MONDAY, OCTOBER 7, 2024
Out of one silo, this: Let the word go forth to the nations! In large part, we agreed with the views expressed in a recent front-page piece by the New York Times' Rebecca Davis O'Brien.
(Note: This report has been delayed by one week due to last week's breakdown by our Internet Service Provider. We're posting one day early.)
When her piece appeared, O'Brien became the latest Times reporter to describe the state of play of the presidential campaign. She did so on Saturday, September 28, in a lengthy front-page report which appears online beneath this headline:
POLITICAL MEMO
Harris Has a Lot of Strengths. Giving Interviews Isn’t One of Them.
Online, this "Political Memo" had appeared on Thursday, September 26—two days earlier.
When that headline appeared, we agreed with its pair of assertions. We still agree that Candidate Harris has a lot of strengths. As of September 26, we also agreed that "giving interviews" hadn't recently seemed to be one of them.
We agreed with large parts of O'Brien's overall assessment! We'd call this her nugget statement:
In her dizzying ascent to the top of the Democratic ticket, Ms. Harris has proved to be a disciplined and effective debater and a tireless campaigner, nimble and energetic in rallies. But one-on-one televised interviews with journalists have long been a weakness in her political arsenal...
We agreed with that list of strengths. We also tended to agree with O'Brien's statement about that one weakness, though we aren't sure that this possible weakness stretches back into the past.
We also agreed with the trio of statements which follow. These are the sorts of observations O'Brien makes before her lengthy, front-page memo seems to go off the rails:
As a presidential candidate, Ms. Harris has largely eschewed such interviews.
Plainly, that was true at that time. Also, we largely agreed with this:
The avoidance appears to reflect a nervousness that is palpable from the moment Ms. Harris takes her seat across from an interviewer.
We thought we'd seen that nervousness too! For us, it seemed strangely inconsistent with the impressive self-assurance Harris displays when she delivers her speeches.
We definitely agreed with the following statement—but then, we regularly watch major programs on the Fox News Channel:
It has opened her up to mockery from her opponents and detractors.
There was no possible doubt about that! As of late September, Harris was being mocked and derided around the clock on Fox News Channels programs for this alleged shortcoming, both real and vastly embellished.
We agreed with all those statements by O'Brien. This additional assertion also seemed to be true:
[The avoidance of interviews] has also led to grumbling in the news media, where it is an article of faith that somebody seeking the presidency should be willing and able to answer questions from nonpartisan journalists about her plans for that role.
Plainly, some such grumbling had occurred. Imaginably, some such grumbling could now be found right there in O'Brien's memo!
For the record, O'Brien's a good, decent person. She has done a lot of good work during her career.
(Inevitably, she graduated from Harvard, in the class of 2006. She worked at the Wall Street Journal before coming to the Times in 2021.)
O'Brien's a good, decent person. We agreed with many points she initially made in her front-page profile of Candidate Harris's interview style—but then, her lengthy front-page piece seemed to go off the rails.
In our view, her profile suddenly seemed to go sideways. This raised a question within our minds about the state of our nation's political journalism, to the extent that some such creature can still be said to exist.
The New York Times is Blue America's most important news org. For denizens of Red America, the most significant "news org" would likely be the aforementioned Fox News Channel.
These news orgs almost seem to inhabit landlocked versions of two different Americas. The Fox News Channel seems to inhabit a silo inside Red America. The New York Times often seems to live in a silo too—but in that case, the silo is Blue.
Can a divided America "long endure?" As we noted on Friday, Lincoln seemed to think the answer was no.
He stated that view in 1858, when the nation was "half slave and half free." In our view, a similar problem exists today, when we're half Red and half Blue.
This week, we'll take an initial, limited look at the work which emerges from within those two influential silos. With respect to O'Brien's piece, we started out in general agreement—but soon, we encountered the highlighted part of this fuller passage:
...[O]ne-on-one televised interviews with journalists have long been a weakness in her political arsenal. She often winds her way slowly toward an answer, leaning on jargon and rehearsed turns of phrase, using language that is sometimes derided as “word salad” but might be better described as a meringue.
Candidate Harris is sometimes derided for "word salad"—but her language is more like "a meringue!" So it now said in the New York Times, with no real attempt to explain what that foofaw might mean.
It isn't a salad, it's more a meringue! For us, this bit of pseudo-analysis raised an obvious question:
On what type of mystery meat doth this one major silo feed? On what meat does it feed as it produces the very odd stew we met as this memo continued?
Now for a bit of full disclosure:
At the time this Political Memo appeared, Harris was being derided, around the clock, for what was being described as her "word salad." Around the clock, as if by mandate, that was happening within that other silo—the silo containing Fox News.
In fact, large parts of O'Brien's memo now almost seemed to be cadged from within that other silo. Here's one question we'll be asking as our rumination continues this week:
To what extent are these two silos truly apart and distinct? To what extent might a certain type of melding perhaps occur?
Tomorrow: Over in Red America's silo, a gong-show from Charlie Hurt
Who cares. She will do, as Trump does the interviews she wants to do.
ReplyDeleteThe poor media.
ReplyDeleteHowever will they be able to play "Gotcha" with Harris, when she won't even talk to them?
Sounds like a match made in heaven.
ReplyDeleteThe press is useless at interviewing politicians, and Harris, in turn, is bad at giving interviews to the press.
There is no evidence that Harris is bad at interviews. There is only evidence that she has chosen to use her time in other ways. If the press were bad at interviews, would it be smart for Harris to sit down for them?
DeleteDifficult to claim that Somerby isn't in the business of repeating right wing attacks on Harris.
ReplyDeleteHarris is choosing how to use her limited campaign time. How on earth could she be nimble at rallies (as Somerby states) while bad at interviews? Calling someone's remarks "word salad" is not a real complaint, as Somerby notes (but also repeats without refuting).
Meanwhile, today Trump is finally being criticized for his own word salad in an article questioning his cognitive abilities in today's NY Times. How can the same word apply to both candidates? It can't. The right is lying about Harris and Somerby is joining them.
"How on earth could she be nimble at rallies (as Somerby states) while bad at interviews?"
DeleteTeleprompters. The rallies are rehearsed and scripted.
Have you seen her handle hecklers or deal with spontaneous replies and back-and-forth during senate hearings? Implying that she isn't nimble is ridiculous.
DeleteIf she was in the flow and didn't recognize the repetition because it made sense in context, that is little different than what Trump does continuously to stall while thinking of what to say next -- he repeats himself. He did it during his own teleprompter breakdown a few days ago. He said "The teleprompter just went down." then he repeated it "The teleprompter just went down." That is stalling. Then he mocked Biden, who is NOT RUNNING FOR OFFICE. Then he claimed that the wind blew down a teleprompter and talked about how very very strong the wind had been last time, going on and on about it. Then they got the teleprompter going again, while he asked wasn't it nice to have a candidate who could talk without a teleprompter. If you call that talking, when it was rambling nonsense.
But Somerby thinks it is Harris who deserves criticism, not Trump. And if Harris had been campaigning for a few more months, as would occur in a normal campaign, might she be better at handling teleprompter glitches? No one seems to care about that -- including Somerby, whose main focus is to suggest that she is lackluster, doing some campaign tasks well but clearly imperfect because a broken teleprompter might cause WWIII.
Why doesn't Somerby see how ridiculous such complaints are? Perhaps he doesn't think holistically enough?
Someone asked how on earth could Harris could be nimble at rallies while bad at interviews and the answer is teleprompters, scripted content.
DeleteNo one suggested she isn't nimble during public appearances in comparison to Trump.
Somerby said she was nimble at rallies but not in interviews. She brings the same mind and abilities to both contexts.
DeleteTeleprompters are not used during interviews. Her nimbleness at rallies is not during the scripted part but during the back-and-forth with the crowd.
I would blame test anxiety myself. If someone gets nervous about performing well (such as after being told repeatedly they are bad at interviews) then they may have trouble displaying mental flexibility because too much of their consciousness is directed toward not messing up. That is the reason why people rehearse before debates, to achieve fluency while nervous. That Harris could perform well during the debate suggests she doesn't have a problem with interviews -- she is using her time for more meetings with voters. As I mentioned a few weeks ago, Harris's campaign is using social media more than past traditional campaigns. She is meeting with influencers and podcasters because her target demographic (younger people) use those sources and not traditional cable. The time to meet with a cable host in an interview may not be worth it in terms of audience size, compared to getting out and meeting more people in public.
Her campaign has the right to make such decisions without an asshole like Somerby calling her defective.
Thanks for explaining.
DeleteIn case you missed it, "Vice President Kamala Harris found herself in an awkward situation during a rally in Michigan on Friday when an apparent teleprompter glitch caused her to repeat the same lines multiple times." You can watch the video at the link
ReplyDeletehttps://www.newsweek.com/kamala-harris-teleprompter-gaffe-michigan-1964282
IMO being weak at handling a teleprompter outage is not a significant reason to vote against someone. However, it's reminder that being good at reading a speech from a teleprompter is not a significant reason to vote for someone.
Still, my favorite part of The Daily Howler is when David in Cal can't tell "fine people" on the Right from neo-Nazis and white supremacists.
DeleteIt's like everyday is Christmas at TDH.
Trump had the same problem on Oct 3 in Saginaw. Instead of repeating the same sentence, he shouted: "The teleprompter just went out. The teleprompter went out." Then he riffed on Joe Biden's response to such a thing happening. Then it went back on and he said something about low taxes (from the screen), then he returned to talk about high winds blowing out a teleprompter, then he wandered into a list of things he planned, ignoring the tax message on the teleprompter. Then he called Harris "Lying Kamala" and joked about her working at McDonalds.
DeleteHow is that a better way to handle a teleprompter problem? His speech is already so jumbled that when he goes off-topic, no one can tell. He said she [Kamala] can't do any interviews, cannot answer a question. Just like Somerby did today, repeating the talking point along with his right wing buddies.
No one claimed that anyone handled their teleprompter issue better than others.
DeleteIt is implied by the fact that you brought it up.
DeleteSomehow Somerby believes it would be bad for him to be actually enthusiastic about Harris's candidacy, so he damns her with faint praise, joining the right's attack on her supposed lack of interviews (Trump gives fewer and the ones he sits for don't resemble interviews at all). I don't know any supposedly Harris-supporting Democrat who is behaving that way in this election, given how much is at stake in defeating Trump.
ReplyDeleteToday's essay is a hit piece on Harris, reminding readers that she sucks at giving interviews (everyone agrees) without telling us how many interviews she has given or whether her answers are actually word salad as claimed. A definition of word salad is clearly needed, followed by some evidence that Harris speaks word salad. Recall that last week the right was upset because she used the word "holistically" in her interview with Ruhle.
Holistically definition: "relating to or concerned with wholes or with complete systems rather than with the analysis of, treatment of, or dissection into parts"
She may have said this, but is it inappropriate to look at the big picture of a complex situation instead of only breaking it down analytically? Has Somerby never heard the word holistic in his philosophy classes? If so, why would he agree with a stupid right wing complaint about it?
word salad definition: "a mixture of words or phrases that is confused and difficult to understand"
word salad examples: "Bags stain purple vacuum. Running lately people purpose purple. Too often sleeping blankets."
No one in their right mind would think that Harris speaks like that. Why would Somerby go along with this attack on Harris?
" I don't know any supposedly Harris-supporting Democrat who is behaving that way in this election, given how much is at stake in defeating Trump."
DeleteI'm a Harris-supporting Democrat and think she's an idiotic piece of shit. We only have two choices. She's fucking lame. I'm not going to lie to myself about it.
Good example! You support Harris the same way Somerby does, with the same bigotry as the right wing, and only because Trump is crazy. And that makes you not particularly liberal, because liberals would support Harris with more enthusiasm, because they aren't infected with misogynistic and racist stereotypes and admire her accomplishments.
Delete"I'm a Harris-voting Democrat," you should say, because you are doing nothing whatsoever to support her. Somerby is doing things to actively undermine her. You cannot say you are supporting someone while doing nothing to encourage others to vote for her.
I am supporting her. I just think she's a horrible candidate to be president. Especially if Trump is a unique threat. Why run someone as unqualified and unprepared as Harris?
Delete"You cannot say you are supporting someone while doing nothing to encourage others to vote for her."
DeleteNo, you can say that. Your assertion is false.
You know the answer to your own question. The NY Times and Somerby decided that Biden was too very very very old to run again, despite doing an outstanding job as president (most recently by helping to settle the dockworker strike). There is no one else willing to run and also as well qualified as Harris. The others all refused to push Biden aside, showing integrity and perhaps protecting their chances for 2028. Biden asked Harris to run in his place. She did not talk him into stepping aside.
DeleteWho is more qualified? Who is better prepared? None of the alternatives polled as strongly against Trump as Harris did.
How does dissing your party's candidate help them win?
DeleteOff topic: This reality is why the Democrats' hope for a peacefully negotiated two-state solution is fantasy:
ReplyDeleteYesterday, Dictator and Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said
“God willing, we will destroy Israel.”
Western policy makers should note that he didn’t say “God willing, we will have a two-state solution”
You have to check the translation to make sure the claim by the partisans is accurate and then check for context. You would be doing yourself a huge disservice by taking that as gospel, so to speak.
DeleteA two state solution is the only solution. It's like Churchill said about democracy. It's the worst solution, except for all the others. A two state solution is the only way. There's that way and no other way.
A few days ago, we were debating how much money FEMA spent on migrants. Here's one expensive program designed to benefit migrants:
ReplyDelete"According to FEMA’s own reports, the Shelter and Services Program allocated $364 million in the 2023 fiscal year and another staggering $650 million for 2024 to provide shelter, food, healthcare, and even hotel accommodations for noncitizen migrants."
Lots of specific details at the link https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2024/10/rep-nancy-mace-exposes-femas-lies-introduces-bill/
FEMA administers this program but it doesn't run it out of its disaster relief funding. There were no disaster funds diverted to migrants before or after this hurricane. Heather Cox Richardson fully described this program, as did Kessler (quoted yesterday). No one has been hiding this program, but the right is pretending that a diversion of FEMA funds has resulted in a shortage to deal with this current hurricane. That is a lie.
DeleteIt should be obvious that FEMA is best equipped to deal with sheltering people in various places across the country, at short notice. It should also be obvious that migrants need to sleep somewhere and have food and water, and that if they are being held by the govt (such as for deportation), the govt must provide this.
No one said that FEMA doesn't help migrants. This program was acknowledged yesterday and in the linked sources. FEMA also announced that it does not have a shortage of funds to deal with the current hurricane response.
Trump would no doubt put people in cages and not feed them, forcing them to sleep on the floor. That is how third-world countries operate. Republicans are not known for their empathy and Trump has less than the average Republican. Even jails provide beds and food.
The lying Republican argument was that FEMA diverted funds from disaster relief to give to immigrants. More BS out of DIC. It’s a daily thing.
DeleteNow if FEMA diverted charitable money to enrich their personal bank accounts, it would be crickets from DIC.
DeleteSunday sure flew by.
ReplyDeleteSomerby complains that interviewers are bad at interviewer whenever they don't ask the questions he would have asked. He especially makes that complaint when they don't follow up aggressively after a candidate has made it clear they don't want to answer a question. I thin interviewers are aware that they would appear nasty and aggressive, biased, if they were to press too hard after a candidate has signed off on a response.
ReplyDeleteI can only guess what Somerby thinks might be a more effective candidate response during an interview. I trust that the candidates themselves know what their goals are and what they want to say. It is hard to know what Somerby's complaint is about Harris, since he has said nothing specific about her, except that she isn't good at it.
He was saying her other campaigning was bad too, except for her smile, until others started praising her effectiveness at rallies. Maybe Somerby is just overly influenced by the right wing chorus claiming Harris can't do interviews (starting with Trump's repetitive assertion and repeated as a talking point by all right wingers). When you watch Fox 24/7, it is easy to be taken in by their propaganda. It is entirely possible that Somerby is wrong about this and not sufficiently motivated to investigate and see how well she has done, except that Somerby has already said that he thinks Ruhle didn't press her enough (because all good Democrats want to see their own candidate put on the spot and put on-the-ropes by some TV host. Yes, that would be better theater, but how would it help Harris win her election?