MediaWatch: November 16, 1998
Table of Contents:
- MediaWatch: November 16, 1998
- Was 1998 "The Year of the Moderate?"
- NewsBites
- Stamping Dirt Down on Newt's Grave
- ABC's Quiet on Quotas
- Silently Playing the Race Card
Was 1998 "The Year of the Moderate?"
On the liberal Web site Slate, William Saletan declared that post-election spin "can address more than who’s up and who’s down. It can redefine people, issues, and events by rotating their facts so that people see them from new perspectives. For this reason, the contest of interpretation that consumes the 24 hours after an election is as important as the election itself. It defines the election and its mandate."
Saletan explained that the 1998 elections turned the tables on Newt Gingrich’s attack on liberals. "Now the tables are turned. The word ‘conservative’ is being manipulated by Gingrich’s enemies and the media to caricature and marginalize Republicans. If Gingrich isn’t careful, the C word could go the way of the L word, and conservatives could go the way of liberals." Election night coverage on the networks seemed to carry that inspiration, to continue burying the Republican "revolution." The media mantra quickly became that "moderate, pragmatic, centrist" Governors won, teaching a lesson to conservative ideologues in Congress for the next two years.
"Moderate" 1994 Results?
But is this new? Take election
night 1994, as the polls rolled in showing one of the most
stunning victories for conservatism in modern times, coming
after weeks of media demonizing of the man CBS’s Eric Engberg
called "bombastic and ruthless" Newt Gingrich. Even then,
network analysts on six occasions found a mandate for centrism, while
the networks mentioned a defeat for liberalism only five times.
CNN’s William Schneider declared: "The cynics would say this is
a vote for gridlock, but I think it’s easier to say, and I
think the data points to the conclusion, that it was a vote for
bipartisanship, for centrism." NBC’s Tim Russert claimed the
results showed the American people wanted "a centrist, moderate
government, maybe tilt a bit right of center. They don’t want
extremes."
Spin Early, Spin Often.
This year, the media spin
hardened early around the first returns, as two Republican
Senators (Al D’Amato, Lauch Faircloth) and two Republican
Governors (David Beasley in South Carolina, Fob James in Alabama) were
defeated: moderates won, social conservatism and impeachment
lost. On NBC’s election special, Tom Brokaw prodded Trent Lott:
"As you know, the Republican candidates for Governor who were
successful tonight ran away from the presidential scandal and
concentrated on more pragmatic and practical solutions to
everyday problems out there. Do you think congressional
Republicans need to learn something from their brethren in the
state houses?" Brokaw didn’t explain which Governors lost who made
Lewinsky an issue.
On Nightline, ABC analyst George Stephanopoulos sounded the same alarm: "I think that the hand of the moderates has been strengthened tonight. The big winners in the Republican Party tonight, George Pataki in New York, John Engler in Michigan, George Bush in Texas, Jeb Bush in Florida, were all trying for a more compassionate conservatism, more centrist, moderate conservatism, not the far right-wing agenda that really cost the Republican Party a lot tonight."
At about 12:40 am ET on CNN, network veteran Bruce Morton insisted: "This was a fairly tough season for very ideological Republicans, not the moderates but the social conservatives." Minutes later, CNN’s Jeanne Meserve chimed in: "It seems to be the year of the moderate. The two most ideological candidates, Fob James in Alabama and David Beasley in South Carolina, went down to defeat....You saw moderates in places like Connecticut and New York winning. Also in California, you have to look at Gray Davis, a Democrat, and say he ran a very centrist campaign stressing issues like education and crime."
The next morning on Today, Tim Russert also insisted: "Matt, it’s quite striking. Republican Governors who won by margins of 2 to 1 from the northeast to the midwest were those who emphasize pragmatism and performance. When the perception of the Republicans in Congress was different than that, that they were ideological or philosophical the tone and the result was different. It appears that the people chose to emphasize Social Security, education, those kinds of issues and try to downplay the whole notion of scandal."
On ABC, Good Morning America co-host Kevin Newman knew the tune: "It was interesting. We saw a rush to the center. The Republican Governors, the ones that succeeded were the ones that moved to the center. Is this, are we in a period where we’re going to have a debate within the Republican Party over who will control it?"
NBC’s Gwen Ifill strangely added that now tax cuts were a "moderate" issue, apparently because the networks would rather report a tax cut debate than an impeachment debate: "Today Republicans realized that many of their successful candidates are pragmatic Governors concerned with getting results. Congressional Republicans say they’ve learned their lesson, that the first thing the new Congress will focus on is something that people care about: tax cuts."
What Was Missing?
Almost entirely missing from the
coverage was the conservative line on Republican losses: that
the lack of a conservative agenda hurt the Republicans. One
network analyst did suggest that the GOP’s problem was
inconsistency. On Wednesday’s Good Morning America, ABC News
political director Mark Halperin told co-host Lisa McRee: "The
Republican Party, which obviously is the more conservative party,
has sort of made a hash of everything. They so mishandled the
year, focusing too much on Lewinsky, focusing too much on their
agenda, and then only to give up and give the President
everything he wanted on the budget deal, that it’s hard to know
why their base would have turned out at all, and that
obviously allowed Democrats to do better, and makes it unclear
how Republicans proceed now."
Ignoring A Bigger Picture.
The networks also didn’t do
any homework on the overall fiscal picture for state
governments. As the Cato Institute’s Stephen Moore pointed out
in his last fiscal report card on the Governors, these Republican
Governors in large states are using the current economic good times
to look both liberal and conservative — increasing state
government spending by five or six percent a year at the same
time they’ve offered supply-side tax cuts or simple tax
rebates. In addition, one of the reasons these governors have
increased spending on day care and children’s health is because
Washington passed welfare reform and devolved these duties
from the federal government to the states.
By Wednesday night, Tom Brokaw broadened the media line: "The American political landscape looks a good deal different tonight than it did just 24 hours ago. It now has a broad middle road running through it, the preferred passage of both successful moderate Democrats and pragmatic Republicans."
But was it a bad night for extremes? Consider some 1996 ideological scores from the American Conservative Union: the Democrats sent to the Senate Barbara Boxer (5), Russ Feingold (10), Patty Murray (0), Charles Schumer (5), and Blanche Lincoln (a 10 in 1994 before she retired from the House). The Republicans sent Mike Crapo (95) and Jim Bunning (100), and Peter Fitzgerald, who two networks warned was too conservative to win.
Back in April CBS’s John Roberts claimed "Conservative Peter Fitzgerald, who wanted to legalize concealed weapons and ban abortions, won the GOP nomination over moderate Loleta Didrickson. Many Repubicans say she would have a better chance of beating Carol Moseley-Braun." CNN’s William Schneider claimed Didrickson "looked like the perfect candidate, a moderate woman who supports gun control and abortion rights."
Aside from the historical trend of sixth-year gains, since when does losing five House seats signal a tectonic shift in Washington? In the end, the networks appear to be attempting to create political reality instead of merely report it, and ringing the death knell for electable conservatives was all in a week’s work.
