Sam Donaldson is probably more responsible for the dumbing down and

[WCGreen]

political polarization of the news in this country than anyone else.

While it happened, it was a wonder to perceive, the caustic and brusque reporter who was not afraid of the majesty of the White House and zoomed right to the meat of a story.

He was always in the press corp., always with a camera and always giving no quarter to who ever happened to be standing at the pressroom podium.

But looking back, what Donaldson did was give a voice and a face to the right wing feeling of persecution of and by the press.

Until then, it was just Birches and Reagan inspired kool-aid drinking sycophant who TRULY believed the press was a liberal elite eastern establishment that was against mom, apple pie and the flag.

Because it was the Reagan administration that Donaldson attacked, it provided living daily proof to the meme that the press was out to get Reagan in particular and the right in general.

Even though Donaldson was a good reporter, it was his caustic approach, his us against them that shattered the cozy relationship that the White House beat had with who ever happened to be occupying the White House.

Of course, there was Watergate, but that did not work as a touchstone for the right against the press because for one, Nixon was not a member of the Reagan Right. Remember it was his Administration that created the EPA, opened up relations with China, proposed the idea of a negative income tax that later became the Earned Income Credit and the initiated the establishment of Affirmative Action are the big examples.

The ideological war between the party's really erupted in 1972 with McGovern being the nominee but it was not until the Reagan era that the lines hardened into the atherosclerosis we have today.

[Vinnie From Indy]

1. I would have thought that it was men like Rupert Murdoch

and the concentration of our media in the hands of a few corporations.

[WCGreen]

2. Donaldson gave the right a punching bag and an example for it's

base that it really was us against them.

Murdoch and Limbaugh came to the front almost a decade after Sam was ABC's White House correspondent.

[Vinnie From Indy]

3. I have always believed that it was when Walter Cronkite made his famous statement about

Viet Nam being lost that many on the right resolved to build what we see today.

[BOG PERSON]

4. don't blame sam donaldson

blame the invention of television, which exposed just how boring the business of washington really was, and had to find conflict where there wasn't any, because conflict is what attracts audiences.

[WCGreen]

7. Up until then, they didn't carry press briefings live....

they actually had reporters out and about looking for stories instead of depending on the administration to set the news.

[kskiska]

5. I'll never forget Donaldson standing in front of the W.H.

when the Monica Lewinsky story broke, predicting that the remainder of the Clinton Administration would now be measured in days.

[WCGreen]

6. Hyperbole thy human incarnation is Sam Donaldson...