How Small Stories Become Big News

Politico: Clinton's RFK Comments Are An Example Of Modern Journalism As A Hyperkinetic Child

(Politico)  This story was written by John F. Harris.

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The signature defect of modern political journalism is that it has shredded the ideal of proportionality.

Important stories, sometimes the product of months of serious reporting, that in an earlier era would have captured the attention of the entire political-media community and even redirected the course of a presidential campaign, these days can disappear with barely a whisper.

Trivial stories - the kind that are tailor-made for forwarding to your brother-in-law or college roommate with a wisecracking note at the top - can dominate the campaign narrative for days.

Who can guess what stories will cause the media machine to rev up its hype jets?

Actually, I have gotten pretty good at guessing which ones will. So have many of my colleagues and a generation of political operatives.

This weekend’s uproar over Hillary Rodham Clinton invoking the assassination of Robert Kennedy as rationale for continuing her presidential campaign is an especially vivid example of modern journalism as hyperkinetic child - overstimulated by speed and hunger for a head-turning angle that will draw an audience.

The truth about what Clinton said - and any fair-minded appraisal of what she meant - was entirely beside the point.

Her comment was news by any standard. But it was only big news when wrested from context and set aflame by a news media more concerned with being interesting and provocative than with being relevant or serious. Thus, the story made the front page of The New York Times, was the lead story of The Washington Post and got prominent treatment on the evening news on ABC, CBS and NBC.

What gives?

I should say at the outset that I have a pretty good vantage point on this particular case - both as witness of and participant in the echo chamber.

On Friday afternoon, I heard my colleague, Politico reporter Jonathan Martin, bellow in excitement as he called me over to his desk.

Martin was furiously typing away, not looking up as he told me the latest: Clinton had given an interview to the editorial board of the Argus Leader newspaper in South Dakota in which she answered inquiries into why she is staying in the race by citing the fact that it’s only May, and RFK had been shot and killed in June.

Here is what I was thinking: Wow. Maybe she has come unhinged? It’s not as though such macabre thoughts have never occurred to me, but for Clinton to give public voice to such a scenario is bizarre. This is going to be a big story and is almost certainly going to shadow and quite likely accelerate the final chapter of her presidential campaign.

Here is what I said: Martin, quick get that item up!

He needed no prompting.

As leaders of a new publication, Politico’s senior editors and I are relentlessly focused on audience traffic. The way to build traffic on the Web is to get links from other websites. The way to get links is to be first with news - sometimes big news, sometimes small - that drives that day’s conversation.

We are unapologetic in our premium on high velocity. In this focus on links and traffic we are not different from nearly all news sites these days, not just new publications but established ones like The New York Times.

There are probably a dozen websites with a heavy political emphasis whose links are sought by all for the traffic those links drive.

Martin was quick getting the item about Clinton’s Argus Leader comment up on his Politico blog.

But not as quick as The New York Post, which was the first outside South Dakota to notice Clinton’s inflammatory remarks (Martin himself knew about Clinton’s remarks from the New York tabloid’s story). The Associated Press, in what looked at first blush like a classic example of what reporters call “burying the lead,” had no mention of Clinton’s RFK remarks in its original dispatch on the interview.

I urged Martin to keep his foot on the gas: Be the first to post reaction from the Obama campaign. Obama spokesman Bill Burton quickly obliged, denouncing Clinton’s comments and saying such sentiments have “no place in this campaign.” Burton’s comments quickly went into Martin’s blog post. Soon enough, several websites and cable news outlets were giving the story trumpet-blaring treatment.

Perhaps half an hour after the story broke Martin called me back over to his desk. It turned out the Argus Leader had video of its big interview. I huddled over Martin’s computer as we watched.

It was a deflating experience.

The RFK remarks were deep in a 20-minute clip of an otherwise routine conversation. Then, once we actually got to the relevant portion of the video, it was hardly an electric moment.

Clinton does indeed mention the Kennedy assassination, speaking in a calm and analytical tone: “My husband did not wrap up the nomination in 1992 until he won the California primary somewhere in the middle of June, right? We all remember Bobby Kennedy was assassinated in June in California.”

Martin and I both thought we saw a slight twinge in Clinton’s facial expression, as though she recognized she had just said something dumb.
Whether she recognized it or not, she had.

But it was also clear that Clinton’s error was not in saying something beyond the pale but in saying something that pulled from context would sound as if it were beyond the pale.

It would be a big story if Clinton said something like this: “Hey, I know it looks bad for me now. But, think about it. Obama could get shot and I’d get to be the nominee after all.”

It is a small story if Clinton said something like this: “Everyone talks like May is incredibly late, but by historical standards it is not. Think of all the famous milestones in presidential races that have taken place during June.”

It seems pretty obvious that the latter is what Clinton meant, and not too far from what she actually said. It was not surprising that the Argus Leader’s executive editor, Randall Beck, put out a statement saying, “Her reference to Mr. Kennedy’s assassination appeared to focus on the time line of his primary candidacy and not the assassination itself.”

Make no mistake. Clinton stepped on a rake with her comment and got bopped in the face. This was entertaining political slapstick, for those of us who like that kind of thing. Little wonder she apologized.

But Clinton’s clumsiness does not excuse news media clumsiness in making a minor story seem like a major one. A note on the randomness of the news: If this really was a big story, then the media has blown it for months. Clinton made similar remarks to Time magazine back in March. (The Wall Street Journal reporter with Clinton has an entertaining look at how the pack traveling with the candidate initially missed the story.)

Keeping one’s journalistic bearings amid a hype storm is a challenge for every publication, this one included. In the early months of this publication (we launched in January 2007), a short news item broken by Ben Smith about John Edwards’ $400 haircut became one of our most-trafficked stories. I thought we handled that news nugget with a decent sense of proportion. The item, for instance, never led our site. But it’s true I was not exactly despairing when other websites and cable TV networks went way overboard on the story, with citations to Politico.

Nor is this column intended as a mea culpa for Hillary Hype. Velocity is a virtue in the Web world, and we are not going to stop trying to be fast off the mark - for relevant and fairly reported stories. What Clinton said about Robert Kennedy, whether it was cold or just a bit clueless, was newsworthy, and Martin’s original blog post was responsible in framing the context of her remark. He was equally quick to post her clarification and apology. The uproar was never the lead of our site.

But it was striking to see the broadcast networks and big papers, which were still going at full boil that evening and the next morning even though they had plenty of time to assess the (dwindling) significance of the story as the day wore on. (Meanwhile Friday, Obama was giving a major foreign-policy speech in Miami to unveil his plan for Latin America.) In an earlier era, these establishment outlets prized their role in promoting and preserving high standards of relevance.

In this era, with their business model challenged by the Web and other forces, and in the same scramble for audience as everyone else, these fabled elite media organs are if anything more buffeted by sensationalism and whimsy than their new media counterparts.

Once, the elite papers and network news set the agenda, and others followed suit, following up on what these establishment pillars deemed important.

Now it’s just the opposite. The conservative old voices increasingly take their cues from the newer, more daring ones.

The distinguishing feature of most political hype storms is that they pass quickly. Who the hell can remember what we were up in arms about last month? Wasn’t it something about Sinbad and a telecom lobbyist who was bitter about being a Muslim?

In that sense, a news culture in which - like the amplifiers for “Spinal Tap” that go up to 11 - everything is exaggerated may not seem like a big deal.

But the consequences are more serious than meets the eye. The uproar du jour mentality in the media can be a hassle for public officials, but it can also be their friend. Hillary Clinton, for instance, can be glad that a serious look by The New York Times about Bill Clinton’s dealings with a Canadian tycoon trying to curry favor with a dictatorship never generated much interest from other media.

Politicians know that as long as they have a base of support they can probably ride out any story confident that the pack will soon move on. Only a news media with the focus and discipline to distinguish a big story from a small one can hold politicians accountable - and produce the work that deserves an audience.

[kelvin_ketty]

Clinton has taken Kentucky and Obama is right there in Oregon.
The Democratic race for nomination is still very much alive %u2013 and most likely to be decided by superdelegates %u2013 as CNN points out clearly

http://edition.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/05/20/primary.wrap/index.html

If you%u2019re tired of waiting around for those super delegates to make a decision already, go to LobbyDelegates.com and push them to support Clinton or Obama

If you haven''t done so yet, please write a message to each of your state''s superdelegates at http://www.lobbydelegates.com

Obama Supporters:

Sending a note to current Obama supporters lets them know it''s appreciated, sending a note to current Clinton supporters can hopefully sway them to change their vote to Obama, and sending a note to the uncommitted folks will hopefully sway them to vote for Obama. It''s that easy...

Clinton Supporters too %u2026. !

It takes a moment, but what''s a few minutes now worth to get Clinton in office?! Those are really worth !

Sending a note to current Clinton supporters lets them know it''s appreciated, sending a note to current Obama supporters can hopefully sway them to change their vote to Clinton, and sending a note to the uncommitted folks will hopefully sway them to vote for Clinton. It''s that easy...

[kelvin_ketty]

Clinton has taken Kentucky and Obama is right there in Oregon.
The Democratic race for nomination is still very much alive %u2013 and most likely to be decided by superdelegates %u2013 as CNN points out clearly

http://edition.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/05/20/primary.wrap/index.html

If you%u2019re tired of waiting around for those super delegates to make a decision already, go to LobbyDelegates.com and push them to support Clinton or Obama

If you haven''t done so yet, please write a message to each of your state''s superdelegates at http://www.lobbydelegates.com

Obama Supporters:

Sending a note to current Obama supporters lets them know it''s appreciated, sending a note to current Clinton supporters can hopefully sway them to change their vote to Obama, and sending a note to the uncommitted folks will hopefully sway them to vote for Obama. It''s that easy...

Clinton Supporters too %u2026. !

It takes a moment, but what''s a few minutes now worth to get Clinton in office?! Those are really worth !

Sending a note to current Clinton supporters lets them know it''s appreciated, sending a note to current Obama supporters can hopefully sway them to change their vote to Clinton, and sending a note to the uncommitted folks will hopefully sway them to vote for Clinton. It''s that easy...

[denn034]

My apologies for the Accounting joke posting earlier, CBS!

[b-easy63]

Actually, in another era, HRC would already have been drummed out for being a liar--when her Bosnia snafu came to light--now we know our potential nominees tell incessant lies and break pledges and still let them run.

We should not be surprised anymore when we end up with unscrupulous leaders who have corrupt inept administrations that lie, break pledges and rob us blind.

I mean--they start it on the campaign trail--whatever makes us think they will change it after they have the power stick? LMAO HRC''s administration would be the same as her campaign and so would the nations spending under her--just like Johns would mimic his campaign--and Obama''s would mimic his. We get our first glimpse of them in their management prowess--right now.

[javalation]

On that oil question... oil is traded in dollars, so as the dollar has tanked, the foreign producers have needed a higher price, in dollars, to keep their own purchasing power even. Of course the oil companies have raked in big bucks as well, but we need to get used to it. Peak oil may have already passed, and there are few inexpensive new fields being identified. We need more incentives to develop and use alternative energy sources and to use more efficient vehicles.

[elliern-2009]

Re:comment by bobnjersey........I don''t believe I made any comparison to the last 7 years. That said, however, Mr. Bush and those around him who really call the shots have been quite instrumental in taking this country into its current tailspin. What a pity!!

[bobnjersey]

[That would mean that there''''s no increase in profits, it just looks that way due to the bigger numbers involved. Am I right or wrong and, if wrong, why? This would mean that the media either misunderstands or is intentionally misleading Americans on oil companies to achieve some goal. Period!}
[Posted by denn034 at 10:17 PM : May 27, 2008]

does it cost any more to get the oil out of the ground? how about get it onto the tanker? does the tanker have to travel further? is it more expensive to process the oil into usable byproducts?

if these costs have not increases signifigantly ... then the profit has increased ... the only question is for who.

[denn034]

The oil companies charged 150% profit before the cost of oil per barrel went up and they''re maintaining their profit margin as the cost goes up. That would mean that there''s no increase in profits, it just looks that way due to the bigger numbers involved. Am I right or wrong and, if wrong, why? This would mean that the media either misunderstands or is intentionally misleading Americans on oil companies to achieve some goal. Period!

[gce65]

How Small Storied Become Big News?

You conveniently forgot the part about most media being owned by only 6 corporations: Viacom, Disney, Newscorp, GE, Bertlesmann and AOLTimeWarner.

[baldtruth]

HOW ABOUT "TYPICAL WHITE PERSON"..."TYPICAL WHITE PERSON"..."TYPICAL WHITE PERSON"..."TYPICAL WHITE PERSON"..."TYPICAL WHITE PERSON"..."TYPICAL WHITE PERSON"..."TYPICAL WHITE PERSON"..."TYPICAL WHITE PERSON"..."TYPICAL WHITE PERSON"...??????????????

HYPOCRITICAL, RACIST OBAMATONS GO BACK TO YOUR SICKENING LOVE FEST FOR THE AFFIRMATIVE ACTION CANDIDATE OF THE CENTURY!

NO EXPERIENCE, NO ORIGINALITY, NO POLITICAL OUTSIDER, NO TACT (OBAMA GIRL?), NO EQUAL RIGHTS (CERTAINLY NOT WOMEN)....NOBAMA...THAT''S NOBAMA....

[bobnjersey]

[Do we really want someone representing the USA to the world who is quick to misspeak and slow to own her mistakes? I think not!]
[Posted by ez2cy1 at 03:32 PM : May 27, 2008]

are you kidding? really, is this a joke ... like tongue in cheek?

the current idiot in charge does this every day ... every time he stands at the podium and speaks ... it''s a daily bit on letterman five nights a week ... and they''ve been doing it for a couple of years now.

gwb and his sixth grade level of mastery of the english language is an embarrassment to the whole country ... and you come up w/ this ... amazing!

[bobnjersey]

[If either one wins the nomination and goes on to defeat John McCain, we as a Nation will suffer the ignorance of those not paying attention.]
[Posted by Elliern at 04:32 PM : May 27, 2008]

oh yes ... and this is somehow different from the last seven years in what way?

[geneonlbk]

Right-on assessment of the mainstream media. I believe there will come a day when the majority of Americans stop believing the media is anything but a profit driven propaganda organ and French Circus.

The media''s audio tricks surrounding Howard Dean''s now famous acclimation are another case in point. If you were in the hall you would never have noticed Dean''s exuberance. The media as an industry used a direct mike feed rather than a recording taken from the floor of the gathering. When the entire media industry is capable of such deceits, then this country would be better off without such a misleading and damaging element within our society.

[forthepeopl1]

HEY JOHN F HARRIS, HOW ABOUT DOING A STORY ON THIS MESS..
GENOCIDE committed against a gentle people: the Di''neh (Arizona Navajo
McCain, supported by Senators Kennedy and Kerry from Massachusetts, and Senator Rockefeller from West Virginia coal mining country, attains profits through massive business gained by McCain''s Wife and her Alcoholic Beverage Distribution business. McCain is backed by the very Nevada casinos and energy companies, who stand to gain the most from the Coal stolen from the Indians: money that fuels McCain''s campaign chest the excess of which he can pocket after every Campaign ends comes to him through street names in Nevada, according to Common Cause, a vastly well regarded public watchdog agency.

where double the national average birth defect rate is found among newborns... Who''s behind these horrifying events?

Press blackouts issued by McCain/Rockefeller/Kennedy interests at Peabody Group since 1987 have prevented the American Public from learning of the enormous international hue and cry for justice regarding the deprivation of Human and Civil Rights being committed by McCain, his fellow Senators Kerry and Kennedy, Bill Clinton, Al Gore and Peabody Western, against the Di''neh Navajo in Arizona. And now it has invaded the electoral process.


http://acsa.net/cain2004.org/?gclid=CJeu
m47l-pICFQ-WGgodriWUGQ



DAVID A BELANGER,U.S.ARMY VET,[e-mail],978-618-3105

[forthepeopl1]

"under water" as their loans exceed the diminishing value of their properties.

please this is a simple thing to fix, why are you bending over for all of the wallstreet scum.
you have the right to do what this paulson/ben did for wallstreet,saying they had to to save america. so you can say the same thing, but this time you would be saveing america, and not wallstreet.
you must come out and stop the forcloseing of all these millions of homes, now,
ALL YOU HAVE TO DO IS MANDATE THAT ALL MORTGAGES THAT HAVE BEEN TAKEN OUT FROM 2000 TO 2007 BY ALL AMERICANS TO BE RE-FI A.S.A.P. NO EXCEPTIONS,


NO MATTER WHAT THE CREDIT IS, THEY WILL RE-FI EVERYONE AT JUST OVER PRIME, AND AT A RATE OF 40% OF WHAT IS OWED ON THE PROPERTY( PERSONAL HOMES ONLY)!!
WHY, BECAUSE MOST HOST ARE SELLING AT FORCLOSER FOR 20 TO 30 CENTS ON THE DOLLAR, SO AS TO WHAT PAULSON SAID TO BEARSTEARN 2 DOLLARS IS BETTER THAN NO DOLLARS SO TAKE THE DEAL..NOW REMEMBER ALL OF YOU, IF THIS COMPANY IN 6 MONTHS LOST 98% OF THEIR VALUE FROM 700 BILLION TO WHAT IS IT NOW. AND FOR SOMEONE TO COME IN AND BUY IT FOR NOTHING, WHAT IS THE REAL VALUE OF ALL THESE HOMES???NOBODY KNOWS, SO WHY NOT JUST START OVER??? AND STOP THE BLEEDING FOR ALL AMERICANS.

[e-mail]
DAVID A BELANGER
FOR COMMON SENSE THIS IS SO EASY TO FIX DONT MAKE IT HARDER THAN IT IS PEOPLE.

THE GREAT POTATOHEAD PAULSON,AND BEN ARE IN TALKS WITH ANOTHER WALLSTREET FIRM GOING DOWN

[forthepeopl1]

"under water" as their loans exceed the diminishing value of their properties.

please this is a simple thing to fix, why are you bending over for all of the wallstreet scum.
you have the right to do what this paulson/ben did for wallstreet,saying they had to to save america. so you can say the same thing, but this time you would be saveing america, and not wallstreet.
you must come out and stop the forcloseing of all these millions of homes, now,
ALL YOU HAVE TO DO IS MANDATE THAT ALL MORTGAGES THAT HAVE BEEN TAKEN OUT FROM 2000 TO 2007 BY ALL AMERICANS TO BE RE-FI A.S.A.P. NO EXCEPTIONS,


NO MATTER WHAT THE CREDIT IS, THEY WILL RE-FI EVERYONE AT JUST OVER PRIME, AND AT A RATE OF 40% OF WHAT IS OWED ON THE PROPERTY( PERSONAL HOMES ONLY)!!
WHY, BECAUSE MOST HOST ARE SELLING AT FORCLOSER FOR 20 TO 30 CENTS ON THE DOLLAR, SO AS TO WHAT PAULSON SAID TO BEARSTEARN 2 DOLLARS IS BETTER THAN NO DOLLARS SO TAKE THE DEAL..NOW REMEMBER ALL OF YOU, IF THIS COMPANY IN 6 MONTHS LOST 98% OF THEIR VALUE FROM 700 BILLION TO WHAT IS IT NOW. AND FOR SOMEONE TO COME IN AND BUY IT FOR NOTHING, WHAT IS THE REAL VALUE OF ALL THESE HOMES???NOBODY KNOWS, SO WHY NOT JUST START OVER??? AND STOP THE BLEEDING FOR ALL AMERICANS.

[e-mail]
DAVID A BELANGER
FOR COMMON SENSE THIS IS SO EASY TO FIX DONT MAKE IT HARDER THAN IT IS PEOPLE.

THE GREAT POTATOHEAD PAULSON,AND BEN ARE IN TALKS WITH ANOTHER WALLSTREET FIRM GOING DOWN

[gaiaschild-2009]

''member when we wanted her to say she was sorry for her iraq war vote empowering bush people to do what they did? she wouldn''t ever do it. that was a big big deal. but she was so confident then of her electorate that she was already too much the emperor. now, she wants some primary votes to show her lawyer so she can polarize the convention. now she wants this so now she''s apologizing. iraq vote was substantive compared to this, was policy, supposedly her strong suit.

[elliern-2009]

........no one is paying attention! What a statement! And right on the money, so to speak. That is why we have a liar and a Muslim in the Democratic race. If either one wins the nomination and goes on to defeat John McCain, we as a Nation will suffer the ignorance of those not paying attention.

[jack3213]

SOME SMALL STORIES CAN BE BIG NEWS- AND SOMETIMES THE PASSES WE GIVE PEOPLE THEY DO NOT DESRVE, AS WITH HILLARY- SHE HAS BEEN GIVEN ONE TOO MANY PASSES ON HER MISTAKES- SHE IS NOT QUALIFIED TO LEAD A COUNTRY AT WAR- IN FACT- EITHER IS OBAMA, GOD FORBID!

[krogersmd]

Maybe some small stories become big because some news channels report them while they ignore others. Yesterday Obama was seeing dead people, but a scrubbed clean video of his speech is posted today on his website--gaffe edited out. I find his rewriting of history fairly creepy. And new questions today about an uncle who liberated Auschwitz, or a grandfather''s role in the war, neither of which can be historically accurate. Obama is imploding and no one is paying attention.