He’s Talking To You, Chuck
Unserious person and DFH James Fallow is being all sorts of unvillagelike and calling you out, Chuck Todd:
Seriously, when does an official part of the chattering class—one of the weekend talkers, someone from the leading newspapers—look back on these past two weeks in journalism’s effort to represent reality and ask how the dominant narrative could have been so wrong, and wrong in a way that was easily noticeable at the time? Just curious. The guiding motto for the inquiry should be the deathless subhead on Tish Durkin’s article: “Even through a veil of censorship and propaganda, the Chinese people managed a clearer view of Obama’s visit than the US media did.”
Any comments from the bobbleheads? Chuck Todd? Mr. Gregory? Georgie? Anyone?
November 27, 2009 4:13 pm
Posted in: Media
67 Comments
67 Responses
Sue - November 27, 2009 | 4:18 pm · Link
“dominant narrative”? What does Sarah Palin have to do with this?
jeffreyw - November 27, 2009 | 4:21 pm · Link
I think it’s Fallows, and he has better chops than any of the usual suspects on talking head tv.
jeffreyw - November 27, 2009 | 4:23 pm · Link
Not gonna bother to dig the articles out, but he was right on Iraq at the same time that being wrong was cool.
licensed to kill time - November 27, 2009 | 4:25 pm · Link
I am really glad Fallows is calling them out. Someone has to note that the infotainment crowd is nekkid.
beltane - November 27, 2009 | 4:25 pm · Link
The product churned out by our cocktail party bobbleheads is no better than the propaganda of a state-run media. In fact, it is worse in that it does not even give the appearance of being serious. The best-known media figures here are almost without exception catty, vapid, trivial, and downright ignorant.
Cat Lady - November 27, 2009 | 4:26 pm · Link
Go Fallows. I think he’s found his grail quest, now that he’s really seeing with new eyes how far his profession has fallen since he’s been back from China. Let’s see how long the Village can ignore him while he attempts to fucking burn it down.
comrade scott's agenda of rage - November 27, 2009 | 4:29 pm · Link
In some ways, Fallows has become the point guy for Villager criticiscm ever since the (com)Post fired Froomkin. Yeah, I know Froomkin’s out there but he just doesn’t seem to be getting the exposure he once did.
Whatever we hear from Chuckles and his ilk will be the same tired old bromides and excuses about how they got it right and the flak they’re getting ultimately originates with lefty bloggers who
a) don’t know wtf they’re talking about cus, yunno, we ain’t journalists and all that,
b) we use foul lanquage (which they do too—just ask anybody who’s ever worked in a newsroom), and
c) we’re shrill.
Oh yeah, we’re communists trying to socialize Obama’s nazism but that’s for another thread.
Zach - November 27, 2009 | 4:30 pm · Link
Sometimes I wonder how successful a Sunday news show packed to the gills with unserious people airing on CBS after Sunday Morning would do… preferably in a format combining segments like the old Meet the Press (a panel of journalists interviewing a newsmaker) and Firing Line (one on one debates on issues of the week… updated for the modern era with questions from the Internet or something).
General Winfield Stuck - November 27, 2009 | 4:32 pm · Link
There are entirely too many Idiots on my idiot box.
slag - November 27, 2009 | 4:34 pm · Link
If the Village didn’t make it their business to ignore their critics, they would have no business.
OK. That was way too many negatives, but you get the idea.
OT: I walked to a place that I thought was going to be absolutely insane with shoppers today (just to see what it was like). The result: No wait in line whatsoever. No problem getting through the aisles. I was even able to find an employee to answer a question for me. If they always staffed their store this well, I would shop there more. But sadly for them, they’re probably losing money today. I don’t know if my experience is at all representative, but if so, it truly is a black Friday for most retailers this year.
Napoleon - November 27, 2009 | 4:36 pm · Link
@jeffreyw:
I think you are talking about this article:
http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200211/fallows
The Bearded Blogger - November 27, 2009 | 4:37 pm · Link
It’s fun to observe how much more shrill the villagers are than the people outside who are “shrill” because they call them out on their hackery.
I sued to think the demise of trad-med would be a bad thing. These days, I can’t wait for the lot of them to go bankrupt
Cat Lady - November 27, 2009 | 4:39 pm · Link
@slag:
OK, point taken, because without knowing for sure I know for sure that neither Fallows nor Huntsman will be on my TV on Sunday, and that Lieberman, McCain, Cantor, Bayh, Lincoln, Nelson, Schumer, Gingrich, Armey or Perino will be.
jeffreyw - November 27, 2009 | 4:42 pm · Link
@Napoleon: That’s the one. Love the intro:
comrade scott's agenda of rage - November 27, 2009 | 4:42 pm · Link
People like Fallows and Froomkin are the Don Quixote’s of our day: so many Villager windmills, so immune from a lancer charge.
Quit reading my mind. Except that it would screw sports reporters who, at least at the WaPo, are the best reporters. They actually report, are objective, don’t fall into repeating team talking points as if they are unassailable facts, etc.
Mike G - November 27, 2009 | 4:44 pm · Link
The best-known media figures here are almost without exception catty, vapid, trivial, and downright ignorant.
They’re good little corporate PR drones, attentive to their bosses’ whims and opinions, spinning storylines they know will get them pats on the head in their incestuous little circle.
If you start thinking of them as storytellers rather than journalists, it starts to make more sense.
slag - November 27, 2009 | 4:47 pm · Link
@Cat Lady: Don’t forget the Cheneys! Can’t have a Village hoedown without them.
The Bearded Blogger - November 27, 2009 | 4:47 pm · Link
@comrade scott’s agenda of rage:
Maybe that’s where KO got his objectivity?
It’s true, sports reporting is one of the few remaining places where vapid infontainment/propaganda has yet to replace journalism…
comrade scott's agenda of rage - November 27, 2009 | 4:47 pm · Link
Hmmmm, this reminds me of post-WWII Europe and Japan. Gee, we got it right in both cases. I shudder to think of what would have happened if Dubya and his cronies were in charge back then. Everything would have been outsourced, everything would have been mismanaged, in short, everything would have been fucked up.
The more I reflect on the 8 years of the Cheney Presidency, the more I consider it to be the nadir of an American presidency.
geg6 - November 27, 2009 | 4:52 pm · Link
James Fallows, a true journalist and true gentleman, has obviously been appalled by the state of journalism here in America. Time away in China gave him the distance needed to see the Village for what it is. THE most unserious people in the country is what they are and now Fallows has seen that. And what he has seen has made him, one of the most polite people on earth, call people out, a turn of events I would never have expected from this particular man. No one knows China as well as Fallows and he clearly saw the significance of the China trip and no one paid him an ounce of attention. And the trip was even more successful than Fallows intuited. In fact, it was wildly successful. But we won’t hear that from our Liberal Media. And Fallows is daring them to do exactly that. But they don’t care. Thankfully, Sally Quinn was extremely impressed and approving of the Obamas’ State Dinner abilities, so although he’s a completely failed preznit, he hasn’t trashed the place like those gauche Clintons.
slag - November 27, 2009 | 4:55 pm · Link
@comrade scott’s agenda of rage: Re-reading that article makes me want to punch every single one of these assholes in the face. (And that includes John Cole sometimes even though it would just be an unnecessary, one-time “That’s for being such an asshole back in high school” kind of gesture.)
Mike G - November 27, 2009 | 5:03 pm · Link
Meanwhile on Faux News, bone-stupid rendered in visual form—
http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/2.....hart-ever/
slag - November 27, 2009 | 5:07 pm · Link
@Mike G: Haha! Best comment:
I wish I had said that.
Violet - November 27, 2009 | 5:08 pm · Link
Oh, John Cole. You ask for so much.
Chuckie is too busy making insightful comments like this to ask his pretty little brain to spend time on something so hard as actual policy:
Thank goodness the Washington press corps is on the turkey beat.
The Main Gauche of Mild Reason - November 27, 2009 | 5:10 pm · Link
@Mike G:
Nice that Ritholtz is still nominally independent; I was worried for awhile when he went on his relentless anti-Geithner/Obama kick and I stopped reading him.
valdivia - November 27, 2009 | 5:10 pm · Link
I have been loving all the Fallows posts on the China trip. Yesterday and today he totally hit it out of the park with the snark in the title. I am curious to hear, if any of you have been paying attention, how these developments are being framed in the media now. Are they reporting the advances in climate change targets to cut emissions in china and the iran resolution (with both china and russia joining) as simple coincidences or actual work of the Obama team.
tomvox1 - November 27, 2009 | 5:13 pm · Link
Fallows has been a pit bull on the pant leg of the president’s Asia trip on both its real long-term implications and the MSM’s completely myopic and superficially wrong-headed misreading of it. But his point at the end of this most recent post is a particularly interesting one:
The inference that the generally poor quality of MSM international affairs reportage prevalent today is at least partly to blame on the dearth of fully staffed major media foreign bureaus is an offhand but salient observation by Fallows. And just as important IMO is the other side of this equation: reporters stationed overseas for any length of time gain valuable perspectives that they carry with them should they return to covering domestic political assignments, an ability to look at America from the outside that seems sorely lacking in many of today’s commentators.
rs - November 27, 2009 | 5:18 pm · Link
Another unserious journalist, Amy Goodman, was detained at the border for over an hour on Wednesday trying to cross from Washington to BC to give a speech.@Zach: A show like that exists, albeit not on CBS and not on Sundays. It’s GritTV, hosted by Laura Flanders, on FSTV (Dish Network 9415).
Autboy - November 27, 2009 | 5:19 pm · Link
turn off the TV. Or shoot it
Gwangung - November 27, 2009 | 5:20 pm · Link
@tomvox1: Ding! Ding! Ding!
Anne Laurie - November 27, 2009 | 5:23 pm · Link
@Violet:
Truly, for if our impudent POTUS had failed to honor the long-standing Turkey-Pardoning Tradition, it would have been Mr. Todd’s duty as a new-minted Media Village Idiot to deplore, I tell you, deplore said failure as a sign of Clobama’s dithering in the face of Real America’s™ enemies. (So unlike POTUS-in-Waiting Palin, who not only pardons turkeys, but shows no hesitation to be filmed while they are shoved head-first into killing tubes and decapitated! Our Sarah, CSC, would happily & efficiently waterboard any turkey to protect America from terrorists…. could we count on That One to do as much? ! ? Is it irresponsible to speculate, even?)
Mike G - November 27, 2009 | 5:28 pm · Link
He’s certainly been critical of Geithner’s coziness with Wall Street and the handling of the financial crisis (and I agree with him) but I didn’t perceive a general anti-Obama shift, more a frustration with the specific policies in this area.
Most immigrants living in the US, and Americans who have lived overseas for significant chunks of time (like myself), perceive this as a general problem with American society, its insularity and parochialness and disinterest in the rest of the world on more than a self-interested, superficial basis (“Where our troops at this week?”).
But it is particularly acute in American journalism where blow-dried corporate-PR banality, puerile simplistic storylines and camera-hogging self-promotion are the dominant values, and the jingoistic, proud-know-nothingism of Fox News is widely emulated. Observe a BBC-trained reporter like Christiane Amanpour and you can immediately see the difference. Watching CNN’s international channel compared with the US version pisses me off, because it readily becomes apparent that they are knowingly feeding the US audience idiotic, nationistic, puerile slop despite being capable of doing better.
Violet - November 27, 2009 | 5:30 pm · Link
@Anne Laurie:
So funny, yet sadly so true. Can you imagine what the Sunday morning Bobblehead Hours would be like had Barack not pardoned the turkey? Turkeygate scandal! Obama not living up to demands of office! President heaps scorn on American tradition!
Nevermind any real news like China, Iran, or even the Dubai meltdown. It would be All Turkey All the Time.
Our media is pathetic.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ - November 27, 2009 | 5:31 pm · Link
The Village cannot fail, it can only be failed.
Shorter James Fallows: “I am not a number, I am a free man!”
Cue the giant white bouncing beach balls, as they smother him with bullshit and inanity. That’s all our so-called media pundits are any more – the bouncing white beach balls of comformity, reacting mechanically to anything which tries to breach the perimeter.
Adam Collyer - November 27, 2009 | 5:35 pm · Link
@The Bearded Blogger:
You definitely do not follow college football, who’s entire championship crowning scheme relies on vapid infotainment/propaganda.
In this arena, the Southeastern Conference (the SEC) is “clearly” the best league in football, since it has all the brand name teams (i.e., Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Tennessee, Auburn, etc.) and exists in the psycho college football subculture known as the South. This, despite the fact that Alabama and Florida are the only two very good teams while the rest of the conference flails about in mediocrity.
In contrast, the Big Ten (which has 11 teams…don’t get me started) is considered to be in a “down year” (second in a row, now) because Michigan is awful, Ohio State lost to USC very early in the year, Iowa won multiple games in dramatic fashion (in media-speak, read as: lucky), and Penn State has played a “joke schedule” that literally mimics every major conference team’s schedule in America.
Believe me, infotainment is alive and well in the sports arena. In fact, watching ESPN makes me long for the “objective” reporting of CNN.
Martin - November 27, 2009 | 5:36 pm · Link
@tomvox1:
Correct. And since Fallows served as editor of US News & WR back in the 90s, he understands the problem in the media from the nuts-and-bolts side of things as well.
I don’t expect that Fallows will be a pitbull on broad domestic media idiocy because I suspect he’s going to focus on his areas of expertise and leave the general stuff to everyone else (even knowing full well that they won’t do it.)
Cat Lady - November 27, 2009 | 5:38 pm · Link
@valdivia:
This Umbrella Uproar shows how carefully planned this trip was, but since Chuckie Todd’s nuance detector is set on 0 and the narrative is set, we get media twits twittering turkey twaddle.
ksmiami - November 27, 2009 | 5:41 pm · Link
Bueller, Bueller????
Martin - November 27, 2009 | 5:44 pm · Link
@Mike G:
Wait until US News realizes that dropping from a weekly to a monthly won’t save their asses and rebrands as Hot Naked Chicks & World Report. I’m thinking 2012 at the latest.
Kyle - November 27, 2009 | 5:45 pm · Link
Don’t even go there. It would be a solid week of “Out of touch with the Heartland” and “Obama hates farmers” and “Is Obama a secret vegetarianazi?” headline stories and flag pin/Dijon mustard/arugula nonsense.
Martin - November 27, 2009 | 5:47 pm · Link
Oh, and kudos to the Secret Service for admitting that they are embarrassed by the state dinner episode. Yes, it was a fuck-up, but it’s nice to see someone lead off not trying to polish the turd. It’d be nice to see every single other government agency admit to their fuck-ups as well.
Cat Lady - November 27, 2009 | 5:49 pm · Link
@Cat Lady:
Obama’s failure in China is especially acute when compared to this.
The Bearded Blogger - November 27, 2009 | 5:59 pm · Link
@Adam Collyer: true, I’m a soccer man myself. There are a few wanker announcers and a couple of overhyped players (beckahm, cough, beckham) but all in all the quality of reporting is good.
Napoleon - November 27, 2009 | 6:03 pm · Link
I am a little surprised no one has mentioned this but Fallows has long been critical of the US press and even wrote a book about the problems with the press 10 or 15 years ago (or even longer ago then that).
Shawn in ShowMe - November 27, 2009 | 6:04 pm · Link
How many times does the other shoe have to drop before it becomes clear that Obama really is playing 7-dimensional chess?
freelancer (itouch) - November 27, 2009 | 6:07 pm · Link
@Martin:
SHIT SUCKS!
eemom - November 27, 2009 | 6:11 pm · Link
yeah, yeah, Obama pardoned the turkey…...but do you know WHY he pardoned the turkey?? Because it wasn’t read its Miranda rights, that’s why!! Same reason the 9/11 terrists are gonna be acquitted and taken by limo to LaGuardia airport and provided with another set of jetliners!
REAL Americans hold press conferences in front of turkey slaughterhouses, just in case you didn’t KNOW.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ - November 27, 2009 | 6:14 pm · Link
@Shawn in ShowMe:
I don’t think that Obama is playing 7-dimensional chess so much as that our press corpse has been playing 1-dimensional Russian Roulette. They finished emptying all the chambers into what was left of their brains a long time ago, but that zombie won’t go down easy. We need to burn it with fire.
You Don't Say - November 27, 2009 | 6:21 pm · Link
@jeffreyw: If you’re talking about the Atlantic story he did on post-war planning in 2003, I think, that was the best piece of journalism I’ve ever read.
Maude - November 27, 2009 | 6:22 pm · Link
During the European visit by the Obama’s, the foreign press was very critical of the coverage by the US press.
The only thing I can think of when someone says msm is a baby hitting a highchair table with a spoon.
Notorious P.A.T. - November 27, 2009 | 6:28 pm · Link
So if someone criticizes Obama, you ignore them? Don’t care to be part of the reality-based community?
Notorious P.A.T. - November 27, 2009 | 6:30 pm · Link
@Martin:
hahaha )
Mark S. - November 27, 2009 | 6:40 pm · Link
@eemom:
Didn’t Scalia mention in one of his dissents how many pardoned turkeys have returned to the battlefield?
Brachiator - November 27, 2009 | 6:41 pm · Link
@The Bearded Blogger:
The only problem is that the new media is long on opinion, but woefully deficient when it comes to original reporting.
And I get a sense that people like Rupert Murdoch are trying to find ways to be major information suppliers as other organizations fall by the wayside. The struggles may not be pretty.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ - November 27, 2009 | 6:42 pm · Link
@Shawn #45:
Obama isn’t playing 7-dimensional chess. Our press corpse has been playing 1-dimensional Russian Roulette; the chambers are empty, their brains are long gone, but by some unholy means they are still walking. That zombie won’t go down easy – we’re going to have to burn it with fire.
[crosses fingers, prays, and makes a sacrifice to the fickle gods of comment moderation]
General Winfield Stuck - November 27, 2009 | 6:55 pm · Link
Jaysus christ – CNN political reporting is a post apocalyptic waste land.
Yutsano - November 27, 2009 | 7:04 pm · Link
@General Winfield Stuck: They do political reporting on CNN? I thought it was the DC version of Page Six.
@Brachiator: What scares me more is how much Uncle Rupert wants to control said content to further his own business agenda. I’m waiting for a Saturday Night Massacre at the WSJ any day now if they dare to say anything bad about the old man.
Annie - November 27, 2009 | 7:10 pm · Link
@Brachiator:
But, CNN and the New York Times do a hell of a job of original reporting—both covered the riveting and compelling story of misspellings on the dinner menu at the Indian state dinner. Apparently several wines were misspelled as was the word “chickpea.”
Now that story alone should tell us much about the state of diplomacy under the Obama administration, as well as the nature of China-US relations. I bet the Chinese had every important word spelled correctly, if nothing else to show Obama which country is holds the power.
Brachiator - November 27, 2009 | 7:10 pm · Link
@Napoleon:
Man, I wish that someone in the White House would read Fallows’ article in advance of Obama’s speech on Afghanistan decision.
Martin - November 27, 2009 | 7:14 pm · Link
CNN is about to talk about the UNs strong rebuke to Iran. What are the odds they’ll mention China’s change of position on that issue following Obama’s visit? Zero? Yeah, I think so too.
Yutsano - November 27, 2009 | 7:15 pm · Link
@Martin: But…but..but…THE TRIP WAS A FAILURE! Didn’t you get the latest talking point?
burnspbesq - November 27, 2009 | 7:26 pm · Link
@comrade scott’s agenda of rage:
As long as the Kaplan Daily continues to pay Stephen Goff, it has no claim to having a top-notch sports section. His awfulness more than outweighs everything that Kornheiser and Wilbon contribute.
Brachiator - November 27, 2009 | 7:39 pm · Link
@Annie:
I will bash CNN and the New York Times every day and twice on Sundays.
This doesn’t change the hard facts: the major media concerns are losing money and going out of business, but there ain’t much popping up to take their place.
Mike - November 27, 2009 | 7:45 pm · Link
People are acting like Fallows has just come around to this point of view, but he’s been beating this drum for a long time. Go read his excellent book, Breaking the News, which was a brutal critique of the American media, which came out over 12 years ago!
Tuck Chodd - November 27, 2009 | 8:12 pm · Link
I’m like so totally going to de-friend Fallows from my Facebook page
1!!
And he can just like forget about pre-Christmas drinksies at the tire swing with John and Lindsey.
Tuck Chodd
Annie - November 27, 2009 | 8:24 pm · Link
@Brachiator:
I agree with you. Hence, the riveting stories about misspelled words, and almost no coverage of the shit in Iraq. They are trying to follow the Fox model—crap that makes money—without seeming too be moving in that direction.
With internet it is hard for the traditional media to make money. I read the New York Times for free every morning on-line. I don’t need to subscribe.
Unfortunately or fortunately, with so much on internet people just gravitate to sites aligned with their political views. Or, do what I do. Each morning I go to sites I disagree with just see what daily bullshit is being offered. Then I go back to sites I love.
The lines between opinion and news are completely blurred. And many people don’t read. They just drift to sites like Fox News to have their biases reinforced. And, think they are getting objective news.
We are in a crisis with our media.
apistat - November 27, 2009 | 10:00 pm · Link
If anyone is interested in subscribing to The Atlantic there’s a black friday deal here:
http://www.discountmags.com/pr.....slickdeals
1 year subscription for only 4 dollars. I bought one this afternoon.