Mark Halperin Finally Concedes The Battle To The Totally Obvious

In an op-ed that's been already described as "hysterical" and "stunning," but yet isn't really worth reading, Mark Halperin blames Richard Ben Cramer for his being an unrepentant fool for these many years.

For most of my time covering presidential elections, I shared the view that there was a direct correlation between the skills needed to be a great candidate and a great president. The chaotic and demanding requirements of running for president, I felt, were a perfect test for the toughest job in the world.

But now I think I was wrong. The "campaigner equals leader" formula that inspired me and so many others in the news media is flawed.

That's right. He now "thinks" that making a one-to-one correlation between the superficial pageantry, well-constructed facades, unlimited amount of marketing money, and crowds of willing sycophants that define running for President, and actually being President, may be "wrong." And, mind you, this realization came weeks after Rudy Giuliani compared the sleepless nights spent traveling the country to the tortures meted out to alleged terrorists. For Halperin, that wasn't a sufficient enough discrepancy.

Still, this is a case where the correct conclusion has been reached in spite of the reasoning that it took to get there. Consider this paragraph:

Case in point: Our two most recent presidents, both of whom I covered while they were governors seeking the White House. Bill Clinton and George W. Bush are wildly talented politicians. Both claimed two presidential victories, in all four cases arguably as underdogs. Both could skillfully serve as the chief strategist for a presidential campaign.

Bill Clinton was an underdog to Bob Dole? Really? George W. Bush could skillfully serve as a campaign strategist? The same George W. Bush who gives Karl "The Architect" Rove credit for putting him into office? The same George W. Bush who precisely nobody is beating a path to for advice in 2008? (Bill Clinton may well be thought of, presently, as a "campaign strategist" for his wife, and let me tell you, Mark...the reviews thus far are mixed.

That's just the beginning of a mounting pile of not-of-this-earth reasoning that would have you believe that the public wouldn't have resoundingly re-elected Bill Clinton to a third term in office, given the opportunity or that Bush's advisers went from being "discplined loyalists who created a cheerful cult of personality" around Bush to later become a "barrier to fresh advice." But Halperin's most egregious moment comes with this sentence:

So if we for too long allowed ourselves to be beguiled by "What It Takes" -- certainly not the author's fault -- what do those of us who cover politics do now?

"We?" Sheesh. Speak for yourself.

Comments

[blooddoc]

12:40 PM on 11/26/2007

Halperin, George Will, David Broder, Bill Kristol and their ilk have been parroting the Republican line for lo these many years, either ignorant or in denial of the conflicts so many others kept pointing out. These are, presumably, intelligent men ,however with large ideological roadblocks to reality - sort of like their fearless leader, GWB. Political punditry, in general, has suffered greatly at the hands of these people and the country has not been well-served by their proclamations. It will be interesting to see if the wind changes after the Democrats take over Congress and the White House in '08.

[cobraxus]

10:08 AM on 11/26/2007

the news media for some time now has adopted a very simple philosophy:

"WE WEREN'T PART OF THE LYNCH-MOB.WE WERE JUST THERE TO COVER THE LYNCHING!"

[OneFish]

10:06 AM on 11/26/2007

With journalists like Halperin, who needs enemies?

[wfjuggler]

12:01 AM on 11/26/2007

Much though I would love to contribute the screaming over the incompetence of the national press corps, it might be wise to take a step back for a moment. The fact is that Mark Halperin offered the best political news available when he was an editor at ABC News' The Note and was a consistent voice for media restraint and research during the 2004 presidential campaign.

The national media does tend to cover procedure over substance, but that's not Halperin's fault and he specifically lamented the way presidential elections are covered in 'The Way to Win' last year.

Moreover, a president should be a good politician: without the ability to sell a proposal to the media, a bill is dead on arrival. How well a candidate campaigns should be part of the calculus that voters use when marking their ballot. The problem is that it has become the only part.

I am not a Halperin lackey and there is no question that the old media failed catastrophically in the leadup to the Iraq war. Then - and many times since then - major media outlets, including the Times and the Washington Post, have covered form over substance, obscuring the issues for the reading public. But the internet media has done an equally bad job in a new and different way. By encouraging like-minded individuals to read the news that suits them, internet news sites have created communities where fever-pitch anger is prized over the arguments and hysteria is rewarded with the electronic equivalent of a high five.

Halperin and others haven't done a perfect job - sometimes not even a good job - with election coverage. But it's important to realize that networks get better ratings on stories about campaigns than stories about issues. We can't blame news outlets for giving us what we want. Until the American people start actively demanding substance over form, no journalist will be able steer our national dialog towards sanity. And persuading the American people to start demanding substance is one of those tasks that will require a compelling, charismatic campaign rather than just e-screaming.

[peterg76]

10:24 PM on 11/25/2007

The so-called "journalists" seem to be the last ones to figure out that campaigns are not just the circuses that media can exploit, but they actually are also connected to the hopelessly dysfunctional election outcomes.

[ChiGuy]

10:16 PM on 11/25/2007

And here all this time I'd been under the impression that Halperin was just auditioning for a gig on Fox News, and it turns out he was just stupidly (ahem) naive.

[RamonBackwards]

08:03 PM on 11/25/2007

that's two lame posts in a row. is this your full-time gig? are you like a scab or something?

[Oskaloosa]

07:10 PM on 11/25/2007

After reading Halprin's column this A.M. I thought..DUH! I've been telling Iowa caucus goers for years that campaigning and governing are two different things. I'll waste no more time on Halprin's writing, or even the Times.

[nastywolf]

04:34 PM on 11/25/2007

Just more of conservative America's attempts to marginalize Clinton's successes and sweep Bush's dirt under the rug so there's only the Reagan benchmark left to weigh our political choices against. Let's get real! They're talking about the same Reagan who ran screaming like a frightened school girl from Beirut, only to embrace those same bombers in his badly thought out plan to create a global terrorist golem, then suddenly take credit for dismantling the same Soviet empire he was trying to court as an anchor of his global economic plan. Reagan is a myth and his administration was instrumental in setting this nation up for the failures we are facing today.
There are no benchmarks anymore. We;re into new territory and we need new, creative leadership...not another Reagan clone.

[amberglow]

03:59 PM on 11/25/2007

Seriously--he's in a position of great power, yet still allows Joe Klein to spread lies about telecoms and spying and FISA without repercussion. It's just sad, and they all need to go.

[amberglow]

03:57 PM on 11/25/2007

This is nonsense, because he and all the others are still doing it--they don't care about issues, and would rather talk horserace or wait for the next GOP blastfax or phonecall. He actually never vows to do better either anywhere in that piece.

It's repulsive, it's hurting the whole country, and their declining ratings and readerships show it.

[LindaJay]

03:35 PM on 11/25/2007

"So if we for too long allowed ourselves to be beguiled by "What It Takes" -- certainly not the author's fault -- what do those of us who cover politics do now?"

What you should do is just f**ing resign! You're a disgrace and so much of what is wrong with this coutnry can be laid at your feet and the rest of our cowardly press.

Halperin also has the gall to talk about the reporter's "code of objectivity." Code of objectivity? Surely you aren't reading and listening to the same press that the rest of us are. The only place you'll find a code of objectivity these days is on some blogs on the internet. In the mainstream press? Not a chance.

Just look at the coverage of the past 7 years and tell me with a straight face that there was anything objective about it. The press became the Bush propaganda machine, plain and simple. The most outlandish assertions were never questioned, just dutifully reported. The most blatant misuses of power were hardly commented on. Corruption the like of which we haven't seen in our lifetimes didn't even see a sentence on page 30 of our supposed greatest newspapers. But given that a handful of corporations own practically all the mainstream media, it is doubtful this will change in our lifetime.

Quite frankly, the journalists of today are such hacks that the only way to fix it is to fire every last one of them and start over again. None of you really get it, or will take responsibility for the very grave damage you have done to this country. You are complicit in the selling of the Iraq War, in the current drumbeat to war with Iran, in the destruction of the Constitution, and so much more. A bunch of 1st year journalism students would have done so much better.

[swift goat pet for truth]

02:51 PM on 11/25/2007

It is not fair.

It serves no purpose to beat up on a writer for a Supermarket Tabloid (time magazine) as if it was a valid source of news or opinion.

I realized when Idi Amin rose to power that the skills necessary to become a national leader and the skills to run a country had NOTHING in common.

[jmpurser]

02:12 PM on 11/25/2007

One thing you can't expect morons to be real good at is, well, realizing that they are morons.