HeadlineUpdate

The Lady, or the Tiger?

Sorry, but I just couldn't resist that one, as cable news went split screen gaga over the simultaneously breaking news of the assassination of Benazir Bhutto and the escaped murderous tiger in San Francisco.

Sometimes life imitates art, and sometimes it's the other way around.

How Consultants (like me) Harm Democracy

The New York Times today again tackles one of the great perennial news stories, and one of my personal favorites:  why political consultants cost too much.I've been writing about this since this practically verbatim account of a meeting I held in a Senate candidate's living room.  Then there was the time I proposed an end to the "consultant's protection act," in which consultants made money on the TV buy. The mainstream media picks up on this theme every election cycle, in between the stories about the front runner collapsing and the possibility of an "open" convention.  (Watch for it, it will come)

Now according to the Times, more and more campaigns are limiting these fees and it's no longer routine, as I wrote here, for consultants to take an additional ten or fifteen percent off the top merely for making phone calls, sending copies of commercials to TV stations (in my day, we actually had to rush envelopes of bulky videotapes to airport mail facilities) and having lunch with media reps in fancy restaurants.

But I'd bet on Mike Huckabee's bible that the consultants are finding other ways to profit from the process, from more focus groups, better lunches for the crew and lots of sudden changes in plan that require boatloads of expensive new commercials.  Joe Trippi isn't partners this election cycle in the firm that was handling the media buy for his candidate, but there's plenty of other folks, in the immortal words of Bob Shrum in this article, making " a career out of something I love to do."

I've long advocated a "one consultant, one candidate" policy.  Most politicians only run for one office at a time, and they should expect the same standard from their consultants. I believe Mark Penn is giving good advice to Hillary Clinton but I'd hate to be the Senate candidate who signed up with him thinking he was going to get any of the great man's attention while Hillary's campaign was going on. 

The Times article concluded with a great quote from Tony Coelho, who knows something about raising money. 

Tony Coelho, who managed part of Mr. Gore’s bid, said he had “a huge fight” with Mr. Shrum and Mr. Devine shortly after the Democratic primary season over how to divide the campaign’s tight cash reserve between television ads and field organizing.

Mr. Coelho said he thought the consultants had “a real conflict” in that they were “setting up the media buy, and they were getting a commission on the media buy on top of that.”

“And to a great degree,” he added, “the media consultants won the battle, but we lost the war. If you had put more into the political operations in Ohio or one of two other states, Gore would be president.”

As I've said many times before, it's not the cost of campaigns that's out of control, it's the mark-up.

 

A Hillary Lover Sings

No, this is not a confessional that will soon appear on the Drudge Report, but it is a sideways plug for Billy Bragg and also what this long time supporter of Hillary Clinton has to say 11 days before the Iowa caucuses.  I just saw  a great clip of Obama on C-Span's Road to the White House telling how he got the "fired up" "ready to go" chant.  It started out as a story about keeping a commitment to a state legislator who promised her endorsement if the Senator visited her district, "about a hundred miles from anywhere."  He had gotten to his hotel late the night before after many long days of being on the road, "dreaming of my pillow" when he was told to be in the car at 6:30 to keep the commitment. 

Of course, it was a rainy day and he said twenty people were there but I'd bet that included staff.  And then a strong voice chimed in from the back of the room....

I stared speechwriting in my head, as one does, and came up with this, with nod to William Safire who used to do these little ambles into political leaders' inner thoughts all the time.

Inside Hillary's Head

I wanted to talk to you today not as a political candidate, but as a political consumer like yourself.  If you're coming to see me on the campaign trail or watching me on C-Span , like me you're the kind of person who reads the political news before the style section and loves, deeply loves, the nuts and bolts of politics.  I had my political heroes growing up and whether it was John Kennedy, Bobby Kennedy or Franklin Delano Roosevelt, I suspect so have you.

Whatever happens in this election, history will be made.  I'll be proud when I'm the first woman to be elected  president, and millions of women, the  daughters and mothers and grandmothers I meet on the campaign trail, will be jut as proud.

But I want you to know I'd be  proud too if I were a supporter of Barack Obama, who is making history and inspiring millions. Senator Obama and I may disagree about issues but we see the same way about the value of speaking out about politics to bring about real change.   I will say it myself.  I love watching Senator Obama give a good speech too.  I just love the story of how he got that "fired up"  "ready to go" chant.

And like that fine woman Sen. Obama met in the going-to-church hat the folks I meet in Iowa, New Hampshire and around the country and I are moving up together not just because I want to be first--but because I want to be best. These are all good people, and all the campaigns on both sides of this contest, are full of them.  So to everyone who, like me and like you, pays close attention to politics, I ask you to pay close attention now. 

My record, my strength and experience, and the way I listen and talk to voters--this is what I'm most proud of and passionate about.  If you want to see who's "fired up and ready to go" over the next ten days, watch me.

The Press Packs a Punch

You can't make this stuff up:

Anchorwoman Arrested

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: December 17, 2007
A television news anchor from Philadelphia was arrested in Manhattan on Sunday after she punched a police officer in the face, the police said.

The anchor, Alycia Lane, hit the officer at West 17th Street and Ninth Avenue about 2 a.m., said the police, who provided no information about what led to the encounter. The officer was treated at a hospital for a cut and she was then released.

Ms. Lane, 35, was arraigned on a felony charge of assaulting a police officer and pleaded not guilty, her lawyer, David Smith, said. She was released.

Ms. Lane “denies striking anyone,” Mr. Smith said.

“We’re confident that after a full investigation of the facts she’ll be cleared,” he said.

Ms. Lane, a Long Island native, is a co-anchor of evening newscasts at KYW-TV, the CBS-owned station in Philadelphia. “We are still trying to sort out exactly what happened,” a spokeswoman for the station said.

Annotated Archives

Annotated Archives/Published  Punditry

"I've suffered for my art, now it's your turn."

Click through the links below to see all the pieces I've written for major publications such as the Christian Science Monitor, the Washington Post, Alternet, Beliefnet, the New York Daily News and others. 

It' amazing editors give me the time of day, really ,when you see how wrong I've been predicting political events.  For instance, I was wrong about Kerry picking Max Cleland as his running mate, but it got picked up in some columns, and instead of having the #2 spot at the convention Max went third. Oh well...

And as Fiorello LaGuardia used to say, when I make a mistake, it's a beaut. First I wrote about how boring the field of candidates was in the New York City mayoral primary on the day that one of them, Fernando Ferrer, broke out the pack and started soaring in the polls. (That was September 8th, by the way. A few days later, my article was even more out of date.)

Then I confidently predicted victory for my old friend, Mark Green over that ridiculous Michael  Bloomberg.

And with my usual starry-eyed optimism I quoted my favorite Robert Kennedy speech and wrote approvingly of his daughter Kathleen Kennedy Townsend's race for Governor. Oh well, at least I was right that Andrew Cuomo was going to fail miserably in his primary campaign against Carl McCall.

I've waited 20 years to make my Watergate dreams come true. My collection of Watergate memorabilia would frighten you. It certainly alarmed my companions during my dinner with the lawyers from the Senate Watergate Committee.

My first published punditry was in the Christian Science Monitor, a fine newspaper you’d enjoy  reading, if you don’t do so already. We all need a Mother Church to keep us on the straight and narrow—or at least, away from the sex and scandal beat. I had just been in a  high-level strategy session with a politician and his team of consultants and was struck by how many agendas were competing for attention in the room. Any similarity between dialogue in this article and conversation that took place in that meeting is strictly--oh forget it.

Later in the Monitor, I wondered if Ralph Nader--€”the one I first heard 25 years ago--would approve of what Ralph Nader is doing now.

Are you shocked  to discover that the Republican National Committee, among others,  circulates boilerplate language for bogus letters to the editor? Neither was I. But that doesn't mean I can't write a witty, sardonic column about it. And get quoted in the online journalism review too.

I thought, though, that hooking people up to MRI scanners and showing them political spots was going too far.

Beware the wrath of Elvis fans!  I went to Graceland. Was bored. Wrote about it. Got some lovely hate mail, some of which was printable. Did that stop me from commenting on popular culture? More to the point, does Hollywood care what  I think about their idea to turn the presidential campaign into a reality TV show?

The Washington Post called it "career arson" when I first wrote about how greedy consultants are harming democracy. It's not the cost of campaigns that's out of control, it's the mark-up. I also wrote for the Post about how to manipulate the media by telling the truth (sort of), using as an example how George W. Bush hornswaggled the press on the campaign trail.

For the alternative press website alternet.org, I looked at the California recall election and saw a lot of consultants laughing all the way to the bank.

I also looked for something positive to say about the election debacle in Florida. Remember Elian Gonzalez?

I deconstructed the deconstruction of campaign ads that newspapers think readers find fascinating.

Then there was my Monitor column exposing the phenomenon of media masochism and proposing a hard-headed solution to the media’s unchecked power. Hint: the answer has something to do with Regis Philbin.

till, there are always pockets of political light and interest in any election  season. I wrote in the NY Daily News a piece comparing Hillary Clinton to Bobby Kennedy. Hillary comes out ahead on points, but Robert Kennedy remains my hero.

I wonder, though, if even RFK could have resisted the allure of focus groups. I wrote a Monitor column about what goes on behind the one-way mirror at focus groups and another in which I blew the lid off the "consultants’ protection act" which keeps the cost of political advertising artificially high. I’ve also written for the Monitor about my experience almost being a spin doctor for Michael Milken and how the spin doctors blew it at CNN.

They say that Washington is full of people who came to do good, and stayed to do well. That was tolerable up to a point, but I've seen how politics has become a big business like anything else, and just as subject  to manipulation and greed.

Do you want to know more secrets? Ask me in print or on the air or send me an email.

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Waiting for the Iowa Editorial Board

This enjoyable glimpse of backstage politics in today's Times is about the pressure on the three-woman editorial board of the Des Moines Register to endorse a Democratic candidate for President.  I particularly liked the part where they quoted a Clinton campaign official, after their first get-together with Hillary became what sounded like a tough Q & A the Clinton campaign wasn't ready for:

“I think they thought it was going to be a more chatty meet-and-greet kind of event than it was,” Ms. Washburn said. “Her staff called and said: ‘That was a pretty intense conversation. Maybe you didn’t get to see her lighter side. Would you like to do that again?’ ”

The Register endorsement helped John Edwards last time and it could seal the deal for Hillary or open the door wider for Barack this time.  I hope they decide not to "dismiss any notion that gender will influence their decision."  It's influencing mine--one of the reasons I support Hillary is because I do think it's time there was a woman president.  Why shouldn't that be evaluated as part of her appeal to voters?

The article concludes:

The campaigns intend to deploy young aides to the printing presses at the edge of town on Saturday night, looking for an early copy even before the endorsement appears on the paper’s Web site.

We'll see who gets the story first...Tune in tonight.

Update 8:30 PM 

Still no word...but check this out, the Register is promising the first word to people who send them text messages!

10:30

It's Clinton.  Argument in a nutshell:

Indeed, Obama, her chief rival, inspired our imaginations. But it was Clinton who inspired our confidence. Each time we met, she impressed us with her knowledge and her competence.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again.  Hillary is a lot warmer, more charismatic and appealing than her opponents want us to believe.  Watch this interview with Iowa TV and listen to her rhapsodize about being a baseball fan.  She's a genuine, authentic human being.  And she's going to be the next President.