\/i> enraged the nation’s newspaper editors. I’ve already explained<\/a> why I think all the hand-wringing is unnecessary. In fact, in some instances, the criticism is backwards — by sidestepping public financing and raising his own war chest, Obama will rely less<\/i> on outside, independent groups, not more<\/i>, which will mean add transparency and accountability to the process.<\/p>\n

But the Politico’s Kenneth Vogel notes<\/a> that the slew of scathing editorials — which, by the way, were far and few between when John McCain flouted the public financing system in a legally dubious fashion — have come from all over.<\/p>\n

The Philadelphia Inquirer’s editorial board called the decision “as disappointing as it is disingenuous,” while The Boston Globe’s board wrote that it “deals a body blow … to his own reputation as a reform candidate.” And The Baltimore Sun’s editorial board called it “a major disappointment for those struggling to restrain the pernicious influence of special interests in American politics.” <\/p>\n

The New York Times’ editorial board, which endorsed Clinton after allegedly leaning toward Obama, wrote that “Obama has come up short” of “his evocative vows to depart from self-interested politics.” […]<\/p>\n

The Washington Post opined that Obama’s “effort to cloak his broken promise in the smug mantle of selfless dedication to the public good is a little hard to take.” <\/p>\n

And USA Today, which also did not endorse any candidates, said Obama put “expediency over principle,” was “disingenuous about his reasons for opting out of public financing” and proved he’s not a “real reformer.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

So, instead of public financing, Obama is accepting financing from the public. The horror. His spin may or may not be persuasive, but there’s nothing illegal or unethical about withdrawing from a flawed system. The conservative scholar who helped write the law<\/i> said<\/a> he “would have sued [Obama] for political malpractice” if Obama hadn’t<\/i> withdrawn from the system.<\/p>\n

But the Politico’s Vogel added that this barrage of condemnations may “mark a turning point in what has been, on balance, fawning treatment of Obama.”<\/p>\n

I hear that a lot, which in and of itself, seems to undermine the point.
\n
\nWhen Obama flubbed his message about “bitter” voters, the media locked on and wouldn’t let go. At the time, plenty of observers thought it marked “a turning point in what has been, on balance, fawning treatment of Obama.”<\/p>\n

And when the media started running brief excerpts of Jeremiah Wright’s sermons in a 24-7 loop, plenty of observers thought it marked “a turning point in what has been, on balance, fawning treatment of Obama.”<\/p>\n

And now that Obama is going to deny public funds, it marks “a turning point in what has been, on balance, fawning treatment of Obama.”<\/p>\n

To be sure, I can think of plenty of media personalities who seem predisposed towards a favorable opinion of Obama. Likewise, I can think of even more media personalities who seem practically ready to create a religion around John McCain.<\/p>\n

The point, though, is that I’m not quite sure where this “fawning” coverage is. Sure, we have clowns like Chris Matthews talking about strange feelings on his leg when Obama gives a good speech, but I’m thinking more of the general interest in various political controversies.<\/p>\n

I feel like the “turning points” have been obvious for quite some time. The media latched onto the Rezko story. And “NAFTA-gate.” And the alleged “plagiarism.” Every step of the way, people said, “Well, it looks like Obama’s finally getting hit by the media.”<\/p>\n

But if we keep saying that, doesn’t it necessary prove the observation false?<\/p>\n

Update<\/i>: Vogel emails to note that he was referring to a turning point among editorial-page editors. He’s quite right; that was in his original piece on the subject. My broader observation about the series of “turning points” in the relationship between the media and Obama, though, remains unchanged.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Barack Obama’s decision to skip the public financing system has really enraged the nation’s newspaper editors. I’ve already explained why I think all the hand-wringing is unnecessary. In fact, in some instances, the criticism is backwards — by sidestepping public financing and raising his own war chest, Obama will rely less on outside, independent groups, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15958","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15958","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15958"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15958\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15958"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15958"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15958"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}