The Culture of Coziness in Washington

[bklyncowgirl]

The reaction of the mainstream media to Stephen Colbert's White House Correspondent's Dinner performance points out something very important about the culture of the Beltway.

These people love their rituals and traditions. It's part of being an important person working for the Federal Government or an important journalist covering people in power. Listening to Dana Milbank on Keith Olbermann's show, he seemed offended that Colbert did not engage in the sort of unchallenging light hearted banter that the Washington Power Brokers and Washington Press Corps like to celebrate and show the world their humorous, humble selves on this well publicized occaision. In fact, he seemed more offended by that than that the Bush administration by and large been giving the finger to the American Public, the American Congress and the American Constitution.

I once asked someone I know who works in the State Department why Colin Powell didn't simply resign when he saw he was being used to promote a war which he had a pretty good idea was going to be a disaster and a blot on his career. "He couldn't do that" she answered "He serves at the President's pleasure." You see the same thing in Democrats who lust for bipartisan consensus but who end up getting kicked in the butt every time. You see in it a press corps which did its best to ignore inconvenient truths like the Downing Street Memo.

There's something which happens to people when they get to a high level position in Washington. Maybe they put something it in the cucumber martinis (YUCK) that they serve at those invitation only coctail parties that turn formerly intelligent independent thinking people into DC zombies. Maybe it's the result of talking only to people who share the same mindset or maybe it's the fact that an ambitious person who veers from the path of Beltwaythink will be quickly dismissed as a kook.

At any rate, the Culture of Coziness is a big problem, especially when it refuses to see that the Bush administration has broken more of their rules than Stephen Colbert ever could.

[Guaranteed]

1. We're seeing some great posts this morning.

:)

[leveymg]

2. Fact is, most of these people were picked & groomed for these jobs since

they were 18 years old. They get talent spotted by teachers, recommended for internships, prove they're part of the team as entry-level scut boyz and girlz, and then given big salaries to carry out assignments that are handed to them by editors and publishers who are nothing more or less than corporate executives.

Journalism is an industry that's owned by the same companies that make gasoline and credit cards, which are ultimately run by oil sheikhs and international bankers, who make the big decisions. Everyone on the payroll serves at their will. Same thing with Congress.

Is it any mystery that almost all these Inside-the-Beltway Biggies think and act alike?

[Joe Fields]

3. The only really consistently courageous W.H. correspondent...

is Helen Thomas. And she is treated as an anacronism.

[Crankie Avalon]

4. It was an event where the ritual is for both...

...the administration and the press hacks to pat each other on the back. To "poke fun at themselves" in a totally self-serving way that ultimately flatters the "target" rather than holds a mirror to just exactly who and what they really are.

So, they expect little skits to perpetuate the myth that there is still some sort of adversarial "check-and-balance" relationship between those in power and those in the press. This farce flatters those in power by falsely implying that their conduct is capable of withstanding any sort of scrutiny, and flatters those who write (type) about the powerful by falsely implying they are intrepid challengers who keep those in power honest rather than being the lapdogs they actually are.

Colbert is not part of either of those worlds, so preserving the illusion was not important to him and he took his opportunity to speak as an honest third party. He held up mirrors to the fatcats and press courtiers in attendance, and they didn't like the reflection. Dana Millbank is part of one of those worlds, and no one (especially someone as self-important as a beltway journalist) likes to be reminded that he is a cowardly hack rather than whatever it is he needs to fantasize being.

The Dana Millbanks of the world are the wrong people to ask about Colbert's presentation. Keith Olbermann should have had non-journalists and non-politicians on, instead.

[bklyncowgirl]

7. It would be interesting if he did have non DC people talk about it.

Hey Keith, you listening?

[Dudley_DUright]

5. WTF?

:wtf:

I once asked someone I know who works in the State Department why Colin Powell didn't simply resign when he saw he was being used to promote a war which he had a pretty good idea was going to be a disaster and a blot on his career. "He couldn't do that" she answered "He serves at the President's pleasure."

Serving at the "president's pleasure" means that he can fire you at any time, NOT that you are not allowed to resign at anytime.

[bklyncowgirl]

6. From what she told me that is indeed the way they think.

For Powell to resign abruptly over his disagreements regarding the war would have been unthinkable to the DC mindset. On top of that Powell is a military man with an ethic of service to the civilian leadership.

Personally I think he should have resigned and said exactly why he was doing so but to do that would have placed him outside of that cozy DC world of which he has been a part for most of his career.

Of course as a non DC person I believe that to publicly go along with something as heinous as launching an unprovoked war while privately disagreeing with it is simply defaulting on one's duties as a human being.

[fasttense]

8. This thread is great. Some very insightful comments. n/t

[Tuesday_Morning]

9. I like Billmon on this subject too

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/billmon/american-nightmarez_b_20175.html

<snip>

Colbert used satire the way it's used in more openly authoritarian societies: as a political weapon, a device for raising issues that can't be addressed directly. He dragged out all the unmentionables -- the Iraq lies, the secret prisons, the illegal spying, the neutered stupidity of the lapdog press -- and made it pretty clear that he wasn't really laughing at them, much less with them. It may have been comedy, but it also sounded like a bill of indictment, and everybody understood the charges.

<snip>

Colbert's real sin wasn't lese majesty, it was inserting a brief moment of honesty into an event based upon a lie -- one considered socially necessary by the political powers that be, but still, a lie.

Like its upscale sibling, the annual Gridiron Club dinner, the White House Correspondents dinner is a ritual designed, at least implicitly, to showcase the underlying unity of our Beltway elites. It's supposed to demonstrate that no matter how ferocious their battles may appear on the surface, political opponents can still gather in the same room and break bread, with the corporate media acting as the properly neutral host. It's a relic of the good old days of centrism and bipartisan log rolling ("the end of ideology"), visible proof that in the American system, there may be enemies, but there are no mortal enemies. And so last night we had Joe Wilson and Valerie Plame sitting at one table, Karl Rove at another, and no knives were drawn.

The light entertainment at these events is also supposed to reflect the same spirit of forced good cheer, to the point where even matters of deadly seriousness -- things that in other countries might cause governments to fall -- are treated like inside jokes, as with Shrub's looking-for-the-missing-WMDs-under-the-couch routine. Ha ha ha. We're all friends here!

<snip>

more at link.

[Spazito]

10. Well said!

It is, indeed, the culture of coziness that was brilliantly exposed by Colbert and that, in the MSM's mind, is unforgivable.