December 13, 2007
Back Talk II Posted by Alexander Burns at 12:20 PM EST A footnote to John Steele Gordon’s post this morning is that in 1980, when Ronald Reagan attracted national attention by snapping at a moderator, “I am paying for this microphone, Mr. Green!,” the future President was paraphrasing Spencer Tracy. In the 1948 film State of the Union, Spencer Tracy plays an idealistic presidential candidate whose less scrupulous backers try to co-opt his campaign. In a climactic moment, as someone tries to interrupt one of his speeches, Tracy exclaims, “Don’t you shut me off. I am paying for this broadcast!” There’s an MSNBC clip noting the similarity between the two moments here. My guess is that Fred Thompson’s performance yesterday was intended to inspire comparisons with Reagan. I don’t think Thompson pulled it off as well as Reagan did. I think Mr. Gordon is right that confronting the media can work in candidates’ favor. But in reply to his query about why candidates don’t do it more often, I’d answer that it’s also a risky business. If it’s done in an excessively self-righteous way, or by a candidate who’s not a particularly deft performer, it can come off as obnoxious or evasive. Consider Alan Keyes’s performance in yesterday’s debate. He rants about how the media wants to silence him but doesn’t seem to consider the possibility that the American people don’t want to hear him either. Keyes ends up looking (appropriately) like an egomaniac without an actual policy agenda. A less obviously botched media showdown took place in July, when Hillary Clinton faced off with Chris Matthews at a forum with organized labor. Matthews asked Clinton whether she would approve of a presidential pardon for Scooter Libby. Clinton, recognizing this as an attempt to draw her into a dispute about her husband’s presidential pardons, replied by demanding that Matthews ask “a question that’s really about the people in this audience, and not what goes on inside Washington.” Matthews snarked back: “Okay, so we’ll leave that as a non-answer.” It was a sloppy exchange on both sides, as you can see here. Initially, many believed that Clinton won the point against Matthews. The audience, at least, fell for her performance. Looking beyond how it played with a group of Clinton’s natural supporters, though, this exchange might very well have reinforced concerns in the general public about Clinton’s trustworthiness. A dispassionate observer, harboring no special affection for Clinton, might (appropriately) conclude from the exchange that the New York senator has something to hide. What’s more, you can only dodge questions for so long, as Clinton found out here. In answering a tricky question about illegal immigration, she flip-flipped and accused the moderator of “playing gotcha.” But she looked ridiculous, and she exposed herself to scorn from a distrustful public and attack from an insulted press. Confronting the media works well sometimes, but when the tactic fails, it can fail very, very badly.
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