Halperin Prefers Style Over Substance
Does Mark Halperin possess any self-reflection? In listing some weaknesses to Sen. McCain’s campaign he writes:
10. That in modern America, perception is often reality and style often beats substance.
With his nanosecond newscycles Halperin is part of the problem. He’s always talking about process over actual issues. If he really cared more about substance he would have given my former boss Fred Thompson more credit.
Halperin’s riff is in contrast to what he wrote last year about campaign coverage:
Voters are bombarded with information about which contender has “what it takes” to be the best candidate. Who can deliver the most stirring rhetoric? Who can build the most attractive facade? Who can mount the wiliest counterattack? Whose life makes for the neatest story? Our political and media culture reflects and drives an obsession with who is going to win, rather than who should win.
For most of my time covering presidential elections, I shared the view that there was a direct correlation between the skills needed to be a great candidate and a great president. The chaotic and demanding requirements of running for president, I felt, were a perfect test for the toughest job in the world.
But now I think I was wrong. The “campaigner equals leader” formula that inspired me and so many others in the news media is flawed.
…
So if we for too long allowed ourselves to be beguiled by “What It Takes” — certainly not the author’s fault — what do those of us who cover politics do now? After all, Mr. Cramer’s style of campaign coverage is alluring in an election season that features so many candidates with heroic biographies and successful careers in and out of politics. (Not to mention two wide-open races.)
Well, we pause, take a deep breath and resist. At least sometimes. In the face of polls and horse-race maneuvering, we can try to keep from getting sucked in by it all. We should examine a candidate’s public record and full life as opposed to his or her campaign performance. But what might appear simple to a voter can, I know, seem hard for a journalist.
If past is prologue, the winners of the major-party nominations will be those who demonstrate they have what it takes to win. But in the short time remaining voters and journalists alike should be focused on a deeper question: Do the candidates have what it takes to fill the most difficult job in the world?
Halperin is failing to heed his own words.
[via memeorandum]
