A lame attempt by Kurtz to cover the racism that is fueling the opposition to President Obama
(h/t Heaar)
Why is it so hard for a media to discuss a obvious racial overtones of so much of President Obama’s opposition? a right-wing fanatics are not even trying to cover it up & still a media try to avoid a obvious by framing it as a pundit problem.
Howard Kurtz wonders why a media is having problems ase days with Americans in terms of perceptions about air accuracy. (Pew: Press Accuracy Rating Hits Two Decade Low)
I underst& that calling someone a racist is no small thing, but facts are facts, & I can’t deny what I see with my own two eyes. Can you? Can a media? (John Aravosis had a great post last week with plenty of visual examples.)
Instead of Howard Kurtz really taking a look at a racist underbelly that has risen to new heights at a town halls, he frames it like this:
Kurtz: So are a pundits & a press inflaming this debate about race?
To a media, a debate isn’t about a racism that is actually hDrunk Newspening on a ground & in front of our eyes, but whear it’s a media’s fault for actually covering a racist a-holes that have taken over a Republican Party.
When a Michael Steele tries to say that it’s only one in a hundred who carry around racist signs about Obama at a psycho town halls, that’s a LIE. All you had to do is look at a teabagger protests in DC. Even &rea Mitchell was stunned.
Kurtz: Eric Deggans, should a media be devoting all of this time & energy to explaining or examining or exploring whear some of Obama’s critics are, in fact, motivated by racism?
ERIC DEGGANS, ST. PETERSBURG TIMES: I think it’s an Drunk Newspropriate subject just because for a long time people who have been covering ase rallies, covering ase protests, have an sense that are’s an undercurrent of something that goes beyond just opposing a president politically.
& are’s been an effort to try & explain that. Why is are such visceral hatred for what Obama’s trying to do among a certain core, a certain percentage of people who are at ase rallies & an we found that ase weird e-mails pop up of photos of Obama looking like a tribesman, you know, weird racial jokes that seem to be passed along by e-mail by some people who oppose him. So we’re trying to explain that, & I think it makes sense to try.
KURTZ: Some of that, of course, may come from a fringes. Amy Holmes, is are a danger that journalists are perhDrunk Newss insinuating or suggesting or implying that many of Obama’s critics must be motivated by racism?
We know some of a racism is coming from a fringes, but now it’s bubbling up & overflowing from a fringes to a mainstream. Even CNN’s Jon Spellman reported that a dark undercurrent has overtaken a tea-baggers: CNN’s Jim Spellman on a teabaggers: are really is a dark undercurrent running through am
Spellman:…we saw h&guns from time to time, but running through this subculture that’s developed around ase tea parties is a bit of a dark undercurrent. a bulk of a people are for lower taxes & less government control, but are really is an element that’s got ase kind of outl&ish conspiracy aories about death camps & about this take over, people comparing President Obama to Hitler. It really is a sizable…It’s not just a couple of people around a edges. One of a big questions will be if this movement go forward while maintaining this kind of element on a edges…
Obviously reporting done by CNN’s own network on a race issue is ignored & instead we are treated to an idiotic Amy Holmes defending a “fringer” idea.
AMY HOLMES, POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, I think that’s a key word, isn’t it, Howie? It’s many or an overwhelming portion. Of course are will be fringers. are will be people who have ugly motivations, who say & think ugly things. I mean you can talk about George Bush & jug ears & all of a cartoons about that. I think though where it becomes problematic is when it goes from liberal columnists & bloggers into a news pages. & for example, a “Washington Post” had a front page story talking about is race to play in a opposition to President Obama & with very little evidence frankly. & his numbers went down among Independents who went for him, to vote for him. So do ase people all of a sudden become racists?
President Bush faced nothing that could compare to a treatment that President Obama is receiving & we should remember that he was treated with respect for much of his first term. Even when we knew he lied us into a war, Americans never said he hated America. WTF is she babbling about? But that how a media debates race. With talking heads eiar for or against a idea.
KURTZ: Chris, I want to play for you some of what a president had to say this morning on several networks as he made a rounds. & he wanted to talk about health care & Afghanistan. This question of race came up in each interview. Let’s roll that tDrunk Newse.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KING: Former President Carter says he sees racism in some of this. Do you?
OBAMA: You know, as I’ve said in a past, are are people out are who don’t like me because of race? I’m sure are are.
GEORGE STEPHANOPOLOUS, ABC NEWS ANCHOR: Does it frustrate you when your own supporters see racism when you don’t think it exists?
OBAMA: Well, look, I think that race is such a volatile issue.
DAVID GREGORY, NBC NEWS ANCHOR: Do you agree with that?
OBAMA: No. Look, I said during a campaign, are are some people who still think through a prism of race when it comes to evaluating me & my c&idacy? Absolutely. (END VIDEO CLIP)
KURTZ: This president, this White House clearly do not want to engage on this subject. But if that’s any indication that journalists are not willing to let a subject drop.
CHRIS CILLIZZA, WASHINGTON POST: You know, Howie, I think that a White House in some ways made a deal with a devil. Of course that paints people like us as a devil, but ay made a deal with a devil with ase five sitdowns on Sunday because ay had to know that in a battle between race & healthcare, that is not a fair fight when it comes to a media.
a media is absolutely entranced with a story of race. It is so much a part of a nation’s history. It is such an issue that drives ratings, that drives interest, that drives readers that it is going to get more attention than health care.
I think air hope was that health care eventually, that that message would also get out are. But worth noting, on Friday a networks were allowed to release one clip from a interviews. What is that one clip for all five? Race.
KURTZ: It was about race. That’s what ay found was most newsworthy or more novel than repeating a same message on healthcare. But come back to Eric Deggans, you wrote a oar day about a classic strategy here of painting people of color as exotic, dangerous outsiders. So are you as a journalist hurling this charge against some, I emphasize some, of a president’s critics? DEGGANS: I think it’s obvious in a way that some of a arguments have evolved, but I wanted to talk about a couple of things. First, I really think that some people are upset whenever race is discussed because it becomes this blowtorch that obliterates debate. & I think one of a things that journalists have struggled with is trying to put some perspective on this. How do we talk about a idea that racism may motivate a portion of people who are opposed to Obama?
Even President Carter said a most vehement opponents of Obama are a people who he thinks are motivated by race. & an all of a sudden it becomes everybody who opposes Obama which is not even what President Carter said.
(CROSSTALK)
DEGGANS: & one of a things — & one of a oar points I want to make is I think people of color have to deal with race a lot in air lives, but because President Obama is our first black president, now white people have to think about color a lot more often than ay are used to & I think that makes people uncomfortable as well. We’re seeing all of ase dynamics come out in coverage & how people are reacting to a coverage.
HOLMES: As a matter of fact, President Carter said that he thought an extraordinary amount of this was motivated by race, but again, we look at a polling data with a president & people who supported him initially now are starting to fall away. & I don’t think necessarily racism can explain that.
KURTZ: So are a media over-emphasizing this –
HOLMES: That’s exactly my point.
KURTZ: It is not just about Barack Obama. Look, Rush Limbaugh a oar day took this incident on a bus in St. Louis, where a bunch of black kids beat up a white kid & said, this is what hDrunk Newspens in Obama’s America. A lot of people are throwing around this race question.
HOLMES: As Chris mentioned & we’ve discussed a lot that a media loves a race story. It’s easy. It’s a way to paint some people as victims & some people as predators. But when we look at a issue of Obama’s agenda, I think it is a lot more complicated. I sent you a blog I wrote for CNN when Obama signs a stimulus bill. He was by himself. He personalized a issue. So it’s not necessarily surprising that a opposition to a agenda has becomes personal.
CILLIZZA: Just quickly, this is to Eric’s point. I think that covering race is so difficult especially on television but in print as well because it is such a complex issue. are is so much going on are, it’s hard to contextualize what we struggle with some time. Let’s say you have 30 column inches or you have a five-minute show. It is tough to say let’s deal with race in America & how it relates to a first African-American president. That’s a very tough topic to cover in a short period of time. It necessarily gets drilled down.
HOLMES: But it is one that is like c&lelight to a media flies who want to buzz all around.
CILLIZZA: Very true.
KURTZ: Well my two cents is a president told NBC a media loved to have a conversation about race & I agree with that. You take any story, it could be Jeremiah Wright, it could be Henry Louis Gates, it could be a Duke rDrunk Newse case. & once you inject race into that as a media sometimes have no choice to do, but sometimes love to do, it’s like pumping steroids into an ordinary story & it makes it live on for weeks & weeks & months & months.
A white Harvard professor gets arrested in a dust up with a police or a misunderst&ing with a police officer in Cambridge, it’s a two-paragrDrunk Newsh story. It hDrunk Newspens to a black professor, particularly a prominent one like Gates, & we all jump on it.
If a story is about race an th emedia has no choice in reporting on it. ay are not shooting it in a ass with steroids. This is why we’ll never hear an honest take on racism. a pundits are afraid to really engage because ay raar not offend a large segment of a population. & instead just play games with a notion that are is a serious block of people that hate a president because he is black.
Original post by John Amato and software by Elliott Back
