"You do what they told ya" [View All]

[plurality]

Posted this yesterday in GD, but it sank, and I believe this really deserves some discussion.

http://www.politicsus.com/presidential%20press%20releases/Kucinich/102903.htm

When Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio) entered the race for the Democratic nomination, his supporters had every reason to expect their candidate to be taken seriously by the press. Already acknowledged as the "leader of the opposition"1 to Bush's Iraq war resolution in Congress, with a 100% rating from the AFL-CIO and a record of beating Republican incumbents in a bellwether Midwestern state, Kucinich, the co-chair of the House Progressive Caucus, had obvious appeal to angry, progressive, antiwar Democratic primary voters in battleground races like Iowa and New Hampshire.

But if Kucinich supporters were hoping for serious coverage, they were in for a serious disappointment. Too many campaign reporters decided that their job was to act as gatekeeper of the "top tier" instead of informing their readers about the field. Just two weeks after Kucinich threw his hat into the ring, New York Times chief political correspondent Adam Nagourney was already explaining why the Ohio Democrat didn't deserve as much attention as others. Warning of the "potential for complication" in having too many candidates running, Nagourney wrote: "Ideally, a sponsor interested in organizing a meaningful debate would like to limit it to, say, the six top-tier candidates. But who decides what top tier means?" To answer his own question, he supplied a soundbite from an academic pundit: "With all due respect, Kucinich and Moseley Braun have no chance of getting the nomination."2

snip

"When I asked the reporters on the plane what the value of this kind of reporting was, I got an interesting answer. No fewer than four journalists replied to the effect that unless the electability issue was addressed, 'someone like Kucinich' might get the nomination.

"'Hell, if it came down to a battle of position papers, Dennis Kucinich might win,' laughed Jackson Baker of the Memphis Flyer, incidentally not a horse-racer and one of the true good guys on the plane.

"'I think its value is that it helps to explain to the reader why I'm spending so much time with one candidate,' said Mark Silva of the Orlando Sentinel. 'He needs to know why I'm reporting so much on Howard Dean, as opposed to, say, Dennis Kucinich.'"

Why do we continue to let the media, who we know doesn't have our interests in mind (reference pre-Iraq war coverage if you don't believe me) continue to decide who will be our party's standard bearer? By all means if you don't agree with Kucinich, don't vote for him. But for those who do think his ideas are good, but still don't support him, why are you allowing yourself to be manipulated like this?