-
sponsorship
Poring through Michael Calderone's "Top Ten Media Blunders of 2008" in the Politico, it was hard not to notice how many of his favorite Fourth Estate screw-ups had to do, in some obvious or oblique way, with sexism purportedly making its way into the press. You've got the whole Hillary-in-New-Hampshire episode, in which Hillary wept and the media's subsequent mockery mobilized women voters on her behalf (or so the mythology goes); you've got MSNBC's choice to hand its election coverage over to Chris "She-Devil" Matthews; you've got the "Obama's baby mama" Chyron on Fox; and you've got the David Shuster pimp-Chelsea Clinton thing—along with the questionable coverage of two alleged Big Macher mistresses, Vicki Iseman and Rielle Hunter.
You could make the case that all the media's stumbles over sexism should alarm women, but I wonder if the opposite isn't the case. It shows how sensitive we've become to the various pitfalls inherent in covering women. (And, well, maybe too sensitive, but that's another debate.)
-
sponsorship
For those who haven’t seen it yet, this clip of Fox News political correspondent Carl Cameron talking to Bill O'Reilly is rather extraordinary, and not only for what it reveals about Sarah Palin. Cameron reports that McCain campaign insiders have told him that Palin was unaware that Africa is a continent, not a single country; that she could not name the three signatories of the North American Free Trade Agreement; and that she had refused point-blank to prepare for those infamous Katie Couric interviews.
But O’Reilly’s reaction is even more gripping than these revelations. Even as Cameron—a Fox reporter!—is talking, he keeps grasping wildly at the “all-criticism-of-Palin-is-snobbery” narrative. “She could be tutored!” he says at one point and gets Cameron agree that the real problem with the Couric interviews was the way the elite liberal media spun them afterward. My prediction: If the Republican Party and its pundits sticks to this interpretation of Palin’s performance, they’ll be out of the White House for the next decade, if not longer.
Join the Fray: our reader discussion forum
What did you think of this article?