Journalistic Cupidity :: Herbert I. London

When Chris Matthews of "Hardball" indicated that it was "our job" to get Obama elected and then to make him look good, a new chapter in national journalism emerged. By any stretch of the imagination this is cheerleading, not journalism. And in the several months since Barack Obama acceded to the presidency, Americans have witnessed the equivalent of the Adoration of the Magi.

This schoolgirl crush knows no bounds. Obama's reliance on the teleprompter is explained as a desire to assert a tightly knit and well thought through message. One might just as well argue the president cannot deliver a message extemporaneously.

His mistakes are viewed as timing issues. During a G-20 speech in London the president attempted to equate the language in the Declaration of Independence with sloganeering during the French Revolution – a dubious analogy to begin with. However, after saying "liberté" he stopped and seemingly lost his way. This awkward pregnant pause was thwarted when his eyes found the teleprompter and the words "égalité and fraternité." Members of the press, however, described this as a pause for "emphasis."

Even the president's odd apology to the assembled nations which legitimized anti-American sentiment ("the U.S. was sorry for wrecking transatlantic relations") was greeted as the beginning of a healthy relationship with our allies.

The New York Times, caught in the Messiah syndrome, rationalizes every word from the president's lips as thoughtful and articulate. Moreover, as A.A. Gill noted (4/5/09) when the president stepped up to 10 Downing Street, he shook the hand of a police officer standing guard and as a consequence, "showed the British how to be classlessy classy." Maureen Dowd argued that Barack Obama "grew up learning how to slip in and out of different worlds – black and white, foreign and American, rich and poor." He "knows how to manipulate." As opposed to George W. Bush who was "manipulated."

As ever, Bush is the handy stooge, the polar opposite of Obama. For the Times' columnists Bush is the exemplar of everything that went wrong, the cowboy rough around the edges. But suppose, for the sake of argument, Bush shook the hand of the bobby standing guard at the Prime Minister's residence. My guess is the headline would have read "the unclassy Bush does it again and violates diplomatic protocol."

Surely the press should point out positive things a president does, but journalism and cheerleading aren't compatible. The president has his public relations flaks who attempt to put a positive spin on everything he says and does. He doesn't need a sycophantic press corps. In fact, an honest portrayal of presidential action is what the country requires.

Instead the American public is getting a consistently worshipful tone. Writing in the Washington Post, Tom Shales describes a presidential press conference in the following way: "Most of the facets of President Obama's personality that have made him intensely popular were on display last night during his second prime-time news conference, and so he emerged from it still every inch 'President Wonderful,' as it were, untouched and intact."

Because of this cupidity, policies are overlooked, policies that are changing the face of America. What we have in its place is a personality cult with image replacing substance and press bias substituting for reportage. If this honeymoon continues unabated Americans may witness the most formidable policy shifts in the history of this nation without journalistic accounting.

The press love affair with Obama may make him look good, but whether this is a healthy state of affairs for the nation remains questionable. I prefer to pray for the Messiah rather than pray to the Messiah the press corps has invented.

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