Media Has Large, Often Unnoticed Role In National Politics

The major media plays a much bigger role in the formation of our national politics than most people realize. The media helps define and choose the issues, and acts as gatekeeper in setting the limits for political discussion and sometimes even candidacies for public office.

The most media-savvy candidates know how to play within the media's rules, and use them to their advantage. Barack Obama is a good example of such a candidate - more on that later.

The media can also veto candidates, as in the case of John Edwards. He was not by definition a "marginal" candidate: a U.S. senator and vice-presidential candidate in the last election, at various junctures he polled better against potential Republican contenders than the other Democratic candidates. He led his rivals in introducing a serious health care plan, and arguably transformed the contest in his appeal to the Democratic base on that and other issues.

But the media rejected Edwards, by a combination of ignoring him and subjecting him to much more negative reporting than the other major contenders. The same was true in 2004 for Howard Dean, who rallied the Democratic base but found himself with five or six times as many negative articles in the media than his major democratic primary opponents.

The media does much more than directly influence the opinion of voters. Most donors, politicians, institutions and other important political participants will not waste resources on a candidate that they think is unlikely to win. They often look at how the media treats a candidate in order to make this decision. If the media does not take a candidate seriously or is obviously hostile to him or her, these potential supporters will look elsewhere.

That's not to say that Edwards would have won if the media had not rejected him; most likely he would have lost anyway. But he would have been a more serious contender.

On the other hand, Obama knew how to define his candidacy within the limits of the media's constraints and still have a mass appeal. From the beginning of his campaign he mostly avoided challenging powerful interests, and talked about "getting all sides to the table" and overcoming "decades of bitter partisanship." The media and punditocracy lap this stuff up like honey. At the same time he was able to tap into the voters' deep desire for change, with inspirational speeches, transcendental narratives, and celebrity-studded videos.

Obama showed his political genius in knowing when to jump the fence and break out of the media corral. In Iowa and New Hampshire, and even the Super-Tuesday primaries he was winning the independent and upper-income voters while losing the traditional Democratic base, including union members and the majority of Americans that do not have a college degree. He had to switch to a more populist tune or risk losing the whole game to Hillary Clinton. He did so, just in time to trounce her among almost all demographic groups (notwithstanding Saturday Night Live's joke about her majority among white women over 80) in the Wisconsin primary. One of his best applause lines in that contest was his response to Hillary Clinton's remark that "speeches don't put food on the table." Obama's reply: "You know what? NAFTA didn't put food on the table, either."

Of course, there's nothing the chattering class hates more than "populism," which they seem to define roughly as appealing to voters on the basis of their real interests, without regard to what rich people or corporate moguls think. For this, Obama has provoked some media backlash: for example, the Washington Post editorial board accused Obama of delivering an "angrier, and intellectually sloppier, message . . . of class warfare and populism," for complaining about the negative impact of trade deals such as NAFTA.

But it's a bit late for the media to reinvent Obama, after affirming his image as a post-partisan, non-ideological, charismatic uniter. If he can clinch the nomination, as seems increasingly likely, he will probably drop the populist rhetoric and once again hew closer to the media boundaries on their "sensitive" issues such as trade. In a different time and place this could risk alienating his base and suppressing turnout, but with the economy going down the tubes and -- no matter what the likely Republican nominee Senator John McCain thinks - an unpopular war, this election should be the Democrat's to lose. The gulf between Obama and McCain on these and other major issues is sufficiently large, and Obama has the intelligence, knowledge, political skills, and mass appeal to capitalize on these differences.

There will be many battles ahead, and Obama can expect a dirty, even racist campaign from various Republican groups that McCain will try to distance himself from. This campaign will make any previous comments from the Clinton campaign or photos of Obama in a turban look mild by comparison.

But Obama has played the media like a violin, and unless he stumbles, it should carry him all the way to the White House.

This was published by AlterNet on February 27, 2008.

Comments

[Dem02020]

Agreed as to the powerful role this thing called a "media" plays in National Politics.

I'd state it only a little different, in referring mostly to this "media" as being those who broadcast on the PUBLIC AIRWAVES (and that includes cable television also), and point out just how few "media companies" enjoy that power and privilege (a privilege, not a Right, to broadcast, by way of License from the FCC, making a private commercial use of a public resource, the PUBLIC AIRWAVES).

I'd state that what these few powerful privileged (with FCC Licenses) "media companies" do, is to influence and manipulate the political opinions of the American People, all across those same People's own public resource, the PUBLIC AIRWAVES, and all according to the political wishes of the closely held ownership of those relatively few "media companies".

That's power in America, to influence and manipulate the American People's political opinions. Real power, worth more than money: because even if those "media companies" generated little or no financial profit from those FCC Licenses, they'd still find them (those FCC Licenses) to be an invaluable asset.

Because when these "media companies" broadcast the political opinions, day and night, of their ownership, then even if the seed of those broadcasts did not generate even a single advertising dollar, they would still sprout money and power from coast to coast, by way of influencing and manipulating the American People, and acquiring political power...

And that's the most power in the United States, and in the world.

Witness George W. Bush, and what he and Dick Cheney do, as business agents of sorts, for the oil and arms industries, in the U.S. and worldwide.

Witness News Corp. and Fox News as a good example of a "media company", that works this influence and manipulation of the American People's political opinions, all for the benefit of their ownership (and those in league with them), and regardless really of whatever advertising revenues they might generate by that broadcasting...

Broadcasting by way of a privileged FCC License, on the PUBLIC AIRWAVES.


Truly, it is the most amount of power in the U.S. and the world, to broadcast to the American People and to influence and manipulate their political opinions.

And that privileged power is closely held by a relatively few people...

And we License them to do this to us, for reasons I find hard to understand.

[Neaguy]

Obama goes to the White House. So what?
We still have free trade.
We still have a muscular foreign policy.
We still have increases in defense spending and troop increases.
We still have big money determining who the electable candidates are.
We still have insurance companies running health care.
We still have lobbyists running Washington and, yes, the White House.
We still have the death penalty.
We still have...
get the picture?
There ain't gonna be no change.
It's just a celebrity political show, what one writer called
a corporate managed parade.
The present trends will continue.

[dadw5boys]

The media has always played a roll in the Government.

Imagine how the citizens would have reacted if the media has published facts about businesses sending rotten food to the troops in the Civil War. Barrels of dirt or trash shipped to fill contracts but the military did not have time or the people to inspect the shipments.

Those who own a press truly have Freedom Of The Press and Freedom OF Speech!

[benjaminblue]

I'm not convinced that "most likely [John Edwards] would have lost anyway." I believe that had the media done its job -- reporting, rather than shaping the news to fit its narrative, that this race had to be "historic" -- Senator Edwards' voice would have been heard and his truths would have been recognized and embraced. Instead, thanks to the media's dismissive attitudes toward him -- and thanks to the media's insistence that people had to concentrate on and vote for either Senator Clinton or Senator Obama -- many people were led to conclude that a vote for Senator Edwards would not count for much, that he had lost the election before the race even started. I'm quite angry, still, that many of us in the "late voting" states were not given the chance to vote for our first choice, whether that was Senator Edwards or one of the others who bowed out after the first primary.

The way to get around the media's attempt to pick and choose for us is to have all state primaries on the same date. Then, when the top two or three candidates were chosen by the entire nation, it would be clear who should continue in the race and who shouldn't.

[ZydecoCaptain]

The media, and the broadcast media in particular, has far too much control over the political process. How many talking heads, from Olbermann and Matthews to O'Rielly and Limbaugh, do we actually need. They all give us their opinion...they tell us how we should think...rather than give us the facts and let us decide for ourselves. They parse and sensationalize everything to prove their point and promote their agenda. I personally am fed up with the media controling our politics and would like to see their role restricted to reporting only. If they want to give us an opinion or promote an agenda, they should be required to state it as such from the outset of the report. It angers greatly me when I see opinion presented as news and I fear for the future of the country when I realize that the general populace meekly, blithly, and blindly accepts this situation.

[Durango]

Exactly. Report the news. Leave it to me to figure out it's meaning. But the network news no longer reports any news. It is not opinion, just lame "features, mostly on miracle medical breakthroughs by biotech companies the anchors and producers own stock in (what other explanation could there be?).

I have taken to fast forwrding or muting the TV whenever a pundit comes on.

I can think for myself, Thank You Very Much.

[afrozashrafi]

yes. In every democratic country the media involves itself in a major way and it is not confined to the formation of the public opinion only . Today Media baron control channels and monitor the situation driven by their own political interests . No longer the Media can be assumed to be objective , committed or unrelenting towards the specific goals as defined from time to time . Infact Media raises and dismantles images and still seek concessions from the Government of the day .
It is a bundle of political ambitions and blatantly biased and do things contrary to its traditional roles . Today media is a pack of unsolicited desires and finds a role in the determination of every Government .

[rr52]

I just saw Ms. Huffington and Sam Donaldson on Good Morning America this morning, and I disagree with her on the media's reporting being unbiased because I wrote several blogs about the media's bias while it was happening like the following:

After Big Tuesday's primaries Clinton lead by over 50,000 popular votes and over 80 delegates. Obama was given a victory by the media for taking more states. So what, they were states with little delegates. But the media called it a DEAD HEAT. Now Obama leads by over 70 delegates only and Hillary is labeled as struggling and a loser already by the media. Where's the dead heat statements now? The same for the Wisconsin/Hawaii race. Hawaii was plastered all over the screen. I couldn't find the results for Wisconsin anywhere, I was all over the Internet. I thought something was funny when the media wasn't forthright with the results in Wisconsin. It's because Hillary almost won half the state, 27 delegates to Barack's 38. That's an example of how the media has hyped Obama beyond where he should have been early on.

Of course, I wrote this back when it was happening because now Obama is ahead. Just goes to show.