George Skelton writes today about Joe Klein’s new book, taking the common approach reporters love to take:  bashing political consultants.  Like reporters don’t play a role in shaping modern day campaigns.

Klein’s book is called "Politics Lost — How American Democracy Was Trivialized by People Who Think You’re Stupid."  Klein and Skelton see the "People" in that title as political consultants; I’m sure the political consultants would say that "people" could easily be switched out with the word "reporters."

Klein writes: "I am fed up with the insulting welter of sterilized speechifying, insipid photo ops, and idiotic advertising that passes for public discourse these days. I believe that American politics has become overly cautious, cynical, mechanistic, and bland; and I fear that the inanity and ugliness of postmodern public life has caused many Americans to lose the habits of citizenship."

Who do reporters go to when they want an "interesting" quote about a Republican candidate?  Bob Mulholland, a guy who gets paid to be a smack-talking bomb thrower.  Do reporters give him the cold shoulder because he demeans political dialogue?  Nope. 

I wish that more politicians made decisions about how to vote or what law to propose only because they believe that’s the right thing to do, not because they’ve seen a poll that says that’s what the public wants.  (I still believe that most do when they are elected. But it is awfully hard to ignore polling data when you’re trying to get elected.)

Besides, I believe that the modern day public wants someone who reads polls and listens to focus groups.  Really, does the public elect folks just do and say what they think is right? Let’s think back to 1998.  Who was the candidate that ignored his political consultants, ignored polls, and said what he felt?  Gray Davis?  No, that would be Dan Lungren.  Gray Davis was famously slavish to polls and whopped Lungren in the general election, getting 58% to Lungren’s 38% of the vote.

I’d like to think that the governor truly believed that the measures on the ballot in last year’s special election were the right thing to do, but did the press laud him for his leadership?  Did they put pressure on the unions to campaign on the issues and not attack Schwarzenegger personally? 

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think campaign consultants are angels.  They are there to get their guy or gal elected and make a ton of money in the meantime.  And I think that most reporters refuse to cover some of the lowdown and dirty tactics some consultants try. 

But as much as the press doesn’t like staged photo ops and mean campaign ads, the reality is that the public responds to both.  And they don’t want to have to pay attention to boring issues like reapportionment.  Really, just leave your comfy world of political friends and go have a conversion about reapportionment with a parent of one of your child’s schoolmates and see how long you can hold their attention.  I recently did this with a friend who was complaining about how partisan things are in Sacramento and Washington, DC.  These are smart people–they just don’t want to have to think about the details of the state budget and reapportionment . 

Besides, if you let a candidate speak freely and unscripted and he bumbles a word, does the press let it go?  Nope (just ask President Bush).  And even if the press ignored these mistakes, the Internet and talk radio jump all over them. 

It is sad that campaigns can’t be more of a respectful, give-and-take of ideas, but the American press corps bears as much responsibility for the way campaigns are conducted these days as do candidates and consultants.  In the end, the American public deserves the biggest blame.  Just like Nike knows how the market shoes in a way that the public wants, political consultants simply market their candidate in a way that the public wants. 

This entry was posted on Thursday, July 13th, 2006 at 12:00 am and is filed under Blog Posts.