Monday Morning Media Quarterback

Perhaps the saddest thing about the Bush administration is how little Americans have come to expect of it.  It has resulted in an orgy of incompetence that have seriously damaged first America’s image, and now our economy and very .

The current agony of more than 200,000 American Airlines passengers stranded on more than 2500 cancelled flights at America’s airports is just the latest example. 

A competent administration would have kept the FAA on the case in the first place.  A more foresighted administration would have recognized the cost to Americans and the economy of airlines like Aloha, ATA, Skybus and now Frontier failing.  And a stronger administration would have acted in the crisis, like Truman did nationalizing the steel industry or, yes, Reagan breaking the air traffic controllers union as a “peril to national safety”. 

“The buck stops here,” Truman said.  By contrast, the Bush Administration has done nothing.  Nothing.  There has been an absolute leadership vacuum. And sadly, that has come to be what we expect from it.  Consider:

• The incompetent prosecution of the war in Iraq, led by my fellow Princeton alumni Donald Rumsfeld.  I originally supported the war on the bill of goods sold us by the administration, but if you’re going to fight a war, win a war, smash the opposition and minimize casualties among U.S. troops.  In five years none of that has happened.
• Where’s Osama? How’s that war on terror going? We’re not losing in Afghanistan, are we?
• Abu Ghraib. 
• Katrina. One word.  More than 1100 people died in New Orleans (in America!)  after the hurricane.  How many have died since or had their lives shortened by stress, disease, alcoholism, and the rest?  How’s the rebuilding of New Orleans coming?
• The credit crisis, stock market crash and the foreclosure epidemic; where was government/adult supervision?  A $600 rebate to spend on Japanese electronics, vacations or, more likely, on alcohol, is supposed to help how?
• Four dollar a gallon gasoline.  If you make $8 an hour and commute 20 miles to work, it will take an hour (more after taxes) just to pay for your gas.  Very soon, the economy will grind to a halt.  Where’s that Iraqi oil when we need it?  Where’s the Manhattan Project or Apollo program to achieve energy independence? 
• Even ’small things’ like last summer’s passport crisis.  Everyone needs a passport to travel now, but no additional staffing of the passport office=long lines, cancelled trips and general chaos.  Now they’ve fully staffed the office with idiots who snoop in passport files.

And the media, distracted by its own evisceration, has done a piss-poor job of holding the administration accountable for its across-the-board failure of leadership.

After promoting its new Airbus A380 first-class service, which includes 12 sleeper compartments with the ‘world’s first airline double beds’, Singapore Airlines suddenly realized the implications.

Although their marketing team had spoken of “a class beyond first”, the airline is now apparently concerned that couples (perhaps even those of the same sex) will show no class and make the beast with two backs.

“All we ask of customers, wherever they are on our aircraft, is to observe standards that don’t cause offence to other customers and crew,” the company told Reuters in a statement.  As Singapore Airline has engaged in the long-term promotion of the “Singapore girl“, you can add hypocrisy to this brewing public relations disaster stew.  Just wait until the first ‘violators’ are apprehended!

At $7350 round trip from Singapore to Sydney (that’s per person, and everyone knows it takes two to tango), I’d expect to celebrate–and not just with the included champagne.

So the plea is in, in record time, and Michael Vick has even more swiftly found Jesus.  Even with his high-priced team of lawyers, Vick didn’t dare go to court, because his friends had his back—where they stabbed him with their testimony.  Hopefully this will put an end to the ‘gangsters don’t snitch’ ethos. 

Pit bulls and dogfighting are part of the same street mentality, and in the name of ‘keeping it real’, Vick has seen some real dough go up in smoke.  Can you say the dogs ate my $144 million?

Why people hate reporters: a Dateline NBC producer “parachutes in” to the DEFCON hacker’s convention to attempt to entrap a hacker (any hacker) doing something (anything) illegal so the Feds in attendence can arrest them. 

Why? So the “people in Kansas” as she so patronizingly describes her own audience can see what ‘illegal stuff’ goes down at DEFCON via the ol’ hidden camera trick.  

The reporter (Michelle Madigan, to name the guilty) reportedly declined four requests to register as press, and actually told a DEFCON staffer that she was going to the bathroom to get her hidden camera ready!

Unfortunately, all the coverage I’ve seen of this horrendous example of “gotcha” journalism has been on technology blogs; Howie Kurtz , Editor and Publisher other media mavens don’t often venture into the technology ghetto.

She’s , (and apparently, according to this , Dateline didn’t even send any back-up to protect her, unlike their anti-predator campaign) but it won’t stop NBC’s Dateline, home of the “online predator” entrapment that led to a man’s suicide (without benefit of trial or conviction) and flaming faked truck explosions.

Was the music for Bob Marley’s brilliant Buffalo Soldier plagiarized?  Was it lifted from The Banana Splits?!  yourself and be the judge. 

You can hear more at Soundalikes or read about the late George Harrison lifting “My Sweet Lord” from “He’s So Fine” here.

The hack creators of “The Banana Splits” could try suing Marley’s ghost estate.  But they’d create a public relations disaster–talk about alchemy turning lead into gold.

The immigration bill has gone down to defeat in the Senate.  Whatever one’s political beliefs, it was clearly a major defeat for President Bush, who used much of his diminished political capital to try to get it passed, but in the end won only 12 Republican senators to his side.

Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) came under enormous pressure from conservative constituents who railed against the measure’s path toward citizenship (”amnesty“) for illegal immigrants.
    
What he said was sad, scary, and possibly true.  ”I’ve learned one main lesson,” he said. “A lot of Americans have lost faith in their government – they don’t think we can control our borders, win a war, issue passports.”

From a media perspective, to be successful the candidates of both parties will have to sell against that with all their optimism, energy, and enthusiasm.

Californians have always prided themselves on their driving skills (except when it rains and there are 500 fender-benders in three hours).  That’s why you’ll see people shaving, texting, applying make-up, reading magazines and screaming at their phones.

But it seems like someone needs to open a Celebrity Driving School.  I don’t venture to West Hollywood, especially late at night, because of the growing celebrity menace.

Accidental meetings with celebrities have always been a lure of Los Angeles, but they were fatal for the unlucky folks who encountered Prison Break’s Lane Garrison and singer Brandy.

Sure–not every celebrity crash is a fatal one.  But with Lindsay, Paris Hilton’s potentially ugly DUI, “Wrong Way” Nicole Ritchie (called that because she was arrested for DUI going against traffic on a freeway!), Halle Berry and even Mischa Barton of the OC commiting mayhem behind the wheel, maybe celebrity chronicler TMZ.COM should change their “Trainwrecks” section to “Celebrity Car Crashes.”

Watch out for celebrities when you’re on the road, or your car will may look like this.

CNN “journalist” Lou Dobbs attacked President Bush today on CNN.com for the immigration bill the President supports.  Money quote:

President Bush is building his legacy, adding another unfortunate line of hollow bravado to his rhetorical repertoire. To “Mission accomplished,” “Bring it on,” “Wanted: Dead or alive,” and of course, “I earned … political capital, and now I intend to spend it,” he has added “I’ll see you at the bill signing,” referring to his own ill-considered push for so-called comprehensive immigration reform legislation.

I’m no Bush fan, but I’m troubled when a network’s leading anchor foregoes journalistic objectivity to blast a President, particularly when that President is trying to address the immigration issue with a bipartisan solution.   A current poll reveals that ”a strong majroity of Americans-including two-thirds of Republicans- favor allowing illegal immigrants to become citizens to become citizens if they pay fines, learn English and meet other requirements.”

That doesn’t stop Dobbs from dancing on the edge of paranoia, xenophobia, and yes, racism, once again.

In what other country would citizens be treated to the spectacle of the president and the Senate focusing on the desires of 12 million to 20 million people who had crossed the nation’s borders illegally, committed document fraud, and in many cases identity theft, overstayed their visas and demanded, not asked, full forgiveness for their trespasses?

Illegal aliens and their advocates, both liberal and conservative, possess such an overwhelming sense of entitlement that they demand not only legal status, but also that the government leave the borders wide open so that other illegals could follow as well…

Does this help CNN maintain its hard-won reputation for integrity and credibility? And is a ranting Lou Dobbs the face of TimeWarner that CEO Richard Parsons want to show?

Dr. Jack Kevorkian, better known as Dr. Death for his hands-on advocacy of assisted suicide, was released today after 8 years in prison.  Even now, cost-conscious HMOs impressed at his efficiency (over 130 assisted suicides!) are no doubt lining up to hire him to create a treatment plan for the coming wave of babyboomers.

CNN anchor Lou Dobbs is a ticking time bomb–and he’s starting to damage CNN’s credibility.  The New York Times, finally catching up with MondayMorningMediaQuarterback,  challenged Dobb’s reporting on immigrants bringing leprosy to the United States. 

Dobbs needed to back away from let-them-eat-cake remarks like “If we reported it, it’s a fact,” and respond with a brief statement like this.  “On a couple of things we’ve broadcast, I’ve got to admit our critics may have a point.  From this point forward we’ll make doubly sure everything we put on the air is accurate,  and while we’ll continue to advocate for the American worker, I apologize to those I may have given offense to.”

Instead, we get this 900-word rant, as swollen with ego as a Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade float.  Here’s some quotes with our commentary.

• “Today’s New York Times column is primarily a personal attack on me.” The Times story is not about the issues.
• The non-factual leprosy quote is from “an ad-lib on the set of this broadcast uttered more than two years ago by Christine Romans.” Blaming others/not taking responsibility for his show.
• “I’m regularly attacked by the left wing — the Southern Poverty Law Center, The New York Times, The Nation, MALDEF and MEChA — for my opposition to illegal immigration…I’m regularly attacked by the right wing — the biggest business lobbyists in the country, The Wall Street Journal editorial page, the Bush administration — for my criticism of so-called free trade policies and outsourcing.” Dobbs is implying that he’s a centrist and his ‘truth’ lies in the middle. Interestingly, The National Association of Manufacturers, seemingly a natural ally for this ‘leading business reporter’, slams Dobbs’ relationship with the truth–which at the end of the day, is all a reporter has.
• “The fact is, I made a mistake” He buries what should be the lead 14 columns down in his rant.
• “Corporate power, expressed by lobbyists spending billions of dollars each year in Washington to influence both political parties and public policy, represents the greatest single threat to this nation’s middle class.”  Dobbs is using airtime provided by one of those corporations, Time Warner, which also pays his $4 million salary.  Commercial speech is different than free speech, as both Pink and Don Imus have learned.
• “Those attacks from the left and the right will continue. They perhaps may get even a little more energetic. And as long as they continue to do so, you and I can rest assured that we’re doing more right than wrong on this broadcast.”  Although they try to martyr him, Dobbs’ crusade cannot be deterred, even by critics like the Mayor of San Francisco who Dobbs says, ”Might as well work for Hermann Goering.”

My concern is that Dobbs will damage the CNN and Time Warner brand, devaluing an image of credibility and unbiased news built up painstakingly over 20 years.  In the past month, Time Warner has quickly fired the head of HBO and their leading African reporter, both for alleged offenses against women. 

With Dobbs, it may be a tougher call, as he has the ratings lead .  But if he doesn’t start acting less like Howard Beale and more like Anderson Cooper, Dobbs credibility, already in tatters, will disappear completely.