Birth of a Backlash - Democratic Underground

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Birth of a Backlash

The Wall Street Journal

Birth of a Backlash
By DOROTHY RABINOWITZ
March 7, 2008; Page W12

Long months before two "Saturday Night Live" skits lampooned a media besotted with Barack Obama -- the deathless eloquence of his speeches, his cool, his grace, his swooning crowds -- a large audience of Americans had begun to grasp the import of the daily drip drip drip of this infatuation on the part of journalists and commentators, and their equally obvious coldness, to put it mildly, to Sen. Obama's competitor Hillary Clinton. It was hard to miss. Finally, in the past few days, journalists seem to have reacted to the adroit skewering they took in the SNL skits.

A few began peppering Sen. Obama with queries more difficult than he was accustomed to, about delicate matters like the question of Louis Farrakhan's support, and hotter ones concerning his campaign's evasive responses with regard to a visit to the Canadian Embassy by an Obama adviser. A meeting in which assurances were reportedly made that Sen. Obama's denunciations of the North American Free Trade Agreement should be viewed in the light of the political season and its requirements... And then there were questions about Mr. Obama's dealings with Tony Rezko, a major political donor now on trial for influence-peddling -- too many questions. Apparently unaccustomed to such persistence from reporters on these issues, the visibly irate candidate walked away, but not before charging that he had already answered eight questions. A diligent if hopeless search of media commentary on this exchange turned up no charges that Sen. Obama was "whining" -- a description TV pundits and analysts have frequently tossed at Sen. Clinton. It did her no good, one sage grimly warned after the last debate, for Hillary Clinton to have whined about being asked the first question all the time.

Maybe not, but ultimately it may have done her considerable good to be on the receiving end, continuously, of confidently contemptuous descriptions of her performances on the campaign trail. Also doing her good, finally, were all those recitals, by pundits and reporters, of her bleak chances -- particularly compared with the celebratory tones accompanying reports on Mr. Obama's crowds and his prospects, not to mention occasions like his endorsement by top stars of the Kennedy clan -- with its resulting suggestion that a successor to JFK now walked among us. There was Ted, then there was Caroline Kennedy -- endorsing Barack Obama at the suggestion of her children, as we were informed with curious emphasis. Maria Shriver, first lady of California, came forward with her own endorsement not long after, because, as she explained, she had awakened that very morning compelled by inner necessity to make this public announcement. Which she had willingly done, she confided, without even getting her hair and makeup done. And all this in the end did Hillary Clinton good, however it may have felt, because her treatment by the media did not go unnoticed by voting Americans -- among them, certainly, the crowds who turned out for her in Ohio, Texas and Rhode Island.

(snip)

Still, she had one important power quietly working its magic for her and bringing out her voters. She had that army of pundits and journalists condescending to her, sniping, harrying her -- particularly in the past week -- to drop out, to give up, to let Mr. Obama concentrate on the battle. It helped, as well, for the public to have witnessed spectacles like the night of the Wisconsin primary, when every one of the cable news networks covered Mr. Obama's 40-minute-long stem-winder in full... Finally, it helped for the viewing public to have heard comments like Chris Matthews's heartfelt, if slightly delirious, reference -- by now forever enshrined in cultural memory -- to the thrill that ran up his leg when he heard an Obama speech. There's a lot to be said for a confessional mode that captures the spirit of the times so acutely. The same can't be said for an admission, by NBC reporter Lee Cowan, that told more than he intended. In an interview with his boss, Brian Williams, Mr. Cowan said that from a reporter's point of view it was almost hard to be objective about Obama.

(snip)

None of this is, of course, Mr. Obama's fault. He has merely been the beneficiary of adulation run amok in a large quarter of the media. We can now contemplate the strange and wonderful role that the media and their forecasts of Hillary Clinton's doom played on Tuesday -- a political resurrection story not exactly the equal of John McCain's, perhaps, but one we'll remember for a long time to come.

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