The second most troubling thing to emerge from the Democratic presidential primary this year was the eruption of media sexism, or perceived media sexism, in the treatment of Hillary Clinton's candidacy.
A genuine feeling of grievance about unfair, biased, and unequal treatment has emerged not only from the campaign itself, but from her mass of supporters, independent third parties, and even from the direction of people affiliated with her political rivals and enemies. Emerging early on in the debate, it never went away, and in the case of certain commentators and journalists, worsened as the contest continued. Although Clinton herself never addressed it directly until the very end of the campaign, it hit so close to home and contained such a portion of truth that it served as an organizing principle for thousands of her supporters, who, in an underground grassroots movement largely ignored by the media, wrote it on blogs, in listservs, and talked about it within the safe and sympathetic zone of woman-to-woman conversation, wondering how the same reporters and pundits who had shown such unthinking deference to George W. Bush as he openly lied to the nation for eight years about matters with the gravest of international consequence could endlessly criticize Hillary Clinton for campaign errors of comparably little weight.
We heard about it. We all know about it. Despite their weight, the charges themselves were the second most troubling thing.
Far worse was the deafening silence with which this outcry was met.
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One of the best things about American journalism is that it is very self-reflexive.
American political reporters, since they are certainly not in it for the money, are a largely idealistic lot that wants our democracy to work, and they understand the value of their craft as a part of that process. Journalism training and indeed, the entire ethos of the industry (even under the current economic pressure) instills in most people in the system a genuine commitment to professional ethics, the most important of these is fairness - a studied openness to all viewpoints, regardless of personal stance.
In most industries, conferences are usually about technology and marketing. But in journalism, industry get-togethers have a very strong component of self-critique: in seminars, reporters and editors question themselves: are we covering our community well? Are we representing all viewpoints?... a continual professional review that also happens in the web of journalism academia.
For example, here is the mission statement of USC's Annenberg School for Communication:
Every human advancement or reversal can be understood through communication.
The right to free communication carries with it the responsibility to respect the dignity of others, and this must be recognized as irreversible.
In an industry so openly committed to representing and documenting the experience of the public in its entirety, one would think that a charge of widespread sexism towards a pioneering female political figure would be taken seriously. One would think that media outlets from CNN to Rolling Stone, now that her campaign is over, would be going through a serious self-review, questioning themselves about the veracity of the charges, looking at the available evidence, and comparing what was said about Clinton to what might have been said against a comparable figure in a similar situation - say, the treatment of John Kerry in the 2004 primary. The evidence is easy to find, easy to review, and in many cases has already been well-documented.
But none of that is happening. In fact, the silence is chilling. As if the charge of sexism wasn't really anything to worry about.
It is something to worry about. Above and beyond the political trajectory of the Clinton campaign itself, the possibility that some of the most powerful people in the media - the men and women who cover and comment on presidential campaigns - have a bias against a group that represents more than half the population, but is still struggling to attain even a basic threshold of representation in government, is a very serious matter. Whether future organizing and political efforts by this group of people will be met with more misogyny and poison, and how to remedy and prevent that - these are serious matters as well. But most important is whether the media has the courage and idealism enough to confront these charges, examine their own work, and wipe their lens free of bias, for the great and honorable goal of achieving the "human advancement" of shared political power between women and men.
Honesty and humility are always a great deal to ask. All but the most preternaturally self-confident of human beings can deal with such serious criticism without going on the defensive. But sexism, like racism or any other prejudice, is something that is passed on subconsciously through our culture - hardly something for which one individual can be at fault. Prejudice is extremely hard to extricate from one's subconscious, but it can be counteracted if is brought to the surface and seen clearly.
And this can be done. Witness the amazing example of Barack Obama getting through an entire primary with no instances of unfair treatment by the media on account of his race. In a media environment dominated by whites, this is a huge milestone that took decades to achieve - conversations, honesty, dialogue, and most of all, a scrupulous commitment to fairness and justice within American journalism itself.
It is my hope that we will see a day where sexism and stereotypes of female political figures are also only vaguely remembered, and that women in politics can act with the full range of public actions as do their male counterparts. I know that everyone who ventures out there every day to do the work of covering politics feels the same way.
The media can cross that distance with honesty, or, to phrase it differently...with some very good reporting on itself.
Does a candidate's policy proposals reveal the kind of president he/she would be? Paul Krugman today in the NYT suggests that policy proposals have revealed the kind of leadership that past presidential candidates. He points out that Bush proposed big tax cuts for the rich and followed through on them, making life harder for the rest of us.
The moral is that it's important to take a hard look at what candidates say about policy..... policy proposals offer a window into candidates' political souls - a much better window, if you ask me, than a bunch of supposedly revealing anecdotes and out-of-context quotes.
The current issue that McCain, Clinton and Obama have responded to is the mortgage crisis. Krugman analyzes the three responses and I found his analysis interesting and to be troubling for progressives.
Just prior to the debate In Austin last night I spoke with several reporters about their presidential primary reporting. Collectively, their answers reveal a powerful force in political reporting: Narrative Stickiness.
Narrative stickiness results in strange reporting. Some pundits (I saw it primarily on MSNBC) have pointed to Hillary's "magic moment" in her last debate answer last night and to the standing ovation she received. But I was there. The standing ovation was for both candidates. In fact, a CNN stage manager was waving his arms for the audience to stand, signaling the debate was over. It had nothing to do with what Hillary had said. The audience thought the debate was over. Many are also overlooking the fact that this supposedly spontaneous and emotional Clinton moment was actually a rephrasing of remarks by her husband and John Edwards.
There's little doubt that most of the nation's traditional media outlets assumed two years ago that Hillary Clinton would be the Democratic presidential nominee. Letting go of that narrative has proved difficult for them, to say the least. It's not too difficult to imagine what the reporting would be like if Obama had lost 10 primaries and caucuses in a row.
One reporter I respect called it the rule of the "oscillating narrative." Obama's up, so the press naturally wants news -- and news would be a Hillary comeback. I don't think that captures what's going on here.
I wrote this for today's Beyond Chron, San Francisco's Alternative Online Daily.
In the presidential campaign, we've heard a lot about "experience" (a plus for Hillary Clinton), "change" (Barack Obama's strongest point), and "electability" (which helps John Edwards.) But one factor that has yet to play a role is "trust." It is one thing to hear what a candidate has to say, but how can progressives know who will stick to their guns when the right-wing noise machine attacks - and who will capitulate, triangulate and take our support for granted? If "trust" becomes a major concern for Democratic primary voters, Hillary Clinton could be in trouble. And while a candidate can tout their resume to boost "experience," their platform to project "change," and good poll numbers to push "electability," there isn't much they can do about the fact that voters don't trust them. Especially when you've been in the public eye for 15 years.
Matt Yglesias slaps me around here in a piece entitled "Against Folksy Primaries" for my post here waxing rhapsodic on the Iowa caucuses, saying,
…it's hard to see how any liberal can be happy, at the end of the day, with the distorting effect the disproportionate influence of Iowa and New Hampshire have on our politics.
His argument is that Iowa and New Hampshire are too white to be good starting places for the presidential process.
I agree with him on one level. Iowa and New Hampshire are way too white to be ideal starting places for the presidential campaign. As much as I love my old friends in Iowa, I think it's an unfortunate historical accident that those are the first two states. I would prefer that other small states be the first two- New Mexico, Nevada, Arkansas, Wisconsin, Missouri would all be better beginning states because of their racial diversity. That's why I was delighted that Nevada and South Carolina were selected to move up on the calendar by the DNC to provide more influence.
But here's the deal: for all the reasons I argued in my earlier post, and more beyond, I still believe passionately in small state starting this thing. How else will presidential candidates ever be face to face with real voters for such a sustained period? Matt never answers that question, but I think it is essential- I think it is the one thing standing between the presidential races being 100% about money and symbolism.
I'm going to chime in on the discussion about 2008 presidential candidates and the blogosphere that Chris weighed in on over the weekend.
Obviously, this is a post in which letting people know up front that I have chosen a candidate to support is relevant (in fact, it's the point). So: I support Barack Obama in 2008, and I'm supporting him as part of an independent grass-roots PAC in California called Vote Hope. This is the latest in my years of experience in electoral and movement politics, including working on the Dean campaign, dozens of state and local races, and being in meetings with Jesse Jackson.
I think Chris was brave to raise this issue, and I thank him for it. Difficult conversations are important, and I admire Chris, and the blogosphere in general, for the willingness to have them.
Chris ended up exploring the issue from a personal level rather than trying to speak about the blogosphere as a whole, and reading through the discussions sparked by his post, that feels like a valuable lesson. While it is tempting to try to analyze the progressive blogosphere in terms of a single voting bloc, that's just not the reality of what's happening in the blogosphere. People who are active in this sector of the movement come to it from very different perspectives, and it has gotten large enough now that it would be unreasonable to expect widespread agreement on one candidate.
However, there are some important questions I think we should be asking ourselves. Chris asked a few over the weekend, and Matt asked some different ones last week. Given that my lens is much more from a broad, progressive movement-building perspective than a "netroots" perspective, my main question is: What is the role of candidates in movement-building?
I actually worked for Joe Biden the first time he ran for president, in 1987. I didn't agree with him on a fair number of things, but I liked his passion, intelligence, eloquence and bluntness. Being in Iowa, I got to know all of the candidates and their families, and Joe and his wonderful wife Jill really appealed to me on a personal level as well- they were fun to hang out with and easy to talk to. So I signed on. For the short time it lasted, it was a wild ride. Richard Ben Cramer's great book, What it Takes, captures well the zaniness of Bidenland, but at the end of the ride, I left with great respect and affection for Joe, which I still carry.
So I write Joe this open letter, and I encourage him to respond in our new Right to Respond section, so that those of us in the blogosphere can have a genuine give-and-take with him.
