Media Matters
I know I said that I hoped I'd be through with politics for a while, but this one on David Brock was written months ago for the Spectator and was rejected. I hate rejection. But this wasn't so bad as they had just published a book review on Brock's "Republican Noise Machine" in the print magazine, and running this would make them seem like they had an obsession with him. At least that's what they told me. They were kind. In editing the piece today I find I was too clever by half.
Cut to today's 'Morning Brief' email from the WSJ, which has an item from Ad Age noting that Staples has pulled advertising from Sinclair Broadcasting, mainly due to a campaign from Brock's Media Matters for America web site. This is quite the feather in Brock's cap, though small potatoes compared with losing the election. Sinclair stations had run an anti-Kerry documentary just prior to the election.
The Cliff Notes for those still reading: Brock was a "right-wing hit man" for the Spectator and broke the Troopergate story, including the outing of Paula Jones; wrote puff book on Hillary Clinton, the gist of which was she was a victim of Bill. After said book's lukewarm reception he came out of the closet, left the Spectator and wrote the anti-right polemic- Blinded by the Right -where he claimed that he lied his ass off while toiling for the Spectator. He then ceremoniously joined the left and started Media Matters.
My article under the flap:
David Brock was the guest speaker for last Tuesday night’s Q & A session at the Los Angeles Press Club in Hollywood. A couple of weeks ago Brock attended the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association National Convention, where he ran into one of our LAPC board members. He made such an impression on her that she invited him here to promote his new book (The Republican Noise Machine: Right-Wing Media and How It Corrupts Democracy) and website (Media Matters for America).
Brock began by describing the website’s mission: To ".. nip in the bud.. the right’s capacity to deliver and disseminate its propaganda." Media Matters monitors ‘right wing’ sources such as Fox News because of.."their disproportionate impact" as deliverers of "misinformation generated in the right wing" through a steady "stream of pollution," because they reach not only conservatives, but a "certain number of moderate, persuadable and swing voters."
"People don’t appreciate the magnitude of what we’re up against," Brock declared to the rapt audience. "We’re awash in this every day, even when we don’t know it." He warned, "It even affects progressives. I’ve been in many settings where I can tell that there’s an echo effect…on people who aren’t in any way sympathetic to that agenda."
This was a friendly crowd, and the moderator's Q & A consisted mainly of leading Brock through his talking points. The most amusing episode of the evening was when moderator Karen Ocamb mentioned a personal conversation she and Brock had while at the convention in New York. They were discussing "people" working under the yoke of the right wing propaganda machine…like "Tucker Carlson." Carlson is an occasional CNN Crossfire co-host, host for PBS’s new series "Tucker Carlson: Unfiltered," and a regular contributor to the Weekly Standard.
Ocamb alluded to Brock’s assertion that Carlson (and "people" like him that) "spew[s] out all these [conservative] opinions, and [don’t] believe them." "Was he blinded by the right?" Brock visibly squirmed this 'private' conversation was just ‘outed.’ He responded by saying that he and his Media Matters site "[we] don’t get into mind reading" like the conservatives. "We don’t question peoples motives." That is of course unless you’re speaking off the record at a lesbian and gay soirée.
"Putting that aside," Brock goes on, "it’s a mixed bag"…"there are true believers and there are people who basically get up in the morning and do this for a living." Brock backs off naming names and leaves exactly ‘whom’ he’s slandering to the imagination of the audience.
In a near classic case of projection, Brock opines the allure of oodles of money motivates the vast right wing media machine. "It’s hard to leave it" Brock responds when asked why people continue this life of lies. "It’s a gravy train." "It’s a cradle to grave jobs program." He mentions that the Weekly Standard pays its employees well into the six figures. Explaining his own participation, chasing the dough for him was "careerism."
Brock accuses the right of running a money machine, pointing out that conservative organizations buy books in bulk from a favorite author to pump up sales numbers. The book then gets on the NY Times Bestseller List; which gets the author on the talk shows; which sells more books to the unwitting masses; and then resells the book "for a dollar." Brock neglects to mention that the left also does this as a matter of course. The DNC and HILPAC's buy of Hillary Clinton’s book Living History comes to mind. "So that’s a whole thing, that basically, one side of the political spectrum has figured out and the other side has not yet." [Update: as of 1/5/05 Brock still hasn't figured it out. The MMA website doesn't offer any of his books for sale, though you can buy t-shirts]
"His Cheatin’ Heart," Brock's name making article in the American Spectator, was the demon seed of the Clinton impeachment. He told of an experience after it's publishing (and during the ensuing Paula Jones lawsuit), that he had of speaking with one of Jones’ attorneys (whom he got to know "real well"). Brock asked him whether or not he thought his client was telling the truth. Brock says the mouthpiece told him "no." All the hubbub was in the service of "a perjury trap that they were trying to lay for Bill Clinton." I'm guessing Bubba would be interested in this little tidbit to throw into his next memoir.
On the subject of left wing bias in the media Brock flatly states that there is no truth to it. He admits that if you go back "30-35-40 years, you can find that little kernel of truth." Otherwise, it is solely a manufactured product that even has liberals convinced that it’s true. In fact, according to Brock, the press has a right wing bias. Brock sites the Drudge Report ("I don’t think its influence can be overstated") as the beginning of a typical right wing news cycle. It starts with something 'not factual' posted on Drudge (for instance an expensive John Kerry haircut), which is then repeated by a Jay Leno as a joke. The joke is picked up by the AP, (or Reuters, "don’t quote me," he’s not sure which one), and presto-right wing news cycle. So…. Drudge posts inconsequential gossip, Leno makes a joke, and an international newswire picks it up. Bill Moyers call your office!
Questions from the audience were hit and miss. A woman said that she prayed for Brock when his book came out. Someone teased, "Is the liberal agenda not capable of a little competition?" The only challenging question asked was in reference to Brock likening Bill O’Reilly to Dan Rather. Was it a fair comparison being that Rather is supposed to be a straight news reporter and O’Reilly is supposed to be an opinion pundit? Brock defended the comparison by quoting the O’Reilly ‘No Spin’ credo, though O’Reilly always refers to himself as a pundit with an opinion, not as a straight reporter.
A curious point for me is that except for mentioning his conversation with Paula Jones’ lawyer during the Troopergate affair, he never once talked about the place that gave him his break, the American Spectator. No bile, no vitriol, no inside stories, nothing. Cripes, even Byron York had some dirt, and he’s still a VRWC member in good standing. Brock did weirdly assert that he wasn’t putting down Republicans, or conservatives, per se, just the puppet masters that control them. The only strings I can find are the ones Brock is still trying to jerk me around with, along with his new buddies on the left.
