Though alternative news
sources
like blogs are being created at staggering rates - implying a frustration
with the profit-seeking, risk-averse culture of the corporate mainstream media -
when it comes to electoral politics, the mainstream news outlets are still
pretty much the only game in town. It is no surprise, then, that when an
upstart politician reaches out through a different medium and communicates
outside the media-political complex, that politician is scorned by the press and
slapped with the badge of not being a “serious” or “electable” candidate. Such
a fate befell Howard Dean in 2004 and the mainstream media may now be dragging
Connecticut Senate hopeful Ned Lamont down a similar path.
Lamont has rankled the
Democratic Party by opposing
Joe Lieberman, considered to be right-wing on many issues, in the
primaries. Lamont, like Dean, has reached out to his base through innovative
grassroots fundraising and effective use of the Internet. Though the race has
received national attention, the coverage has been misleading and incomplete.
For over a century,
Congressional incumbents have consistently been re-elected over 75% of the time;
in more recent years,
it has often been well over 90%. While political scientists may devote a
large amount of time to such a phenomenon, the press virtually ignores this
extreme incumbent advantage, omitting it from stories in which it would provide
the necessary context. Instead, the context is shaped to most benefit the
entrenched political system.
On MSNBC’s “Hardball,” John Harwood from the Wall Street Journal framed the race
as being between the “anti-war” wing and the “more moderate, pragmatic wing.”
Lamont is consistently painted as a one-issue candidate, railing against
the war in Iraq, but lacking the “pragmatic” views of Lieberman. Most stories
describe Lamont as “the anti-war candidate,” simplifying his
robust campaign and virtually echoing Lieberman’s criticism that
“He’s a single issue candidate who's applying a litmus test to me.”
In fact, Lamont has spoken
out strongly about health care, school funding, gas prices, and many other
issues that affect Connecticut and the country. Most of the mainstream media,
like the
LA Times, have declared a “rift” among Democrats because of this race, as
though challengers like Lamont were the sole impediment to party solidarity.
The media does not point out, however, the fissures and disunity caused by
Democrats like Lieberman who have supported Bush’s war, Bush’s Energy Bill,
almost all of Bush’s appointments, and Bush’s policies in the “War on Terror”
(Lieberman voted “no” on legislation that would “provide
for judicial review of detention of enemy combatants.”)
To understand just how
averse the mainstream media is to the sort of change that Lamont represents, one
needs only to look at the coverage of the debate between the two candidates that
occurred last Thursday. Most articles begin by describing Lieberman as “on the
attack,” portraying him as the strong, seasoned candidate. Rick Klein of the
Boston Globe begins his story with, “Senator
Joseph I. Lieberman last night attacked his Democratic primary opponent, Ned
Lamont, for supporting a policy Lieberman said would ‘turn Iraq over to the
terrorists,’ confronting head-on in a widely anticipated debate the issue
fueling what has emerged as the toughest challenge of his political career.”
Right away, Lieberman is presented as the stronger candidate “attacking” and
“confronting head-on.” Klein, like many other reporters, chooses Lieberman’s
career as the backdrop for the story – not Lamont’s career, the anti-war
movement, the devastation in Iraq, etc. The Hartford Courant begins its story
with a similarly one-sided lead:
“Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman relentlessly attacked Ned Lamont during a televised
debate Thursday, painting his challenger as a rich neophyte with a single issue
-- the war in Iraq.”
It sounds pretty clear that Lieberman
shredded his inexperienced opponent in the debate. And if you believe that, you
are in the 25% minority. According to a
poll conducted by Hardball of 1,500 viewers, 73% declared Lamont as the
victor. In regard to this poll, host Norah O’Donnell said, “it‘s
probably not surprising because we know Ned Lamont‘s campaign, in many ways, has
been driven by the Net roots,” as
though only a viewer with the technical savvy and passion of a “liberal blogger”
would vote in the online poll.
With almost every
commentator and journalist describing Lamont as a “long-shot” or a threat to the
Democratic Party, it is unsurprising that challengers in the primaries have such
a difficult road. They usually become “unelectable” precisely when the media
claims that they are. In Liz Sidoti’s AP article, she refers to Lamont “torpedoing
the party's chances to make 2006 a referendum on Bush's handling of Iraq.”
She also mentions the Senate race in Washington, in which the war-supporting
Democrat Maria Cantwell is being challenged by “anti-war activists who want U.S.
troops out, including one candidate who has the support of peace activist Cindy
Sheehan.” She does not tell us the name of this candidate, but does say that
the “challengers lack the cash and name recognition….” It isn’t much of a
mystery why this might be.
It seems that only those who
are entrenched in Democratic party politics are called upon by reporters and
talk-show hosts to weigh in on the primary race. The Hartford Courant spoke to
John F. Droney, former party chairman, who said
“``Lieberman was good on the issues, and he was up against a Cub Scout from
Greenwich….” Few reporters
interviewed someone from a grassroots, Lamont-backing PAC like
MoveOn.org or
Democracy for America (a PAC headed by Jim Dean, brother of Howard), which
have been invaluable in mobilizing voters and campaigning for Lamont.
In a medium like print journalism, where one
must choose one’s words carefully, it is telling when a columnist, like former
Republican state legislator Kevin Rennie of the Hartford Courant, decides to
describe Lieberman’s opponent as “insurgent
Ned Lamont.” Worse is David Brook’s asinine
New York Times column, in which he writes, "What's happening to Lieberman
can only be described as a liberal inquisition.” How, exactly, the attempt to
challenge a candidate within the democratic political process who has failed to
represent his
mostly anti-war constituency is an “Inquisition” is never quite explained.
Ned Lamont is an outsider.
He is staunchly against a war that most of the press was complicit in
initiating. He, like Dean in 2004, does not play the game to which the
mainstream media has grown so accustomed; he represents more than corporate
interests and political pandering. Because of this, the media echo chamber
resonates with declarations of unelectability and divisiveness, preferring
congressional stagnation to threats to the status quo. The media-political
complex has candidates like Lamont squarely in its sites, ready to pull the
trigger, forgetting that lost democracy is more than collateral damage.