What Are the Media Celebrating?

By Howard Kurtz
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, January 20, 2009 5:47 AM

Filmmaker Ron Howard was chatting in Maureen Dowd's living room, saying he didn't mind spending hours in the cold for the inauguration and that even his conservative brother had come to admire Barack Obama.

Outside on the chilly Sunday night, Tom Hanks decided against venturing into the jam-packed row house, mock-announcing to a small crowd on the Georgetown street that the party was paralyzed: "No more hot dogs! The Chinese food never got here!"

The country's big-name anchors, actors, commentators, news executives, producers, editors and scribes have been celebrating the quadrennial event -- and themselves -- at one glitzy gathering after another in the run-up to today's inauguration.

"It's turning into the royal wedding, isn't it?" asks Tina Brown, who threw a brunch Sunday at the Council on Foreign Relations with MSNBC's Joe Scarborough.

Every inauguration is a major media moment, with nonstop television coverage, newspapers churning out special editions and correspondents parachuting in from around the globe. But it is hard to envision this level of intensity if John McCain were taking the oath of office. All the hoopla has left the impression that many in journalism are thrilled by Obama's swearing-in.

"We wanted to celebrate the key themes of the Obama era," says Arianna Huffington, who hosted 1,500 guests at the Newseum last night at a bash featuring massive computer screens--with live-blogging stations--and entertainment by Will.i.am, Sheryl Crow and Sting. These include "the rise of the Internet and new media and the role they had in getting him elected, and the way he's going to use it to govern."

At times the line between celebrity and journalist seemed to vanish. Sharon Stone began interviewing 11-year-old Adrian Kali Turner, one of a group of kids picked to sing with Will.i.am, on a reporter's behalf. Why was she excited by Obama? "It's a benchmark in history," Turner said. Can we get past color? "We're all the same inside," Turner said.

Beaming at her journalistic handiwork, Stone declared: "It wasn't Will.i.am who said that. It was a little girl who said that."

Bill Press, a radio host at WWRC-AM -- now renamed "OBAMA 1260" -- arranged for other liberal hosts, including Stephanie Miller and Randi Rhodes, to join a radio and television broadcast Sunday at George Washington University, complete with a live band. "We wanted to celebrate the inauguration of someone we all worked hard to get elected, and the role that progressive talk radio played," he says.

Obama is being covered not just as an incoming president but as a white-hot celebrity. In recent days, the New York tabloids have run front-page stories on his official portrait and new Cadillac limousine, amid such headlines as "VOICE OF HOPE" and "RENEW THE DREAM." The Washington Times gave front-page play yesterday to an essay Obama wrote for the paper, while Parade magazine's cover story was a letter that Obama wrote to his daughters. Michelle Obama is being touted as America's next supermodel. And there has been much panting over the family's search for a dog.

At what point does the recognition of Obama's gifts and this juncture in history spill over into partisan adulation? Some journalists justify the ebullient tone by arguing that Obama is simply more fascinating than most politicians, as well as a trailblazer who is following 43 white presidents. Others say they are merely reflecting a public groundswell. Still others say Obama moves product when he's on TV shows and magazine covers. Perhaps, more than one reporter says privately, Obama deserves the adulation, given the fact that he pulled off a political feat even harder than landing a crippled jet intact on the Hudson River.

As for liberal pundits who reflexively booed George W. Bush, are they now waving the pom-poms for Obama?

"We're all wrestling with this," Press says. "In the '80s, every night I could just slam Reagan. It's tougher when your guy is in the White House, but it doesn't mean you support everything he does. Your role shifts to holding his feet to the fire."

A bit harder to do when you're broadcasting for OBAMA 1260.

"If the expectations are that he's going to be the savior, absolutely, they can never be met," Huffington says. But she believes that "Obama can be the catalyst for fundamental change in how we all act as citizens."

There appear to be more blowout bashes than when Bush or Bill Clinton came to power, perhaps reflecting the allure of Obamamania. But there are also many more media outlets than in the pre-blogging age.

One thing is certain: in the midst of two long wars and an unnerving financial crisis, even some conservatives say that everyone wants a piece of this feel-good story.

"A lot of people feel a lot of happiness, and it's not a bad thing to grab a happy moment and show it and revel in it," says Wall Street Journal columnist Peggy Noonan.

And feeling good is the point of the social scene as well, as with the New Republic sponsoring a Yo-Yo Ma concert Saturday, and NBC chief executive Jeff Zucker hosting a brunch for 800 yesterday at the National Museum for Women in the Arts.

Jeffrey Immelt, the CEO of parent company General Electric, addressed the sushi-nibbling crowd from a grand staircase at the museum: "I thought I'd begin by saying, welcome, fellow Democrats." It was, apparently, a joke.

The Washington Post Co. has been a player as well: Slate threw a soiree Saturday at the apartment of Christopher Hitchens, while CEO Donald Graham hosted a Sunday night ball at the National Museum of American History for the company's black-oriented Web site, The Root. Boldfaced names included Spike Lee, Henry Louis Gates, Samuel L. Jackson, Natalie Portman and -- mostly secluded in a VIP lounge -- Oprah Winfrey. David Gregory even boogied, showing off his dance moves.

"There's a slightly manic feel to it all, welcoming in a new era with such hope," says Brown, whose brunch helped promote her new Web site, the Daily Beast. "There's such relief that this eight years is gone and everyone wants to celebrate. There's hope that Obama is going to be the man who leads everyone to the promised land. Everyone kind of wants this young president to succeed."

Some serious business was conducted amid the hors d'oeuvres as incoming White House aides made the rounds. Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski chatted with David Axelrod at the Beast brunch Sunday, while at a CNN luncheon at the Newseum an hour later, Gloria Borger tried to wheedle information out of Rahm Emanuel.

But not all the talk was about politics. At Dowd's party, where guests caught glimpses of David Geffen and Diane Von Furstenberg, Larry David got into a surprisingly passionate debate about the Eagles-Cardinals playoff game with ESPN's Tony Kornheiser. But the utter gridlock proved a deterrent: Ben Affleck, like Hanks before him, took one look at the mob scene and fled.

Further thoughts: After broadcasting half-frozen from the Newseum roof, watching endless television and attending all these media parties (I know, tough job, somebody has to do it), I can report that there really is an electric feeling in the city, unlike any I've seen before, going back to Jimmy Carter. But on Wednesday, we'll still be in a financial mess and mired in two wars. Nobody expects Obama to solve these problems overnight. The media will need to aggressively chronicle what he's accomplishing and where he's falling short.

Here's a revelation, from a source very close to Biden:

"Vice President-elect Joe Biden's wife told Oprah Winfrey on Monday that her husband had been offered a choice between being Barack Obama's running mate or his secretary of State, prompting Biden to try to shush her," the L.A. Times reports.

"Jill Biden's comment, during a taping of Winfrey's television show, was an implicit insult to Hillary Rodham Clinton, the person Obama ultimately named to head the State Department, because it suggested she was not Obama's first choice."

And here, the NYT reports, is what Obama had to say about John McCain last night:

" 'There are few Americans who understand this need for common purpose and common effort better than John McCain,' Mr. Obama said at the dinner he held for Mr. McCain at the Washington Hilton. 'It is what he has strived for and achieved throughout his life. It is built into the very content of his character.' "

Can a dinner for Joe the Plumber be far behind?

In Slate, John Dickerson ruminates about today's address:

"His inauguration speech will be framed with the idea of a 'new era of responsibility,' a theme he touched on at the end of the campaign and again in his recent speech about his economic recovery package. The idea is that everyone, from politicians to CEOs to those of us trying to get a bank loan, has to take greater responsibility to get us out of the fix we're in.

"Sounds good. But how do you build this kind of thing, particularly in an age where trust in government is low and people are cynical and distrustful of their fellow humans for all the reasons Obama himself has outlined? To get us all on board with this idea, Obama has to wire us together. To build collective responsibility, there has to be social cohesion. If we're not all in this together, if my neighbor or editor isn't going to do his part, why will I bother to fulfill my responsibilities? I might also be doubtful about whether simply acting responsibly can change anything. And I might also reject the premise: Those Wall Street bankers did more than I did to get us into this mess. So why shouldn't they have to do more to get us out?

"Obama undoubtedly knows this, which is why the entire inaugural cavalcade has been designed to help create unity."

BBC's Katty Kay expands upon Tina Brown's royals comment to me with this Daily Beast post about crowning King Obama:

"Why am I coming over all queasy this week? Oh, yes, it must be coronation--sorry, inauguration--week in the federation of the United States. So this is why you booted us out a couple of centuries ago. You simply replaced the pomp and ceremony of hereditary monarchy and with the pomp and ceremony of elected monarchy. OK, you didn't opt for the dynastic duo of Bush and Clinton, which really had us scratching our crowned European heads, but the fanfare with which Caroline Kennedy has entered the political picture suggests your infatuation with royal families is still not over.

"This week Washington feels like London in the run up to one of our own grand royal events . . .

"There is a more serious problem with treating Barack Obama as an elected monarch; one that affects us journalists, in particular. Put a man on a pedestal and suddenly it's hard for the press to drag him through the political wringer. It happened in 2003 in the run up to the invasion of Iraq and risks happening again."

She's right, no president should be put on a pedestal. We fought a war over this. But neither could a Barack Obama be elected in Britain.

No pedestal for Fred Barnes, who remains openly skeptical of the 44th president:

"Barack Obama is the apostle of hope. But he also arouses the flipside of hope--fear. And while the fear he stirs may turn out to be unfounded, it's not irrational. People don't know who Obama really is or where his ideological center of gravity rests, to the extent it rests anywhere. He was a liberal in the Senate and the campaign, a centrist in the transition, and who knows what he'll be as president. He's elusive.

"I count four separate fears. Whether he's a crypto-Marxist is not one of them. Neither is the absurd fear that he's secretly a Muslim, even a closet jihadist. Nor is the groundless claim Obama was actually born outside the United States and isn't really an American citizen. Forget all those. They're nonstarters."

Very nice of you, Fred.

Barnes's reservations: "He doesn't know what he's talking about. This is a legitimate fear. Obama throws around numbers like confetti. In the campaign, he said he would create 1 million jobs. After the election, he put out a plan he said would produce up to 3 million jobs. Then in a radio address on January 10, he said the number could reach 4.1 million and said 500,000 would be jobs in the alternative energy field, 200,000 in health care. Does he really believe he can achieve this? The fear is that he might."

Others: "He's a pushover." "He's another Jimmy Carter." "He has nerves of jello."

Maybe this is why Barnes wasn't invited to the Obama dinner with Will/Brooks/Kristol/Krauthammer/Noonan and company.

Meghan McCain became a blogging star during her dad's campaign, and now she posts a candid interview with her mother, Cindy:

"What is the best part about not being first lady?

"Well, I guess the best part would be that I can drive my own car and I am back to my normal everyday life. I can make choices and I have the ability to spend as much time as I want with all of you, which is most important to me. . .

"What was the hardest day on the campaign trail? . . .

"Another hard day was the day the New York Times published their profile on me. I had never spoken with the reporter who wrote the article. She contacted the kids that went to high school with my youngest daughter over the Internet, and as a parent, that was scary. I think it was so hard because I had to look at all of you and say we were doing the right thing by running again and yet it was incredibly difficult, it was incredibly heart-wrenching . . .

"I know I cringed at some articles written about you where you were accused of being a Stepford wife or a Barbie doll. Why do you think the media didn't take the time to dig deeper into your personality and instead put you in a box?

"Well, I think, without sounding bitter--and I'm not bitter--I do believe there was a media bias. I do believe that the media had a specific agenda and with that said, the American people cast their vote."

I think Cindy should have given more interviews, but I was not a fan of the sharply negative NYT piece, which ran a couple of weeks before the election.

The erosion of the media, writes James Rainey says in the L.A. Times, can be seen in the coverage of Los Angeles County:

"A slow plague has reduced the corps of journalists who cover county government to four. That's just four reporters (and one of them has other responsibilities) who focus a critical eye on the biggest local government in America -- a $22-billion behemoth that provides policing, healthcare, welfare and more to a county of nearly 10 million people. As concern about the economic crisis spreads, everyone should be alarmed that the ranks of the watchdogs assessing the fallout for government have been cut to shreds."

You know editors are in trouble when the bosses won't even deny they've been thrown overboard. That is the case at Newsday:

"Newsday's ownership and top executives were mum Sunday after a report of a possible shakeup in the newspaper's newsroom management. Citing no sources, the New York Post speculated yesterday that Newsday's top editor, John Mancini, and managing editors Deborah Henley and Debby Krenek may have been fired by parent Cablevision Systems Corp.

"The Post said a rumor was circulating that Cablevision was angry about coverage of a sex harassment lawsuit filed against Eddy Curry of the New York Knicks; the team also is owned by Cablevision."

A very loud no comment.