All Blog Posts from Public Eye

It's not a good sign when much of the discussion of your presidential campaign involves people asking whether or not it's dead.

But that's what's happening with John McCain, whose possible collapse as a viable candidate was the talk of media and political news junkies this weekend. On "Reliable Sources," the Chicago Tribune's Jill Zuckman talked with my Facebook friend Howard Kurtz about a "media death watch" for the former frontrunner:

"Well, on Friday, Senator McCain made his first public campaign appearance since the news broke that he was virtually out of money, that his two top campaign officials had left," she said. "And I don't think I've ever seen so many national political reporters in one place at this point in the cycle. They were all there. And the questions were, you know, 'Is there any way you're going to get out of the campaign?'"

Then there was that Saturday Washington Post piece tracking the struggles in the McCain camp, which came with the tagline "When a Campaign Implodes." On "Meet The Press," Tim Russert asked simply, "Is the campaign done?" (Said the panelists, more or less: No, yes, yes, yes.) Bob Schieffer, on "Face The Nation," wondered if McCain is going to make it to the first primary. Google news is full of stories about how McCain could be finished.

So the question now becomes: Can all the negative coverage actually play to McCain's advantage?

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Want to be president? Don't get on the wrong side of big business.

That's the lesson that comes out of today's New York Times story on John McCain, whose two presidential campaigns are shaping up to be a depressing cautionary tale in the limits of "straight talk" campaigning.

I wrote in February about how the press fell out of love with McCain when he seemed to back off from his "maverick" ways – most starkly in his embrace of Jerry Falwell, whom he'd once (surely to the silent applause of many in the press corps) dismissed as an "agent of intolerance." McCain had clearly made a calculation that he had to play the traditional politician -- with all the pandering that entailed -- in order to win the Republican nomination. But in doing so, he sacrificed much of the credibility he'd earned with the "straight talk" that may have been his greatest asset.

Now, as the Times reports, he's playing a similar game with potential donors in order to keep his campaign afloat. McCain isn't getting the small donors he got in 2004, when he aggressively criticized special-interest groups, so this time around he has to win over the big guns.

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At this point it’s news to nobody that sites like YouTube are political players. (Though to what extent, and to whose benefit, remains up for argument.)

But Salon today dissects the anatomy of John McCain’s recent gaffe where – in response to an audience member’s suggestion that America “send an airmail message to Tehran” – he half-sang “Bomb Iran” to the tune of the Beach Boy’s song “Barbara Ann” in front of a South Carolina crowd.

Was it news? None of the big boys in the mainstream media outlets considered it worth mentioning. Only the Georgetown Times – and even then 450 words into a 750-word story – decided the musical attempt at humor was newsworthy.

Despite this almost-unanimous omission, McCain’s song ended up becoming a national story. How?

An anonymous/guerilla opposition researcher uploaded the video to YouTube and then made sure to pass it along to the Drudge Report, where it became the lead item and entered the political mainstream.

Opposition researchers – people retained by different politicians or political groups to dig up inconvenient information about politicians on the other side – are doing a lot of the legwork for mainstream journalists nowadays, finding inconsistencies in candidates’ records and dirty little secrets in their past. And the public’s dissatisfaction with the mainstream media seems to ratchet up by the month, giving alternative media outlets increasing momentum and influence.

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John McCain, who was profiled on "60 Minutes" yesterday, has been heavily criticized for suggesting that "there are neighborhoods in Baghdad where you and I could walk through those neighborhoods today."

On Friday, "60 Minutes" put out a press release suggesting that McCain would reveal in his interview with Scott Pelley that he "REGRETS HIS REMARKS ON SECURITY IN BAGHDAD, SAYING HE MISSPOKE."

Following the lead of the press release, media outlets have largely treated McCain's comments on "60 Minutes" as an acknowledgment by the senator that he misspoke about the level of safety in Baghdad.

I'm not sure that the interview itself bears out that interpretation, however. Here's the relevant exchange:

PELLEY: You mentioned in an interview that General Petraeus sometimes goes into Baghdad in an unarmored humvee, and that there were neighborhoods you could walk through without being concerned for your safety.

MCCAIN: There is no unarmored humvees, obviously that’s the case. I’m trying to make the point over and over and over again that we are making progress. And there are signs of progress. But it’s long and it’s hard and it’s tough.

PELLEY: You were a little annoyed with yourself, I think.

MCCAIN: Of course I’m going to misspeak and I’ve done it on numerous occasions and I probably will do in the future. I regret that when I divert attention to something that I’ve said from my message but you know that’s just life, and I’m happy with frankly with the way I operate, otherwise it would be a lot less fun.

McCain clearly said he was wrong about the unarmored humvee, but it's unclear, to me at least, whether or not he was trying to back off his much more widely criticized comments about the level of safety in Baghdad.

You can watch the full piece by clicking on the video box.

John McCain, who was profiled on "60 Minutes" yesterday, has been heavily criticized for suggesting that "there are neighborhoods in Baghdad where you and I could walk through those neighborhoods today." On Friday, "60 Minutes" put out a press release suggesting that McCain would reveal in an interview with Scott Pelley that he "REGRETS HIS REMARKS ON SECURITY IN BAGHDAD, SAYING HE MISSPOKE."

Following the lead of the press release, media outlets have largely treated McCain's comments on "60 Minutes" as an acknowledgment by the Senator that he misspoke about the level of safety in Baghdad.

I'm not sure that the interview itself bears out that interpretation, however. Here's the relevant exchange:

PELLEY: You mentioned in an interview that General Petraeus sometimes goes into Baghdad in an unarmored humvee, and that there were neighborhoods you could walk through without being concerned for your safety.

MCCAIN: There is no unarmored humvees, obviously that’s the case. I’m trying to make the point over and over and over again that we are making progress. And there are signs of progress. But it’s long and it’s hard and it’s tough.

PELLEY: You were a little annoyed with yourself, I think.

MCCAIN: Of course I’m going to misspeak and I’ve done it on numerous occasions and I probably will do in the future. I regret that when I divert attention to something that I’ve said from my message but you know that’s just life, and I’m happy with frankly with the way I operate, otherwise it would be a lot less fun.

McCain clearly said he was wrong about the unarmored humvee, but it's unclear, to me at least, whether or not he was trying to back off his much more widely criticized comments about the level of safety in Baghdad.

You can watch the full piece by clicking on the video box.

I was watching CNN this morning and caught an interesting exchange between Soledad O'Brien and reporter Michael Ware, who is following Senator John McCain and his Republican Congressional delegation in Baghdad. The comments aren't online yet, but I've transcribed them below.

O'Brien: Let me ask you a question. There was a report that said you were heckling, and you were laughing, during the senator's press conference. Is that true?

Ware: Well, let's bear in mind that this is a report that was leaked by an unnamed official of some kind to a blog. To somewhere on the Internet. No one has gone and put their name forward, we certainly haven't heard Senator McCain say anything about it, or any of his staff have come forward to say anything about it.

I did not heckle the senator. Indeed, I didn't say a word, I didn't even ask a question. In fact, when I raised my hand to ask a question, the press conference abruptly ended. So what I would suggest is that anyone who has any queries about whether I heckled watch the videotape of the press conference.

The "blog" in question is the Drudge Report, and here's what Drudge wrote, in part:

During a live press conference in Baghdad, Senators McCain and Graham were heckled by CNN reporter Michael Ware. An official at the press conference called Ware’s conduct “outrageous,” saying, “here you have two United States Senators in Bagdad giving first-hand reports while Ware is laughing and mocking their comments. I’ve never witnessed such disrespect. This guy is an activist not a reporter.”

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What About Pig Latin?: The fired U.S. Attorneys controversy has prompted White House aides to stop using their office email except for "purely professional correspondence," according to U.S. News. "We just got a bit lazy," one aide told U.S. News. "We knew E-mails could be subpoenaed. We saw that with the Clintons but I don't think anybody saw that we were doing anything wrong." Their communications solution? "Texting!"

Also, They Know About That Web Search For The Hello Kitty Backpack: Microsoft developed a 5,500 word dossier on Wired reporter Fred Vogelstein, who was doing a story about the company. And then it accidentally e-mailed it to him. It turns out there were about a dozen people keeping an eye on Vogelstein that he didn't know about. "Some transcribed the interviews I conducted; others kept notes on my every utterance for clues about what questions I might ask next and ultimately what my story would say; others briefed executives with questions I had asked and suggested good answers." The dossier also offered a critique of his work: "It takes him a bit to get his point across so try to be patient." Quipped Vogelstein: "I know my long-windedness drives my wife nuts occasionally. I didn't know it had become an issue for Microsoft's pr machine too."

Marine World: Sky News reports that "footage of the 15 British sailors and marines being held in Iran has been aired by Iranian TV." You can watch some of the footage here in English. The news is also up on CBSNews.com – click the video box to watch the footage direct from Iranian television. It's pretty fascinating stuff: Captured seaman Faye Turney is shown saying "obviously we trespassed into their waters," contradicting her government's position, and also says she has "written a letter to the Iranian people to apologize." She will reportedly be released soon, though there are no such plans for her compatriots.

Myprank: John McCain: Now an enthusiastic supporter of marriage between passionate females. Click the link to learn more -- you know you want to.

Last night on the "Evening News," Katie Couric said this: "Well, we've been expecting it for some time, but today Senator John McCain made it official."

Well, sorta.

McCain's last night told us something we all already know: He's running for president. On the "Late Show with David Letterman," he said it quite explicitly, telling Letterman "I am announcing that I will be a candidate for president of the United States." Just one problem: A moment later, McCain pointed out that this wasn't, you know, the real announcement.

"By the way, I'll be making a formal announcement in April," McCain said.

"So this was not the formal announcement?" asked Letterman.

"You drag this out as long as you can," responded McCain in a moment of candor. "You don't just have one. ... This is the announcement preceding the formal announcement."

Why "drag this out as long as you can?" Simple: Because every time you say you're running – formally, semi-formally, quasi-officially, or even semi-quasi-officially – the media gives you a ton of free press. (Well, unless you're Dennis Kucinich.)

The coverage strikes me as pointless. The fact that McCain is running for president, after all, is no longer news. His comments on Letterman are not news. His "formal" announcement in April will not be news. He's running. We know. Can we move on now?

The press used to love John McCain. Maybe it wasn't quite an Obama-level infatuation, but in 2000 his "straight talk" had the press corps swooning – at least according to supporters of his then-opponent, George W. Bush, who complained bitterly about the McCain coverage.

McCain charmed journalists in large part by providing them with the kind of access reporters rarely get from serious candidates. In Feb. 2000, ABC News' Linda Douglass said this on "Reliable Sources": "Whenever there is an issue that is somewhat controversial, the reporters will go after McCain on the bus in the morning, and he will take about 20 minutes worth of questions and diffuse the tension."

He was also a good story – the relative outsider who took on the establishment candidate. Here's Bob Schieffer on that same program: "It has all the elements of a good drama. You know, this is the little guy taking on the establishment. This is a candidate that didn't have a lot of money. This is a candidate that said, well, what I'll do is just get out on this bus and drive around and talk to people."

Unfortunately for McCain, things have changed. As Howard Kurtz pointed out in his Web chat today, "[t]here has been a steady drumbeat of stories for months now about McCain abandoning his maverick ways, McCain flip-flopping on the likes of Falwell, McCain hiring political gunslingers he had once denounced, and how McCain's pro-war position is hurting his candidacy." So why has McCain fallen out of the press' good graces? The simplest reason is that the press isn't going to maintain the same narrative about a candidate for a decade. In the interest of a good storyline, they had to turn on McCain at some point. But it's more than that.

In 2000, McCain sold himself as a straight talker who didn't play the double-talk games most politicians are known for. This time around, he's taken the more-traditional approach – reaching out to extremists like Falwell, for example, whom he once called an "agent of intolerance." It made his earlier "straight talk" look like a political ploy, a cynical strategy by a politician who fooled the press into thinking he was different. Bitter about having fallen for McCain back in 2000, journalists are now quick to hammer the candidate for the kind of political maneuvering most politicians can easily get away with.

There is a lesson here for another 2008 candidate: John Edwards.

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The Skinny, Hillary Profita's take on the top of the news and the best of the Web, appears daily here on Public Eye and on the "Evening News" page at CBSNews.com.

Following the New York Times leakage yesterday of the expected (lest we forget non-binding) report from James Baker-Lee Hamilton & Friends (a.k.a the Iraq Study Group) the Washington Post today has its own rundown of the panel's anticipated suggestions.

The paper highlights the group's planned recommendation to cut troops – potentially by half – by 2008. In case you live under a rock somewhere, that happens to also be the same year we'll be electing a new president. "The choice of early 2008 as a goal could also, intentionally or not, change the nature of the debate over the war at the height of the U.S. presidential primary season." Really?

Both papers and the Wall Street Journal's newsbox have an overview of yesterday's meeting between President Bush and Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki, following Wednesday's snub or no snub kerfuffle.

Graceful Exit From Iraq? Nah.

With that and the leaked recommendations from the Iraq Study Group in the air, Bush told reporters that Maliki is "the right guy for Iraq" and "This business about graceful exit just simply has no realism to it whatsoever." According to the Washington Post, White House aides later modified that statement, cautioning "against interpreting that as opposition to any change in the U.S. troop posture."

Instead, according to an aide: "Some options being discussed by the Iraqi Study Group and his own administration's internal policy review, the official said, are 'things that he's very open to.'" Writes the New York Times: "the idea of a major and rapid withdrawal seems to be fading as a viable option." The paper emphasizes the same in a news analysis, aptly titled, "Idea of Rapid Withdrawal From Iraq Seems to Fade."

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