Frank Bruni has been named the new Sunday op-ed columnist at the New York Times. Bruni has been writing restaurant reviews for the past few years, but came to a lot of people’s attention as the reporter covering the 2000 campaign of George W. Bush. Bruni went on to write a book about that experience, and one of the lessons in the book was that what Bruni actually thought about Bush’s campaign rhetoric and debate performances wasn’t really what he was reporting at the time.
I wrote something about this when the book came out, though I can’t recall whether or not it was ever used anywhere. Part of this was adapted for an episode of CounterSpin, that much I know for sure.
Covering Bush, or Covering Up for Him?
By Peter HartThough conservatives still pound away at the idea that the media won’t cut them a break, it’s hard to argue that Bush has been given anything but kid glove treatment from the mainstream press, all the way back to the early days of his candidacy.
A new book by New York Times correspondent Frank Bruni fills in some of the details in Ambling Into History: The Unlikely Odyssey of George W. Bush. While it is a peek behind the curtains of one of the most guarded and careful administrations in recent memory, the book also tells another, perhaps more important story about a rather lazy and inconsistent press corps.
Though he doesn’t make much of it, Bruni offers some valuable evidence that he pulled his punches while covering Bush. Sometimes the evidence is clear. Bruni explains that at one point he “deliberately soft-pedaled” Bush’s difficulties explaining his tax cut and his apparent trouble communicating in his native tongue. In the home stretch of the campaign, Bruni writes that he gave only cursory attention to Bush’s late acknowledgment of an arrest for driving under the influence. Bruni’s story led not with the arrest details but with Bush’s “lashing out” at Al Gore over an unrelated matter. The curious news judgment earned Bruni a hearty endorsement from the Texas governor: “You’re a good man.”
In other areas, Bruni is not so forthcoming. In the book, Bush is “at best mediocre” in his first debate with Al Gore, and from where Bruni sat it looked like “Bush was in the process of losing the presidency.” Sadly, his newspaper reporting was almost a mirror image: Bruni led his October 4 debate report not with how bad Bush was, but how obnoxious Al Gore was. In fact, the first four paragraphs are all Gore, whose “self-satisfied grin” and “oratorical intimidation” just rubbed Bruni the wrong way. It’s nice to now Bruni’s now getting around to telling us how he really felt–long after it matters.
This revisionism continued once Bush took office. As Bruni explains in the book, on Bush’s first day in office he reinstated a ban on federal funding for groups overseas that provide abortion counseling, sometimes called the “gag rule.” Bush’s explanation was different, though; he said that he was acting to limit federal dollars from being used to promote abortion. A good catch, but one Bruni failed to make at the time, preferring instead to accept Bush’s “conviction” without a word to suggest Bush was not telling the whole truth. Other reporters managed to nail Bush for his deception.
Since Bruni provides little evidence to suggest that he was a cut above his peers on the campaign trail, one can assume that the image of a president that seems aloof, careless or even inattentive has nothing to do with media being too critical of him. In fact, it’s more likely that we only know the half of it. And who’s to blame for that? Bruni, for one, thinks that “modern politics wasn’t just superficial because the politicians made it so. It was superficial because the voters let it be.” If that’s the case, then those charged with exposing political chicanery–namely, folks like Bruni himself–have plenty of work to do. It’s too bad they seem so unlikely to step up to the plate.
Bob Somerby at the Daily Howler also documented the wide gap between what Bruni wrote in his book and what he wrote in the New York Times.
I remember clearly an article in the Chicago Tribune about reporters filling in the blanks and generally clearing up Bush’s fractured syntax and often comically absurd remarks. “We’re just reporting what he meant to say, not what he actually said,” went the reasoning these “journalists” gave for cleaning up after Dubya.
Few points.Number one…a bunch of bean counters counted bams Gaffes during election speeches and found he outpaced Bush by quite a lot.He was the gaffe mister general.No one of course beats the current VP,but lets face it-off teleprompter, Obama should never…be off teleprompter!It is the lefts game to paint every republican as one IQ point above handicapped.I can’t think of anyone they have not painted in this way.Republican woman are whores this week yadda yadda.Look im a pilot of small planes.Bush was a fighter pilot with outstanding(and i do mean outstanding)grades in all fighter tactics.Believe me gentleman there are no handicapped people up there flying at mach one.2Of course your beyond stupid answer would be”yeah but his outfit never rotated to vietnam!People this at a time when Obama at a similar age was a dope smoking coffee house pontificator.So really stuff it in your pie hole.
Watch the tape of all the gaffes in Ireland and England this week.And with the Israeli leader the week before.Good lord what an embarrassment.As far as anyone cutting Bush a break.I am sure all presidents have a certain amount of the press in their pockets.But nothing ,and i mean nothing compared with the cone of silence around obama.All records sealed and accepted as such.Open ,close,lifelong ties with radical,racists,leftists,and yes murderers(Bill air-head)beat way from the discussion by a fawning press..All shushed under the under reported rug.Obama had no vetting at all.How else could a man who had no qualifications for the presidency even enter the race ,let alone win it?Thats why i say to all you libs out there bad mouthing me to watch your asses.I have exactly what it takes to be your next president.No particular qualifications ! Unless you actually put confidence in having graduated from the same College as your current president(in a much harder curriculum and better grades through out).Believe me…i have no qualification.
You say:
“Bush … reinstated a ban on federal funding for groups overseas that provide abortion counseling”.
And Bush said: “he said that he was acting to limit federal dollars from being used to promote abortion.”
And you say that these two statements are different, even that one is a lie pretty much.
Explain the difference please, other than choice of words, and other than the camps that would use them. To me it seems like French vs English, but meaning the same thing. I gather you don’t agree with this, so, if you can, tell me why, please?
I assume that this language expresses a difference in priorities, and this is what you disagree with, not the language used to express it. You want women to be able to chose abortion, and Bush did not.
i learned a bit from reading the comments section, particularly that michael e is a moron.
William Ayers was never charged with or convicted of any crime.
Obama was under ten years of age when Ayers was in the Weathermen.
They didn’t meet until 1995, at a meeting about school reform.
Bush joined the National Guard knowing that such units were never called to serve in Vietnam.
Bs
Completely wrong about Bush
When Bush joined, his type of unit was rotating out quickly.The NVA developed new air defense that changed that quickly and he was not deployed.John Kerry’s unit was the exactly opposite.He joined with the knowledge he would not be deployed.He was wrong.Ayers statement that he was as guilty as sin and free as a bird is well known.Dont defend him.Obama knew who he was, and what he had done ,so it is useless to defend Obamas relationship with him.And he did have a relationship with him.
Joe thanks for the in depth analysis.I also learned a lot about you- from your words.
Ayers was a major figure in Chicago education circles when he first met Obama. I suspect Obama had no idea what William Ayers did in college. Can you back up the statement that he did?
George W. Bush spent two years on active duty and several more years of part-time duty during the Vietnam War all stateside in the Texas Air National Guard as an F-102 pilot, in a unit assigned to the defense of the continental United States. The odds they would be deployed overseas were slight.
Our Government is operating so far outside of its design parameters that this type of discussion is now futile. IMO the place to start is reducing income tax which would force massive reductions in power and programs, bringing the govt. more in line with the founders structure. Only then can a discussion vis-a-vis federal and state govts. become worthwhile.