Bully boys
Toolbox
Published: October 26, 2009
rdinarily, when an officeholder targets a news organization with complaints, news blackouts and lack of cooperation, it's a sign that the officeholder has something to hide or is seeking a scapegoat. We all remember President Nixon's enemies list. More recently, The New York Times and The Washington Post took their share of blame from the administration of George W. Bush because of their revelations about Bush misdeeds. The Rutland Herald is accustomed to a role as whipping boy for people who need someone to whip.
The Obama administration's war against Fox News could be a worrisome precedent, except we know from experience the pernicious methods that Fox uses to distort the news. Legitimate newsgathering efforts by Fox may suffer collateral damage in the crossfire between the Obama administration and the network's talking heads who serve as a conservative scourge, festering on the outrage they provoke as they carve out their special niche in the ratings. But it is naïve or delusional to equate the press's traditional adversarial role with the drumbeat of hateful attacks that emanates nightly from Fox's heavy hitters.
News organizations are not in the business of befriending government officials, and responsible journalism inevitably makes politicians unhappy. But the fear and loathing that underpins Fox's commentary is different in kind. Listen to the tone of voice of Fox's commentators: belligerent, angry, accusing, blustering, moralistic, self-righteous. Walter Cronkite is now nowhere in sight.
Fox makes a distinction between its news coverage and its commentators, and the distinction is a valid one. Editorials like this one and commentaries on newspaper op-ed pages and on television are supposed to take a point of view, and sometimes that point of view will reflect anger. But the newspapers don't put their editorials and commentaries on the front page. Fox puts its most celebrated personalities in prime time, flogging the cause of the day, which often has little to do with reality.
The Herald's close encounter with Fox had to do with Bill O'Reilly's determination that the Herald was the "worst newspaper" in the country because the paper did not support the kind of draconian response to child sexual abuse that he favored. During that week several years ago O'Reilly took on the Vermont press and suggested that viewers call the Herald's switchboard. It was a bullying tactic, a gesture of intimidation, that jammed the paper's switchboard and computers. It had nothing to do with a reasoned discussion of the issue.
Obama has made the calculation that it is in his interest to paint Fox as the equivalent of Rush Limbaugh. Thus, O'Reilly, Hannity and the rest are nothing but talk radio blowhards distorting the discussion and trying to feast off the adulation that is the reward of the demagogue. Obama would marginalize Fox by betting that the public, most of it, is sick of the anger and the bluster.
Even some Republicans have been alarmed that their party seems to have lost its voice except for the strident voices on the right that have nothing to say but no. Without voices of moderation, the Republicans have painted themselves into an increasingly narrow corner.
A generation ago it was the radical left that was accused constantly of tearing down America, of a lack of respect for established institutions, of a holier-than-thou sense of superiority. That role has now been assumed by the radical right.
Obama must guard against the kind of paranoia about conservative media that Nixon felt about liberal media. But he is not out of line speaking the truth about demagogues taking advantage of our system by putting themselves forward as lions of democracy.
But a lion is an image of strength. The bully is a weakling who tries to instill fear and depends upon the reluctance of others to stand up against him. Obama is right to stand up.
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