A MEDIA WATCH SPECIAL REPORT
PLAY DUMB
Posted January 20, 2002
A favorite topic on some discussion boards
is the arrogant and condescending tone of Ari Fleischer’s
stonewalling efforts at White House press briefings. Spin
can be accomplished in many ways, but Ari the Arrogant is plainly
beginning to bug a few of the press crowd as they try to get a
few basic questions answered on the subject of Enron.
Of course, there is the blatant spin you see
on FOX, but the more subtle spin techniques are perhaps far more
aggravating. Like the ones I saw and listened to last night
( Jan. 19)
Tim Russert is on Saturday night in these
parts and I bumped into him as I started getting ready for bed.
James Carville and Paul Begala were on to plug their new book.
My memory tells me that Russert usually interviews guests on a
comfy set, but tonight he was emulating Charlie Rose. Everyone
was around a nice wooden table on a darkened space. I guess
because this was about plugging a book, Russert had to look the
part. Already, I was being “visually spun.”
I tuned as the discussion turned to
campaigns and enjoyed hearing Carville tell the story about how
the “It’s the economy, stupid!” phrase was never
meant to be a theme, but started out as a reminder to campaign
staff to stick to the basics and keep the messages simple. Unfortunately,
Carville says he probably will never run another campaign because
it is so all consuming. Carville reminded us that when the
Democrats fight, they do well, but they’ve tended to
“slide back.”
On about point 5 in the book, the talk
turned to tactics and strategy. Begala told a Newt Gingrich story
about how a lion can get a field mouse anytime he wants but at
the end of the day he still might be starving; the better
strategy might be to take a risk and wait for an antelope so that
he can feed the pride for several days. The image of Newt
“feeding” for several days passed through my mind.
Russert asked about current Democratic tactics and strategies and
Carville said that Enron provides “huge opportunities”
for the Dems. He said they shouldn’t go after Bush,
but focus on how Enron has colored the whole
“thingamajig,” meaning the Administration, the
government in general and all sorts of issues like taxes, Social
Security, etc. The second step should involve what he
calls “rope-a-dope.” He gleefully instructed the
Dems to “make them (the GOP) put out a budget!” He
recalled how the Reagan budget was a lie, but with Enron in the
air, the Dems have a great chance to point out the lies in the
Bush tax plan and budget and make it all stick. Carville
then ran down all the things wrong with the tax package,
especially hitting on the top 1% getting all the breaks.
It was obvious that Russert wasn’t going to get involved in a discussion of the tax issue, so it was time to PLAY DUMB. Instead of asking a straightforward question about Ted Kennedy’s speech about rescinding the tax cut, he went into “innocent and naïve mode.” You could imagine a kid with wide eyes asking the question as Russert leaned forward with that over eager look on his face. Instead of asking, “What do you think about Ted Kennedy’s speech on the tax cut?” he cooed, “Do you think the timing of Kennedy’s speech to roll back the tax cut was right?” (sic) This ploy was to avoid continuing the discussion about the tax cut and to deflect with a question about timing, which also served the purpose of trying to plant in the viewer’s mind some sort of suspicion about Ted Kennedy’s REAL motives.
For a moment I thought Carville was going to
take the bait. But he suddenly sat straight up with his
head bobbing and his nose up in the air as if he were an old coon
dog sniffing out a skunk.He looked like he was thinking real
hard, and then tossed off an comment about how “someone had
to do it first” and how he guessed it was a really good move
because it took the heat off Tom Daschle (Note: Daschle, who is
currently being lied about and demonized by the GOP on this
issue).
But then he used the opening to go right
back to the issue about the budget and taxes! “Everybody
knows we’ve blown the whole stack—Daschle, Kennedy,
Conrad. Everybody knows! This is where the rope-a-dope
comes in!” Russert’s PLAY DUMB tactic had backfired!
So the talk turned to ENRON. Begala
said that in spite of all that’s happened in the past, the
White House “doesn’t see how things fit together.”
He used the term ENRONOMICS and repeated Carville’s charge
that Reagan got away with dishonest numbers but how dishonest
number won’t work now.Begala said he thought that by
insisting that the Administration had done nothing for Enron,
they were risking setting the bar high and inviting trouble
Russert needed an escape fast, so he decided
to ….PLAY DUMB again! “BOTH parties take money
from Enron,” he innocently and almost ruefully
interjected…then listed a string of Democrats while ignoring
the GOP recipients. Oops, was that ever a mistake!Carville
promptly delivered the 73% GOP vs. 27% Dem donor ratio but
Russert proved himself to be REALLY DUMB by persisting. Carville
said “All that may be true, but let’s just investigate
it!” knowing full well that a few legal campaign
contributions can’t compare with how Enron has permeated
nearly every government office under the Bush Administration.
Russert was now fully entrenched in DUMBDOM with no way out as he
tried again to equate the Dems with the GOP. Carville
then got to the fact that it was the GOP blocking campaign
finance reform and that Bill Clinton had tried along with
“the best SEC head ever, Arthur Leavitt,”to introduce
all sorts of offshore tax reforms but “was beaten down by
Arthur Andersen and the Big 5 firms.”
“It’s NOT an equivalency
situation,” he lectured Russert—and again threw in the
73-27 split and the invitation to investigate, just to rub salt
into Russert’s wounds. Remember that line,
folks—“It’s not an equivalency situation”
—anytime someone tries to tell you it is.
Begala then re-entered the discussion by
saying that there was “No need for Bush to lie about his
relationship with Ken Lay,” calling it “very
foolish.” And Carville specifically called the Ann Richards
contributions story a lie and mentioned a couple of others, too.
It was time for bed, so I cut the
“education of Tim Russert” short, knowing full well
that on another show, with another guest, he’ll trot out the
PLAY DUMB routine and be able to get away with it!
I decided to see what was on the radio and
tuned in Coast to Coast, with Barbara Simpson. I can
tolerate Simpson when she’s discussing UFOs and crop
circles, but I’m always aware of her political leanings
after having listened to her tirade blaming Bill Clinton for
September 11 and the rest of the world’s woes. Last
night she was talking about stem cell research. She had one
guest and she was reading an impressive list of
credentials—research, teacher of the year, assistant dean of
a medical school, a big job in Kansas, testifying before
Congress, and on and on.
Sam Brownback was always showing up on TV
coming out against stem cell research and is Republican Senator
from….Kansas. But Simpson PLAYED DUMB. She
didn’t mention that Brownback was a Senator from Kansas or
his stance on the issue. She skirted that part of the story
so the a listener wouldn’t have picked up the overtones to
some of the credentials she was rattling off and where this would
be going.
So when the discussion began and the guest
said the media isn’t telling the public the whole story
about stem cell research and Barbara oozed “That’s
true,” I knew where she was headed. Simpson and
her guest were pushing the use of adult stem cells and basically
were echoing the Bush Administration’s stand against using
fetal stem cells.
Unfortunately, there was no way for me to
play Carville against Simpson. And as I drifted to sleep I knew
that she’d be PLAYING DUMB all night to her audience of
insomniacs, truck drivers, and all those who were either too
tired or too uninformed to care…while I was playing it smart
and getting a good night’s rest.
Copyright 2002, Gloria R. Lalumia