Saturday, October 24, 2009
PRESS RELATIONS
Some of those who are the most prolific advice-givers are the least qualified to be dispensing guidance. So it is with this writer, whose credentials in press relations could be called into question.
This writer recalls that sometime early in his 25 year tenure as a college president, he attended a breakout session at a national conference on the topic of press relations. He recalls well the admonition of that experienced speaker: “Don’t get into a fight with a newspaper unless you own one.” It was akin to Mark Twain’s advice not to battle with somebody who buys ink by the barrel.
This advice must have been received a while after a certain incident in the writer’s early career, or else this writer flagrantly failed to follow it. Just prior to leaving home to attend a banquet of the local chamber of commerce, he looked at that day’s evening edition of the town news. There on the front page was an attack on the college on some matter of local controversy with city fathers. Anger swelled.
That anger had not abated when this writer took the speaker’s rostrum, waved the local newspaper at the crowd, including its publisher, and termed it the owner’s “yellow scandal sheet.” He said to the folks there that maybe he should apologize for the college cluttering up the east side of their nice town and causing problems.
This was definitely not the epitome of good public relations, although raves were immediately received from college personnel and many local friends. Somebody needed to call the paper and the local government to task, they said, for mistreating the town’s major economic and cultural asset.
Curiously enough, there was a bit more local sensitivity after that. The newspaper owner and I later became friends, and his lovely wife served a very helpful term on the governing board of regents.
Nevertheless, this writer would not normally recommend this as an avenue toward good press relations, although now and then a private talk with press people may help alleviate any growing tensions.
In the case of our president, one should not expect any change in the negative treatment of him by Fox “News,” regardless of any positive overtures or straight comments from the White House. Fox is indeed a network driven by political ideology. It is not going to change if treated with finesse. It will continue to feature negative news and commentary about the Obama administration and democrats in general, no matter what. Fox has shown itself to be anti-government, if the administration is democrat, by promoting and sponsoring anti-government rallies. That is NOT a news network.
What does the president lose if he “alienates” a non-news network of continuous negativity and personal attack? How can a network which features vicious personal and political attacks become more unfriendly than it already is?
This writer rarely watches Fox “News” more than a minute or two at a time, except when he is an unwilling part of a captive audience in public places such as doctors’ offices, hospital waiting areas, and fitness centers. He considers the usual Fox network programming to be offensive, and he has been known to request that the channel be changed.
The President is correct, of course. Fox is not a news network, but it is a video journal of “perspective” as he said. It has been sickening when Fox hypocritically claims itself to be “fair and balanced.” News, often slanted, is interspersed within daytime programming, but the prime time is devoted to right wing attack programming.
It is also true that during the evening hours MSNBC programming has a left-of-center ideological stance. Their early morning seems to the right-of-center, while mid-day programming seems to be normal news coverage. But MSNBC lists its evening programs as “a perspective on the day’s news and events.” That is honest.
Except for Lou Dobbs, and maybe other gaffes, CNN is the most “fair and balanced” of the cable news networks. It is in fact worrisome because it compulsively offers two sided arguments about everything. It cannot put on a news report, or its own network news analysts’ comments, without some kind of rebuttal included from one or both parties. It becomes a constant, tiresome, annoying harangue. No wonder they are losing viewers.
In spite of popular criticism from the right wing, the mainstream network television newscasts seem to be the most fair in their coverage and presentations. PBS is remarkably educative without being obnoxious.
Even the newscasts from area television stations sometimes seem to be stricken with editorial bias in selection of content, in the language with which issues or scenes are described, and similar subtleties. Then, too, we are afflicted there with features like “my two cents.” But at least those two pennies worth are labeled.
Somehow we need to find a better way of presenting the news of interest in this country. Perhaps we should go back to the concept of well-run, journalistically professional newspapers where they keep their editorial comments on one or two pages and boldly labeled so.
The reader of an ethically run newspaper can then skip the editorials, which are properly allowed to be politically biased, silly, or just plain annoying. He/she can proceed to read news that is normally properly and fairly collected and presented without bias or selection.
Surely someone can devise a television format for cable network “news” that emulates that conceptual framework.
Dr. Edwin E. Vineyard, AKA The Militant Moderate
This writer recalls that sometime early in his 25 year tenure as a college president, he attended a breakout session at a national conference on the topic of press relations. He recalls well the admonition of that experienced speaker: “Don’t get into a fight with a newspaper unless you own one.” It was akin to Mark Twain’s advice not to battle with somebody who buys ink by the barrel.
This advice must have been received a while after a certain incident in the writer’s early career, or else this writer flagrantly failed to follow it. Just prior to leaving home to attend a banquet of the local chamber of commerce, he looked at that day’s evening edition of the town news. There on the front page was an attack on the college on some matter of local controversy with city fathers. Anger swelled.
That anger had not abated when this writer took the speaker’s rostrum, waved the local newspaper at the crowd, including its publisher, and termed it the owner’s “yellow scandal sheet.” He said to the folks there that maybe he should apologize for the college cluttering up the east side of their nice town and causing problems.
This was definitely not the epitome of good public relations, although raves were immediately received from college personnel and many local friends. Somebody needed to call the paper and the local government to task, they said, for mistreating the town’s major economic and cultural asset.
Curiously enough, there was a bit more local sensitivity after that. The newspaper owner and I later became friends, and his lovely wife served a very helpful term on the governing board of regents.
Nevertheless, this writer would not normally recommend this as an avenue toward good press relations, although now and then a private talk with press people may help alleviate any growing tensions.
In the case of our president, one should not expect any change in the negative treatment of him by Fox “News,” regardless of any positive overtures or straight comments from the White House. Fox is indeed a network driven by political ideology. It is not going to change if treated with finesse. It will continue to feature negative news and commentary about the Obama administration and democrats in general, no matter what. Fox has shown itself to be anti-government, if the administration is democrat, by promoting and sponsoring anti-government rallies. That is NOT a news network.
What does the president lose if he “alienates” a non-news network of continuous negativity and personal attack? How can a network which features vicious personal and political attacks become more unfriendly than it already is?
This writer rarely watches Fox “News” more than a minute or two at a time, except when he is an unwilling part of a captive audience in public places such as doctors’ offices, hospital waiting areas, and fitness centers. He considers the usual Fox network programming to be offensive, and he has been known to request that the channel be changed.
The President is correct, of course. Fox is not a news network, but it is a video journal of “perspective” as he said. It has been sickening when Fox hypocritically claims itself to be “fair and balanced.” News, often slanted, is interspersed within daytime programming, but the prime time is devoted to right wing attack programming.
It is also true that during the evening hours MSNBC programming has a left-of-center ideological stance. Their early morning seems to the right-of-center, while mid-day programming seems to be normal news coverage. But MSNBC lists its evening programs as “a perspective on the day’s news and events.” That is honest.
Except for Lou Dobbs, and maybe other gaffes, CNN is the most “fair and balanced” of the cable news networks. It is in fact worrisome because it compulsively offers two sided arguments about everything. It cannot put on a news report, or its own network news analysts’ comments, without some kind of rebuttal included from one or both parties. It becomes a constant, tiresome, annoying harangue. No wonder they are losing viewers.
In spite of popular criticism from the right wing, the mainstream network television newscasts seem to be the most fair in their coverage and presentations. PBS is remarkably educative without being obnoxious.
Even the newscasts from area television stations sometimes seem to be stricken with editorial bias in selection of content, in the language with which issues or scenes are described, and similar subtleties. Then, too, we are afflicted there with features like “my two cents.” But at least those two pennies worth are labeled.
Somehow we need to find a better way of presenting the news of interest in this country. Perhaps we should go back to the concept of well-run, journalistically professional newspapers where they keep their editorial comments on one or two pages and boldly labeled so.
The reader of an ethically run newspaper can then skip the editorials, which are properly allowed to be politically biased, silly, or just plain annoying. He/she can proceed to read news that is normally properly and fairly collected and presented without bias or selection.
Surely someone can devise a television format for cable network “news” that emulates that conceptual framework.
Dr. Edwin E. Vineyard, AKA The Militant Moderate
