Cheney incident highlights press rumor-mongering

The vastly overblown incident of Vice President Cheney's accidental injuring of fellow hunter Harry Whittington with his gun the past weekend unleashed a truly startling display of folly. This writer has been rather critical toward press behavior and emphasis in the past, but even so, was still surprised by the sheer tomfoolery and descent into condescending hysteria by members of the White House Press Corps this week. With unctuous tones and innuendo, and even apparent partisanship, some of the press members fixated upon a botched PR move on the part of the White House (and don't mistake me, the White House PR has been, and remains, bafflingly abysmal in most matters) to leap to filing the most negative and hysterical spins on a straightforward story.

After all, under all the glare -- a true case of all heat and no illumination -- this week saw most of the news sources going ape about the sluggish response in informing them in detail or speedily about a very straightforward accident. With amusing indignation and self-righteous bombast, the White House Press corps was seen grilling Scott McClellan about the shooting as if a dire conspiracy had been concealed from them. It looked partisan, certainly at the very least, juvenile and hysterical. Given the tone they took, its useful to note the following basic facts:

1) The VP accidentally shot a Friend, in fact his Host, on a private hunting excursion. Fine.
2) The one shot was not a Democrat, or somesuch political rival, but the tone taken by questions seemed accusatory and angry. To even hint of foul play or misconduct was beyond absurd. Though this was not directly done, the very tone and heat of the coverage suggested it, and one feels, was intentional to make a big story out of a modest one.
3) There was a delay in the national press being informed, true.
4) This delay was then taken with the utmost offense by the White House Press Corps, who began to carry on and make angry statements, and let insinuations build where calls for Cheney's resignation were even being made. As if something more deliberate then a goof while hunting had taken place or been intended.
5) In all this, there was little concern for Mr. Whittington's own reaction to all this, how he felt about his FRIEND being accused, and especially there was NO concern at all for VP Cheney's feelings about injuring his friend in said incident.
6) The incident became the (understandable) butt of jokes in its immediate aftermath, and then after a lull when Mr. Whittington's health was in question, again once he was known to be alright. The incident is now fading rapidly.

What makes it important is that the White House Press Corps, and the mainstream media it tends to represent in the public's eyes, boldly and disappointingly displayed themselves as little more than rumor-mongers. A few even gave the impression of being schills for the opposition party -- or more precisely, its most conspiracy-minded fringe, the moveon.org crowd. This impression comes from their haste to make a straight-forward incident into a "black helicopter" scenario. As I said above, the press behaved AS IF Cheney had tried to take out an opposition member, not a friend. Indeed, given the basic character of the incident, they seemed determine to give it a `layered meaning' or `ominous nuance' for sensationalistic purposes, where there was none.

But that's just the point. From the very start, the circumstances of the shooting were too clear-cut --- VP Cheney wounding a friend on a private hunt -- to admit to all this black-helicopter think, or indignant affront on the part of the press. It is in fact arguable whether they even had this presumed "right to know" instantly about the incident before local press.

One thing is clear. The White House Press corps and the mainstream media has descended into the role of schills for their own significance and import. They come across as eager to make mountains out of the proverbial moehill, in their haste to create a `sensation' or `headline blaring' story. No attempt is made to use their power of investigation for `rumor control' but rather the opposite. This incident had none of the semi-opaque murkiness of the Iraq War or Abu Ghraib, yet they behaved with the same accusatory tone. They have completely forsaken the still needful and once embraced role of `watchdog' for and against BOTH political parties and big government in general. This neglect of stern inquiry in favor of overheated quizzing and innuendo just obscures the real issues. It also operates in the failure to seek out to cover and expose genuine malfeasance in domestic government, and in the frauds in various programs, both Republican and Democrat. Instead, over and over again, they go to the noiseist of demagogues for "story" and by so doing, as this week, seek to generate only the heat of sensationalism and hyperbole, and none of the illumination of inquiry and fact-checking.

This constant magnifying of all events out of all proportiona and coverage is counter-productive. Every disappearance becomes a national incident, every incident becomes a "a blank- gate" and bad occurrence "a crisis". This is just hyping for hype's sake, and clouds up all the issues more than anything else. The nation needs the true watch-dog role of the press restored, the current brand of journalism retired, and needs it now. A true bipartisan press, skeptical and slow to trust either party, but putting America's interests foremost, is what is called for. In many ways, such did indeed once exist, especially prior to the 1960's. But unfortunately, it seems all but extinct now. However, since history cycles, one can hope for a resurrection of such. Its long overdue.

- Anthony