BAGHDAD VISIT: THE BROADCAST MEDIA AND THE MORNING AFTER
Keep in mind, of course, that last night was Thanksgiving. You have to assume that for millions and millions of people, watching the news was just not on the to-do list. So the way the visit to Baghdad gets framed by the morning "news" shows today, is the way the visit to Baghdad may well have meaning for them, at least within certain parameters. At some level, the media cannot completely shape people's perceptions of the event's meaning. For example, no matter how they spin their coverage, Americans are likely going to make up their own mind regarding whether it was a cynical or political move, or a sincere and moving gesture. But at another level what the media do this morning is absolutely critical -- because most people were not watching the news yesterday, how the media choose to frame the story today determines what aspects of the story fit in the piece, and what pieces of footage can be cut out since they certainly will not replay the event in its entirety. And what the media chooses to leave out as unimportant, for all intents and purposes will never have happened as far as most people are concerned.
And, as near as I saw this morning, as far as the broadcast media were concerned, what happened yesterday, whether cynical or grand, was defined as "an event." The name of the narrative is "President's Surprise Visit to Troops in Baghdad." The stories are all about how he fooled people, how he fooled the people in Crawford, how he fooled the people in Baghdad, how surprised the troops were, blah blah blah. It's all about the surprise. That works great for television, it makes for great visuals, and there are plenty of troops to interview who were indeed surprised (although ABC still doesn't quite seem convinced.) But when this becomes a narrative about an event, it stops being a narrative about a speech and what the president actually said just seems to go away. The money quotes, which there seemed to be universal consensus on last night, disappear, in favor of the last line, "I bring greetings from America . . . God bless you . . ." which is, rhetorically speaking, boilerplate. There is no substance there in an argumentative sense.
On The Today Show (which notes the president's group flew to DC "to pick up reporters" a phrase that makes it sound subtly as if there was a concern with guaranteeing coverage, as if the Baghdad-based press corps wouldn't have seen to that) where a British arrest of an al Queda linked terrorist suspect gets a single sentence, less than the news that Michael Jackson's father served Thanksgiving dinner to the poor yesterday, two enlisted personnel are interviewed.
The little female specialist (that isn't a disparaging comment, she's tiny) says the mood was "euphoric." Says the seargant with her, "his remarks were outstanding . . . it brought chills up my spine." The message? "The message it sends to the troops in Iraq is nothing's gonna stop us." Back to the female: "Our president's willing to sacrifice too." (Tom Friedman, are you hearing this?)
Analysis today provided by Chris Matthews. Remember two things about Matthews. First, he's been railing against the Iraq policy, and second, nothing stops him from saying what he things. Matt Lauer asks him to rate the visit from 1 to 10, and there isn't a nano-second's hesitation: "10." He notes: the man was "almost crying he's so emotionally connected to those troops. This is pretty non-political as far as I'm concerned."
That answer doen't particularly help Lauer out, since Lauer clearly has an agenda. I don't have the verbatim wording down, but the essential gist goes, was there a place in America yesterday where Americans sat down to eat Thanksgiving dinner (and, he must know how it sounds to make this into a political issues, as he actually apologizes for this) where the Democratic nominees didn't lose their appetite as news of this spread. Matthews says that what won the president the presidency and his popularity is his "daring, his likeability . . . that moment with the bullhorn" at ground zero.
He guesses the idea came from the president himself, taking attacks because he "wasn't connecting to the troops, wasn't going to those funerals, and that he took some risks [that a Stinger or SAM could have hit the plane, that anything could have happened, argues Matthews] that's no small part of this."
ABC tops them, not because their two soldiers are officers, but because they're actually a married couple. But Charlie Gibson just doesn't seem to be buying this "it was a surprise" idea. "Was it truly, truly a surprise?" Weren't there rumours? Well, it turns out there were indeed rumours -- that Nicholas Cage and Shania Twain were in-bound. He asks again -- there were really no rumours that that large plane had landed? Sorry, no sale. Word hadn't leaked. And the response? Says the husband, "electrifying . . . I got chills. I can still get chills when I hear the tape being played." (There's that idea of the words making a difference again.)
She agrees "electrifying" is the only word. That "he had tears in his eyes was so moving to all the troops . . . such a morale boost . . . we could never have expected . . . it let us know the people of America were thinking of us and thinking of the Iraqi people." Well that's a bit much for Charlie, who hastens to assure them that even without a presidential visit we are all thinking them.
CNN says this will be memorable, "perhaps all the way to election day," a not so suble insinuation that this was a campaign stunt, and thus introduces a replay of the John King piece from last night, this time, interestingly, with the argument that the president's visit might provoke attacks in coming
They then bring in the Los Angeles Times' Ron Brownstein. So while they do play the money quote from the speech it is with the purpose of asking him to respond to it from the position of pondering how a Democratic nominee might handle such a situation, "how does someone compete with the power of the presidency in creating such a moment?" turning a powerful statement into nothing more than a tactical problem for a competing campaign.
