Some of my best friends really are or have
been journalists, or at least teachers of journalism, but here is one case in
which I agree with Donald Trump against "the media."
In a brief Associated Press article on 31 December 2016, Jill Colvin very elegantly
told the world, Donald "Trump ditches media for golf game" in
Jupiter, Florida. More specifically, "President-elect Donald Trump has ditched his press
pool once again — this time traveling to play golf at his club in Jupiter,
Florida, without a pool of journalists on hand to ensure the public has
knowledge of his whereabouts." Without straining AP objectivity too far,
Ms. Clovin complains that "Trump, both as a candidate and during the
transition, has often scoffed at tradition," specifically the tradition of
an ever-present press pool, "allowing a group of reporters to follow him
at all times, to ensure the public knows where he is. Not long after his
election, Trump went out to dinner with his family in Manhattan without informing
the pool of his whereabouts" and now — playing hooky to play golf!
Clovin
says, "The practice is meant to ensure that journalists are on hand to
witness, on behalf of the public, the activities of the president or
president-elect, rather than relying on secondhand accounts" and notes …
generously? that "The White House also depends on having journalists
nearby at all times to relay the president's first comments on breaking news."
Repaying that generosity, "Trump aides appear to have made an effort in
recent weeks to offer additional access, allowing reporters to camp out outside
a doorway at Mar-a-Lago to document staff and Cabinet candidates' arrivals and
departures and providing information about his meeting schedule."
Uh,
huh.
Working
backwards through the quotes:
*
Camping out?! Are you people presidential paparazzi? Well, yes, with about as
little self-respect, apparently as paparazzi.
*
Getting the President's (or President-elect's) "first comments on breaking
news": Gang, with any president, but especially with Donald Trump, the
last thing that should go out to the world are comments on breaking news beyond
a boilerplate notice, "We are following developments and will comment when
we have more information." It may be cruel to note, but the 24/7 news
cycle is your problem, and shouldn't
be allowed to tempt officials and spokesfolk into making statements when they
don't really know what's going on and prudence requires that they just shut the
hell up until things settle down.
*
I'm old enough to remember when stalking the president got started, and it may
be that "The practice is
meant" in someone's theory "to ensure that journalists are on hand to
witness, on behalf of the public, the activities of the president or
president-elect, rather than relying on secondhand accounts" — but the
specific occasions when the practice got started were the assassinations of the
1960s and the attempted assassinations later of Presidents Ford and Reagan.
There's
a morbid origin to constant coverage of the president, and as a continuing
matter an assassination attempt is about the only thing that requires reporters
right there reporting on what a president is doing in public. Where there's a
pressing public right to know and media's obligation to report, we're talking
policies decided on in private meetings and announced (if at all) in formal
public addresses — not paparazzi stuff or shouted questions and
over-the-shoulder answers.
No.
Guys and gals of the press corps: Go home or, and better, back to the office.
News organizations: Enough already with the death-watch coverage of the
president and other important people; put your money into bureaus — you can
look the word up in histories of journalism — and into in-depth research of
mostly public documents, with interviews with the aides and agency operatives
of what has been insightfully called "the permanent government." That
is, drop the celebrity-reporting already and do the sort of in-depth
journalistic Scheisswerk that I. F.
Stone and such were good at.
Think
about it. You guys and gals in the White House press corps look down your noses
as the literal paparazzi and the "jock sniffers" who rush into locker
rooms to get the very first post-game comments from players who really should
be left alone to shower — and I'll bet show equal contempt for the on-air
airheads who do celebrity interviews … right? Well, if you're camped out at
goddamn Mar-a-Lago, you're no better.
In
this case, Trump is on the mark: he should ditch you and have dinner with his
family or play a game of golf. He has a right to some privacy, and the public
have a right to go a couple days without having to hear one word more about
Donald J. Trump. Serious journalists should spend more time trying to get hold
of Trump's financial data and the full-form prescription list from Dr.
Feelgood, his hippy-dippy family physician, or spend more time on what the
Congress might be up to and/or the bureaucrats who most directly affect
people's lives.
So
Go Trump! / Lose the Press Corps! But not for too long. There's much to be said
for your staying in the public eye, Mr. Trump, over-exposing
yourself, and getting your enemies pool up to critical mass.
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