Reliable Hacks

Here's a textbook example of how to say nothing and avoid embarassing your employer while appearing as if you're "casting a critical eye" on that employer.

On the June 22 Reliable Sources, conflict-of-interest Kurtz was roundtabling Susan Schmidt's tall tales of Private Jessica Lynch with writers from Newsweak (another WaPo property) and the Philadelphia Inquirer and some former Larry King producer. All three guests were on their best behavior, trying very hard not to say anything bad about the Post's coverage.

The Newsweak reporter allowed as how "it [the story] was a mistake," but then blamed it on "the fog of war." (Oh, how I wish I had that excuse in the sixth grade.)

The Inquirer reporter, a television critic, then went off onto an insane tangent, stating "I think the fact that this is a female, I think that the fact that she's a small woman from a small, Appalachian town played into the whole romance of the attraction of the story. It was a natural story for people to go after." What this has to do why the Post reported a false story is anyone's guess.

Then Howie pipes up, saying "I'm not here to defend my newspaper." So of course the next words from Howie's mouth are "'Post' reporters tell me they had relied on very good intelligence sources, who obviously turned out to be wrong in those conflicting accounts during the fog of war."

Ah, there's the fog again. But it's Howie's own smokescreen. There weren't conflicting accounts, if you trust the June 17 Post story. None of intelligence reports said that Jessica Lynch acted as the Post claimed she did in its April story. But Howie's counting on the fact that you don't know that, because he hasn't told you otherwise.

Here we stumble onto the heart of the matter. Howie's actually looked into the story, he says. He's talked with the "Post reporters." And since there were only two reporters on the original story, that means he talked to both Susan Schmidt and Vernon Loeb. Very interesting.

But Howie's not going to tell anyone who the sources are or why Schmidt and Loeb had any reason to rely on them. No, that would be enlightening. Rather, Howie tosses it back to the Larry King producer who helpfully says, "I'll defend your paper."

Nice save. The defense is: "Because I think that it's really easy to look at a story that's so high profile and say we should have known, we should have done this, we should have done that." Really easy. Almost as easy doing it right the first time. You know, professionalism.

Of course, you could say "we should have done this" after any fuckup, so it's not much of a defense to say that fuckup shouldn't be second guessed.

Then Newsweak and the producer pat the Post on the back for "deconstructing" the earlier tale. And they toss in the obligatory reference to Jayson Blair.

At this point, Howie is actually asks a serious question. It was a heroic story of a dramatic rescue, he says. "[I]sn't that when the media ought to exercise some judgment at restraint and not just sort of play into creating or conjuring up a Hollywood extravaganza if the facts don't support it?" But Inquirer has a snappy comeback: "Well, that's sort of a rhetorical question (UNINTELLIGIBLE)." Wow. Now even the transcriptionist is making fun of her. Then Inquirer says "it's all hindsight." Well, yes, what do you think media criticism is? Then she tries to change the subject again, mentioning how the media largely ignored the "African-American woman who was also POW." Unfortunately, she forgets Specialist Johnson's name, making her point at her own expense.

Apparently realizing that Inquirer is a complete dolt, Howie turns to the producer and asks if she "believe[s] there was a hunger for a heroic, uplifting story in a time of war." The producer responds, "No, because that implies that all the senior editors of the networks and of all the different media publications sit around and say, what are we hungry for." Yes, a Larry King producer can't imagine that programmers and editors are looking to peddle an upbeat story for the sake of ratings. It's incomprehensible! Why there's no precedent for it, certainly not at CNN.

That's how the game is played. Howie brings on the guests to ask them the tough (sounding) questions, and the guests either give the answers that Howie wants to hear or are incapable of following the conversation. No need to invite anyone who might have criticized the Post's coverage on Lynch in the past. Better to ask a Washington Post Group employee, a tv columnist with attention deficit disorder, and a talent wrangler for Larry King. Brilliant!