Surviving the Media Circus, Without Becoming the Clown

In 1959, JFK wrote an article in TV Guide talking about the influence of television on politics:

Television is a medium that lends itself to manipulation, exploitation, and gimmicks. Political campaigns can actually be taken over by the public relations experts, who tell a candidate not only how to use TV, what to say, what to stand for, and what kind of person to be.

I mention this quote in Poliwood, and covered the subject in Wag the Dog, which was not just an exploration of what happens when Washington exploits Hollywood's talent for selling fantasies, but ultimately its Machiavellian code of conduct in the area of messaging and public relations. Communication -- the ability to connect and manipulate -- is perhaps the most interesting part of politics we can observe, and the most frightening. JFK warned us, but no one listened.

When I arrived in Denver at the 2008 Democratic National Convention, I was amazed at the media spectacle of it all. We live in an age where television dominates our reality, and particularly our political reality. Everything has been turned into entertainment. Why does politics have to be entertaining? Because it has to be. Because it's on television all the time. If it's not entertaining, we turn it off. So the result is the media takes national issues and makes them our entertainment. Everything must garner some acceptable rating. Ratings represent money and that bottom line is the holy grail, which should surprise no one. Politics today is increasingly driven on conflict as the news uses entertainment techniques founded on conflict. Polarization is ideal to exploit for conflict.

This year, President Obama delivered a speech to the joint session of Congress on health care, one of the most important issues our country faces. No one really remembers what he said though. Why? Because of Congressman Joe Wilson's "You Lie" comment. We heard far more about "you lie" than the crisis of the health care system. The media dissected every aspect of the "you lie" story. The "for" and "against." The issue of "civility." Was Wilson going to apologize? How much money was Joe Wilson getting in campaign donations because of the you lie comment? An anonymous Congressman suddenly becomes famous because of an inappropriate statement and many real issues took a back seat.

I saw firsthand just how difficult it is to get matters of substance into the national dialogue as I followed a number of politically active actors, musicians, and writers through the 2008 election. As we explored the impact of entertainment and the media on modern day politics, you see that today's Washington political celebrities and politically active celebrities all have to survive a media circus. To quote a line from Poliwood, "How do you survive the media circus and not turn into the clown?"

Like any great invention, there are both positive and negative effects to television. It has been a terrific source of entertainment, some times educational, and always a part of our national identity. But the negative effects are more subtle, more covert, and we tend to ignore them. If we had only paid more attention to Kennedy's warning, would we be in a better place today?

Poliwood premieres on Showtime Monday evening, November 2 at 7:30 pm.

 

Comments

[kreiz]

Mr. Levinson: just wanted Poliwood. Terribly entertaining and thought provoking; enjoyed every minute. As a Boomer, I've been less than conscious that I've witness politics largely through television's lens (give or take a few books and periodicals along the way.) Appreciate the reminder that television creates iconic images that may or may not be true. Masterful piece; very well done.

[jeanrenoir]

If the masses think Obama has failed on the economy and in Afghanistan in '12, however they define "failure," then the vicious right-wing media blitz will come into its fascist own. But if Obama is seen to have succeeded in these two crucial areas, Sheldon Adelson, Fox, and Rush will be absolutely helpless to prevent Obama from crushing the Republican sacrificial lamb even worse than he did McCain-Palin. The right-wing Big Lie factory is indeed frightening, but Obama success can easily trump it. If he fails, however, he may well be a declining America's Weimar Republic, and after his failure, the deluge, presented to us in ferocious living color and HD by Fox.

[EscapeTireTube]

And if it weren't for television, JFK would not have been elected. The televised debates swung the election to JFK (except of course the voting fraud shenanigans in Chicago). People who heard the debate on radio, thought Nixon won the debate.

[tummyAuto]

Yeah. It's worse, way worse... Not just the death of journalism, but the birth of the corporate sponsored totalitarian police state. This won't be funny in ten or fifteen years when we have a generation of sociopaths who have been raised in a climate of culture which finds torture and dehumanization amusing and an entitlement. Democracy is in decline in the developed west. The conflict driven character cited as part of TV is now part of all of pop culture media, music, film, video games, books, magazines. In the age of collectives and social networks everyone can play the role of a sociopath, klansman.

This is all so mainstream there's a Law & Order episode for a version of it. "human flesh search engine" aired tonight.

Time Magazine ran a short piece on this back in 06. "Beware the online collective"

[eyepatch]

Hey Barry,

Great article! because many Americans
have been thinking just what you wrote!....

How influential is TV in our political system???
in my opinion I think TV is overly influential in
how the reality of the politcial situation is perceived...

Case in point the 2000 Presidential election was seemingly determined
by Fox News. During the election coverage each individual
network took Florida away from Al Gore because they didn't
want to be perceived as not having the up to date results....

Now the Media has become fixated on the "Tea Bag"
movement! I question if there would actually be a
"Tea Bag" movement if the media was not focued on it?

Personally, I don't think so because recent polls have suggested that
many American do not identify themselves as republicans
and fewer still identify themselves conservatives. So without the
people, where is the movement! It's definately not a grass roots
movement thus the term astro-turf movement meaning
the opposite of grass roots, which is solely for the benefit
of special interest groups, i.e. corprate interests

Again great observations!

[EscapeTireTube]

Yes and it was Al Gore who first brought up the Willie Horton issue in the 1988 Dem Primaries against Dukakis, and yet television has reported it as a Bush tactic that the truth is buried.

[orkt]

Kennedy's 'warning' about television and politics was truly more of prophecy than a warning, as was Eisenhower's about the military-industrial complex. Objectively, it appears that we are powerless to stop it; it is more like a wave that needs to crash into the shore before it breaks.

[humorgazette]

Well stated, Mr. Levinson -- President Kennedy's prescient warning about the media-industrial complex calls to mind Dwight Eisenhower's farewell remarks about the confluence of political power and military might.

Today's descendants (twice removed) of Edgar R. Murrow and Walter Cronkite are cogs in an infotainment machine that is calibrated to reward ratings over real perspective, sound bites over substance.

This media circus makes clowns of us all with its manufactured conflict-driven, donkey-and-elephant show. And your Joe Wilson "You lie" example is right on the money. Media overkill of Wilson's animal house antic deprived us of actual insight into the health of our nation. But hey, it was a "box-office smash."

The Balloon Boy debacle was equally revealing. A longtime journalist/humorist, lately I've been compelled to satirize the system on CNN iReport and YouTube as fake news anchorman Reid Page. (This just in: Richard Heene charged with "contributing to the delinquency of the media.")

Now I am very eager to see "Poliwood."

A quick aside: One of your earlier works inspired me to create a video homage to America's national pastime and the World Series, featuring the imaginary baseball savant "Rain Delay Man" -- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NB2e9acXDxA

Thanks again for your thought-provoking take on the media carnival.

[LMPE]

Debate means that we get to hear both sides, even if only one side makes sense. If only the one side that makes sense gets heard, we get accused of bias.

[lightbulb10]

Isn't that how Richard Nixon even got elected? I wonder if ads are nearly as effective as direct marketing/ packaging/good merchandising. Or if it's just something for people to do.
Some ads are very entertaining. The high dollars they bring in, however, does seem to legitimize a lot of back hand springing, a custom of incessant irresolution, a culture of hate and greed as The Way. If Kennedy saw the sway his good looks could have afforded him on the set ahead of time, I am sure he was not the only one. I do love that seeing callous ploys and degenerate tactics unfold makes more than me uncomfortable. I love the seeing of it. The address of it. The air to it. The thought warranting. The personal absorption. If the media is upset that people are thinking about whether or not they should believe their every word blindly, being a well purposed media is the furthest from their mind. No apology for the earnest comment.

[shadow7]

It's not a circus. It's a corporate success. Keep the masses uninformed and you can manipulate their fears and control their views. Circuses are fun and make no attempt to disguise their clowns. Corporate media pretends to inform as strives to entertain and has, in effect, successfully dumbed down a huge segment of the public. That's why the Internet is so vital. An informed electorate is the foundation of any country based on democratic ideals. That is also why our not for profit site continues to gain readership. Thanks all around.from http://tvnewslies.org

[lightbulb10]

I appreciate that plug :) will be checking out the website.

[dipconsult]

As Jefferson and many others have pointed out you can't have an effective democracy without a free press.

But today the press - the media - is free: not to tell the truth,r but to tell us what will make most money for the media. This article makes just that vital point.

This is because the media is, for the most part capitalist - the bottom line is what counts, and also the whims of the owner (consider Mr. Murdoch and his all but monopolistic News Corporation which helped drive us into the disastrous Iraq war and thus the near lost occupation of Afghanistan)

But obviously socialism is no help here - government ownership of media is even more distorting and biassed than capitalist ownership.

Maybe we should look at public trusts - such as once owned the Observer in the UK. But experience shows that these too, can either be broken in the absece of strong enough legislation, or they can fall into the hands of ideologists who also can be worse than opinionated egotistical capitalist owners of media.

Perhaps the simplest solution is to invoke very tough ownership laws simply preventing any one having controi of more than a very limited newspaper plus tv ?

It is of the highest importance that - as newspapers as we know them are failing - that essential for democracy, a truly free 4th estate, is somehow preserved.

We need the best brains working on this before it is too late. .

[TheEmptinessOfTruthiness]

What is this socialism you speak of?

CBC in Canada, which relies on gov't grants, does a reasonable job of delivering news.
BBC, the best news in world in my opinion, also relies on something you may as well call a tax.

So to say "But obviously socialism is no help here" is ...well .... no help here.

[Rogan]

True. I've been arguing for twenty years that our government should "socialize" and take over running all the radio and tv stations. It can't be any worse than the creeping-fascism-by-proxy problem our current tv and radio stations' management and programmers are causing us. And the examples other countries have set, tend to be positive examples: you've named a couple, and I could name others (though that would just be begging the "opposition" trolls, to crawl all over me about being a socialist, like it's some kind of, I don't know, disease, to prefer socialism, to the mess we have, now)...

[johnalene]

About ten years ago, the head of PBS ordered the producers of Washington Week to make it more "confrontational." To their credit, the people who were in that group refused, and a new moderator was chosen, who insisted on keeping it civilized.

With corporate sponsors like mining , railroad and aircraft industries, the content has had to be watered down, but at least no shouting matches occur.

[balloonloon]

Don't overlook C-SPAN -- they definitely qualify as a third-ring in the
'media circus'. I believe we've all witnessed at one time or another
near 'Wag The Dog' moments as members of Congress delivered
speeches (and other mindless ramblings) to empty chambers.

Today's House compromise on the public option underscored the
need for C-SPAN cameras to be present at Congressional closed-door
meetings--it would have been interesting to see how negotiations
unfolded on the, 'robust public option vs compromise public option'.

I have supported Obama at every turn--however, I'm disappointed on
his lack of follow through on 'full transparency' after he continually
said during his campaign that he'd invite the C-SPAN cameras in
so the American people could see how health care reform would
come together. Instead, both the House and Senate crafted their
final versions behind closed-doors.

It was a missed opportunity...send in the clowns.

[balloonloon]

Off-topic -- 'Avalon' is one of my favorite films (DVD). Sad we recently
lost actor, Lou Jacobi.

[sheaintsayin]

Co-signed, big time! I just have to say that "Avalon" remains one of my top 10 favorite movies of all time... At least every Thanksgiving I want to see it and revisit one of my favorite multi-generational families.

I still really appreciate The News Hour, Washington Week, and Bill Moyers' Journal is fantastically in-depth, usually very topical. And the yummy David Brancaccio does wonderfully on "Now."

[jessicajuliette]

OMG--

-I WAS DRAWN TO THE ARTICLE , SO WANTED TO COMMENT ON HOW MUCH I LOVED AVALON---
ONE OF THE BEST MOVIES OF ALL TIME.....

actually, one of the points of the movie, when they all ran to get tv trays to watch Milton Berle, watched tv didnt talk with each other at dinner...

sorta of indicates how tv can contribute to the communication break-down in families,etc..

just a searing,lovely heart-stopping movie for me..i tear up everytime i see it...

[mandymarleyandme]

I think Mr. Levinson makes an important point in this article, that the news industry (print, radio, television, internet) is a FOR PROFIT industry. We, as the general public, often view news organizations as altruistic institutions working for the public good and presenting Joe Friday's "just the facts". I think that as long we understand the justifications and motivations of the media and acquire our news from a variety of sources the power of any single news agency is greatly diminished in its capacity to influence outcomes.

As a side note, I have also become grossly unsatisfied with both television and radio pseudo-news broadcasts. On a number of ocassions, I have been asked questions by students in class about various topics in the news. Inevitably, a very minor amount of time invested in my own research seems to garner far more substantive fact and primary documentation than the vast majority of stories I see in the media. Are they actually paying people to do research? If so I would be more than happy to offer my services. Even a paltry media salary would be an improvement over one in public education.

[Jude Nagurney Camwell]

No one seems to truly listen to one another on the cable news networks. Have you ever sat for very long at a table where people are only talking to themselves while in your company and you can't get a word in edgewise? It's dreadfully boring and you don't learn a thing except what it means to be isolated inside your own skull and waiting for an opportunity to get the hell out of there. That's how the typical citizen with a voice to raise feels about cable network news these days. It's blah dee blah blah all day and everyone has to take one clear side or another in order for the manufactured controversy to continue. And does it ever continue - ad nauseum. The few snippets from comments received from social networking outreach efforts that these networks choose to relay to their television audience are cherry-picked according to their editing whims. A turn-off for truly critical thinkers. We need a lot more critical thinkers and a lot less of the big three-ring circus with the dancing bears in the tutus (boasting two and only two, predictable points of view) that Fox News, CNN, and MSNBC have allowed themselves to become.