Bury The Press At Wounded Knee
Famous people, you see, don't deserve privacy – or so many people (and media outlets) seem to think. Laura Bush's skin cancer, while not insignificant, appears to have been relatively small potatoes. "It's no big deal and we knew it was no big deal at the time," she said in reference her decision not to disclose her tumor five weeks ago. The matter arose because reporters noticed a bandage on Bush's knee, leading spokesman Tony Snow to discuss the medical issue.
The reporters pushed Snow at the press briefing yesterday on why Mrs. Bush hadn't come forward. "And she didn't feel any obligation as a person of public status to talk about this?," one reporter asked. Many similar questions followed. One reporter pressed Snow over why Mrs. Bush did not come out publicly to raise awareness over the dangers of skin cancer. "What I'm saying is even though she may not be an elected official, she's a very public official and very well loved. And as someone who has two adolescents who don't like to listen to mother when she says, put on the sun screen, get out of the sun, she could potentially have a great influence on a lot of people's lives, especially young women." Here's the exchange that followed:
MR. SNOW: She's also had colds, she's had the flu, she's had stomach aches --Well, no argument here. There is, I'll admit, something to the notion that Bush could have come forward to discuss the issue and raise awareness. Katie Couric, who is something of an expert on using medical conditions to raise public awareness, wrote this on Couric & Co about Mrs. Bush's condition: "It got me thinking though, that the disclosure is actually a big deal because it gives us a chance to learn more about skin cancer, which isn't often in the news."Q When? (Laughter.)
Q But those tend not to be --
MR. SNOW: -- she's had a number --
Q Melanoma can kill, skin cancer can kill. It can be very serious.
MR. SNOW: This particular one could not.
Q But she could still -- it could be a platform.
MR. SNOW: You guys are really stretching it. I mean, it is now officially a really slow news day.
Fair enough. Ultimately, though, it should be up to Laura Bush to decide if and when she wants to come forward and talk about her own medical problems. (At least when those problems are relatively insignificant; if Mrs. Bush has a serious medical problem, one that could effect how the country is run, she has an obligation to disclose it.) And that's why the press corps' hammering Snow on the matter yesterday seemed so odd. It was as if reporters were of the mindset that no information should ever be kept from them, regardless of what that information may be. Last night, Couric said this on the "Evening News": "Laura Bush has been treated for skin cancer, and today she and others in the administration were defending her decision to try to keep that story out of the press." It's a pretty easy defense, isn't it? So why not leave it at that?