Critiquing the Press

Howard Kurtz has been The Washington Post's media reporter since 1990. He is also the host of CNN's "Reliable Sources" and the author of "Media Circus," "Hot Air," "Spin Cycle" and "The Fortune Tellers: Inside Wall Street's Game of Money, Media and Manipulation." Kurtz talks about the press and the stories of the day in "Media Backtalk."

The transcript follows.

Media Backtalk transcripts archive

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Kettering, Ohio: I am going miss today's discussion, but I am interested on your take -- last week MSNBC's David Shuster went after a Tennessee congresswoman for not knowing the name of the most recent soldier from her district to die in Iraq, reminiscent of the geography lesson that was tried on Bush in 2000. Turns out the guy was wrong and his research had uncovered a death in the wrong district. Shouldn't he have apologized for this failed gotcha, and is this really what should be expected of journalism? I spend way too much of my listening/viewing time trying to figure out what the reporter's slant on the news is, although with this reporter it was rather easy -- especially after the error was announced.

Howard Kurtz: Shuster did put out an apology. To me, it felt like a bit of a gotcha question no matter what district the soldier was from.

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Hoboken, N.J.: Heya, Howie. Was Washington Post Radio the media equivalent of the Edsel -- something a corporation through the public actually would need?

washingtonpost.com: With Low Ratings, Post Radio Venture To End Next Month (Post, Aug. 28)

Howard Kurtz: Maybe more like New Coke -- a spin-off of a successful product that didn't make it in the marketplace. I think that Post Radio had its strong aspects and its weaknesses -- and that there were some things we should have done differently -- but it was a worthy experiment, even though it didn't make it in a competitive marketplace.

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Bronx, N.Y.: Mr. Kurtz, I don't know if you're familiar with the comedian George Carlin, but he would sometimes make jokes about Irish Catholics and say "it's okay to make fun of your own guys." So is it okay in today's climate for female pundits like Maureen Dowd to make sexist remarks about Hillary Clinton, like calling her a "nag"? Chris Matthews tries to be a bit evasive while saying the same sorts of things, putting the offensive comments into other people's mouths where possible. Can black pundits now make quasi-racist remarks about Obama and Richardson etc? Does the fact that Clinton is -- at this extremely early point -- the favorite to become the next president mean that almost anything goes as far as personal remarks are concerned? Do you try to get your guests to exercise self-censorship, to keep the discussion on a higher level that those other shows?

Howard Kurtz: I do try to keep the "Reliable Sources" discussion on a higher plane than many of the shout shows, but I don't tell guests what they can say or don't say. I just try to set a tone. George Carlin may be right as far as what you can say on the street, but when you're talking about professional journalists, I don't subscribe to the notion that women, minorities or whomever can be more cutting toward their own kind than a white male could get away with. They may have a little more leeway, but people always are going to object to cheap shots, no matter where they come from.

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New York: Hi, Howard -- love your column. Last week you said that "there is no consensus, of course, on what to do about Iran's progress toward nuclear weaponry." On the same day the lead Washington Post editorial referred to Iran's "race for the bomb." I'll admit I hadn't been keeping up with the issue of Iran and its nuclear program, but my recollection had been that there's no solid evidence yet of the existence of any Iranian nuclear weapons program. So I checked out Robin Wright's chat that same day, and she twice stated (in response to separate questions) that no one knows if Iran has a nuclear weapons program. Shouldn't you and The Post be more careful about appearing to suggest that the existence of an Iranian nuclear weapons program, or progress toward a weapon, is an established fact?

Howard Kurtz: Iran, defying world pressure, is proceeding toward developing advanced nuclear technology. Ahmadinejad and company have been quite open about that. He says this technology only will be used for peaceful purposes (of course, he also says there are no gays in Iran) but the same technology can be harnessed for nuclear weapons. Whether Iran goes that route or not, within a couple of years it will have the capability to begin building nuclear weapons unless some agreement is reached with the West.

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New York: Regarding The Post's headline last week referring to DC antiwar demonstrators as a "vocal minority" when they outnumbered the pro-war crowd ten-to-one by conservative estimates, why should we believe Deborah Howell that this is somehow yet another "honest" mistake?

washingtonpost.com: Protest Coverage Worth Protesting (Post, Sept. 23)

Howard Kurtz: The question is whether you believe The Post's journalists whom she interviewed. One of the reporters said she included the crowd figures high in her story but that it inadvertently was deleted during some editing done on deadline. That's a common problem in the newspaper business. I certainly don't believe that The Post's reporters deliberately decided to withhold that information.

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Oviedo, Fla.: This morning on a talk show Jenna Bush said her dad had suggested she release the book after his term, "to give it a chance" without any flak pertaining to him. Fair enough point. But geez ... does she really think a 24-year-old newbie teacher would have had the chance to travel to the depths of the third world and then publish a well-advertised book about it if she wasn't the First Daughter?

Howard Kurtz: I don't think she would dispute that for a second.

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Columbus, Ohio: When the New York Times determined that MoveOn had not paid the correct price for their full page General Betray Us ad, the group paid an additional $70,000 to make up the difference. Rudy Giuliani had demanded and received the same rate as MoveOn. Has his campaign now also paid the extra $70,000? Thanks.

washingtonpost.com: The Trail: Was Giuliani's MoveOn Deal Unfair? (washingtonpost.com, Sept. 25)

Howard Kurtz: MoveOn paid the extra money last week. I believe the figure was $77,000.

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Pittsburgh: Speaking of New Coke, what happened to the TimesSelect deal? I read Paul Krugman this morning without having to pay! After the New York Times went to this system, my visits to their site dropped precipitously.

washingtonpost.com: Times Ends Fee on TimesSelect Content (Bloomberg, Sept. 18)

Howard Kurtz: The Times abolished the two-year experiment last week, saying it hopes to make more advertising revenue by not hiding its columnists behind a pay wall. The venture did bring in $10 million a year for the paper, but it really took Friedman, Krugman, Dowd, Rich, Brooks and the others out of the Internet debate. I'm glad I can link to them again.

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Philadelphia: Why does the media have such a right-wing slant? Do you really think people want to hear about John Edwards hair, or Hillary's laugh? Why not tell us about the Lieberman-Kyl amendment? Tell us what that bill means as far as war with Iran. Talk about issues instead of fluff.

Howard Kurtz: The Hillary's laugh mini-flap began after she did a lot of belly-laughing during her five Sunday show interviews last weekend and Jon Stewart made fun of it on "The Daily Show." Others, including me, picked it up from Jon, and I don't think he's been accused of being a right-wing tool.

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Baltimore: Howard: I'll admit it -- I'm a diehard liberal, so I much enjoy Keith Olbermann's Countdown on MSNBC. Keith successfully transitioned from doing sports (ESPN's SportsCenter) to being a political commentator. But now he's back doing sports on NBC's Sunday evening show, "Football Night In America." Frankly I wonder if this is a good idea, given that it makes him seem like just another media guy, especially after he has tried to positron himself as an Edward R. Murrow for the Bush presidency. What is your take?

Howard Kurtz: I don't see how reaching a bigger audience on NBC can do anything but help his cable show. His "Countdown" ratings are up on the order of 80 percent, but remember that cable ratings remain a fraction of what the broadcast networks still draw, especially on hit shows.

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New York: Why do headlines refer to Giuliani as taking a "strong stand" in favor of gun ownership rights? The term "flip-flop" is used with any Democrats so craven.

Howard Kurtz: I haven't seen any "strong stand" headlines, and every single story I read or heard about Rudy's recent NRA speech emphasized that he was trying to minimize or soften positions he had strongly staked out as New York mayor -- when he likened the National Rifle Association to extremists and backed suits against gun manufacturers. The only storyline that competed with that was the weird cell phone call he took from his wife in the middle of his speech.

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Enough is enough, U.S.: I'm crying uncle here! Okay, we get it -- there is no aspect of Sen. Clinton that is off-limits. But this brouhaha about her laugh is crazy. What is driving this? Could it be that she may actually think it's funny that reporters are tripping over their self-satisfied selves to get her to slip up? Oh, if they only did that to Bush...

Howard Kurtz: She could actually think it's funny. Or she could be using laughter as a way of defusing tough questions. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

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Little Rock, Ark.: In discussing the Bill O'Reilly's comments on Sylvia's Restaurant on CNN, you stated that you felt that the situation was overblown. You also stated that Clarence Page of the Chicago Tribune felt that the media outcry was overblown. In actuality the title of Page's column was "Giving Soft Bigotry a Break." In it he stated that O'Reilly was ignorant, but not a racist. Page felt that whites could not feel comfortable discussing race if they would be attacked because of ignorance on certain topics.

I have heard similar opinions about not "offending" whites by attacking outrageous statements made by some for decades. Somehow blacks should serve as educators as a benefit to the country. Because most news outlets, columnists, news anchors and even media critics are Caucasian, how much time should blacks allow to pass before they can be released from the burden of being educators? How can the country discuss race truthfully, if one segment has to suppress their feelings?

If O'Reilly can express his opinions regarding race on a daily hour-long news show, when will the same opportunity be provided as an outlet for the views of a large percentage of blacks who think for themselves and have a different point of view than you or Page? It would seem more diverse mix of media news hour hosts would be more educational to the country than isolated guest spots and suppression of a full and honest discussion by all sides.

Howard Kurtz: It's striking that there are so few black talk show hosts on cable, no question about it. It seems African-Americans have made more progress as anchors and correspondents than in that arena.

On my show I mentioned Clarence Page's column, but also played clips of two black commentators who were critical of O'Reilly's remarks. I noted that Page had made fun of O'Reilly for seeming surprised that black diners used silverware but concluded that he was not guilty of racism. Here's what Page wrote:

"Does ignorance about race make you a racist? That boiling question bubbles at the heart of the controversy that Fox News star Bill O'Reilly's kicked up with his poorly received compliments of black diners in a New York restaurant. My answer is, no, ignorance about race does not always make you a racist, but it can make you sound like one.

"That's O'Reilly's problem. O'Reilly has been vilified recently by the liberal-leaning Web site Media Matters for America for insinuating how surprised he was to discover how (gasp!) civilized black folks behaved while dining in Sylvia's, one of (double gasp!) Harlem's best-known restaurants.

" 'I couldn't get over the fact that there was no difference between Sylvia's restaurant and any other restaurant in New York City,' he marveled. 'I mean, it was exactly the same, even though it's run by blacks, primarily black patronship.'

"Yup, they had knives, forks and everything! Just like white folks!...

"I know O'Reilly. I've argued with him about various topics on his radio and TV shows. I relish a good 'gotcha' moment against inflated egos as much as anyone does. But I also believe that this Sylvia's kerfuffle is a bum rap."

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Boston: Putting aside for the moment the question of whether laugh analysis is serious journalism, is it appropriate for journalists to use sexist terms like "giggle" and "cackle" to describe Hillary Clinton's laugh, as Patrick Healy did in the New York Times? "She giggled, giggled some more, and then could not seem to stop giggling. "Sorry, Bob," she said, and finally unleashed the full Cackle."

Howard Kurtz: What, you'd rather be debating her cleavage? You should listen to the sound online and make your own judgment on whether journalists are being humor-impaired here.

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Falls Church, Va.: After listening to the context of Bill O'Reilly's comments, they were worse than what people originally thought. To paraphrase, all you white people that listen to me and are scared to go to black-owned restaurants in black neighborhoods are wrong. They are normal. So, while he may not have been surprised, the fact that he thought he had to give this lecture to his audience I think is pretty awful.

Howard Kurtz: He didn't say anything about white people being "scared."

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Baltimore: Howard, I'm a longtime daily reader of your column, but I continue to be puzzled by one aspect of it -- the amount of weight and credence you provide to bloggers. I don't see much difference between bloggers and radio call-ins: Anyone with an opinion can do it. But whereas you give heavy exposure to the likes of Arianna Huffington, you rarely cite someone like Rush Limbaugh. Why the difference? Also, by interspersing quotes from bloggers along with mainstream heavyweights like The Washington Post, the New York Times, etc., I think you give them a legitimacy they don't really have. Your thoughts?

Howard Kurtz: I've been quoting bloggers for all the years I've been writing this online column. I believe they've become an important part of the conversation. Some are provocative, some are brilliant, some are shrill and demagogical, but they are fast and often get to the meat of issues and trends before the mainstream media. They also provide, from the left and right, a valuable counterweight to the mainstream media. And they have opened up the process to more than just credentialed journalists who work for the big newspapers, magazines and networks. Huffington Post and InstaPundit, to take two examples, are among the most popular Web sites out there, so why not include them? And in case you haven't noticed, lots of journalists (at places like The Post, the New York Times, Time and the Atlantic) are now doubling as bloggers.

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Ellicott City, Md.: Howie, I have to strongly disagree with your final segment about the Oklahoma State coach and the columnist. You said: "I read through the entire column written by Carlson and found it filled with supposed incidents, very few which had a named source or any evidence that they were true other than statements such as 'word has it,' 'rumblings are that' and 'some people say.' Doesn't a reporter, or columnist in this case, have some obligation to back up their claims with named sources instead? Frankly, how are we supposed to know whether this columnist isn't just making this stuff up?"

Personally, I found some of the items the columnist included in the column to be downright personal in nature and I really don't believe they should have been included in a column like this. Just my opinion, but I thought some of it went over the line. But after Dan Rather was caught using fabricated documents to attack a president on a major network, maybe there really is no line to begin with...

Howard Kurtz: I don't know where you're getting that quote from, but it's not from me. This was written by a sports columnist, Jenni Carlson of the Oklahoman, who said that in her opinion a benched college quarterback wasn't a gutsy player and had even had his mother feed him chicken after one game. That was her opinion, no different than hundreds of sports columnist who sound off every day. Maybe it was fair and maybe it wasn't, but it wasn't a case of factual mistakes, of which Coach Mike Gundy has supplied none. Instead, he went into a tirade about how Carlson must not have children because otherwise she couldn't have written such a thing.

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Prescott, Ariz.: Howard, regarding that weird cell phone call Giuliani took from his wife, his explanation to the Christian Broadcasting Network was that ever since Sept. 11, he and his wife always chat prior to flying in case something happens. Now, wouldn't the objective and journalistic thing to do be to figure out if that explanation applied to the former Mrs. Giuliani (whom he dumped post-Sept. 11 via press conference) as well, or was he only calling his mistress and current wife in the months following Sept. 11?

Howard Kurtz: Rudy split with his former wife Donna Hanover in 2000, which was before Sept. 11.

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Raleigh, N.C.: Good afternoon! Hypothetical here ... the Democrats in the Senate propose something. The Republicans say they'll filibuster it. There's a motion for cloture, which gets between 51 and 60 votes. The Democrats don't force the Republicans to filibuster; they give up and move on. Please write an opening paragraph that doesn't reflect Democratic spin of Republican intransigence, nor reflect Republican spin of Democratic impotence.

Howard Kurtz: Didn't the Democrats force the Republicans to actually filibuster during an all-nighter earlier this year? And didn't that attract a fair amount of criticism as a meaningless stunt? Keep in mind, the Democrats regularly were employing the filibuster, or the threat of one, during the years when they were in the minority. This is a subject on which the parties blatantly change their arguments depending on whether they are the majority or minority party.

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Portsmouth, N.H.: I know elections are like crack to the media, but the coverage has to be crowding out actual news, isn't it? I'm starting to think "oh, God, just get it over with" -- and I'm from New Hampshire, where our vote counts and all that. It must be agony to the people who live where their votes don't matter. Would you consider beginning a daily countdown to the next election, kind of like the Iranian hostage crisis countdown? ("Only 878 more days...")

Howard Kurtz: I'm sure it feels that way to lots of folks. I don't know how much other news is being crowded out -- the Bush administration doesn't have a whole lot of domestic initiatives left, and the war still is covered fairly heavily. We now are heading into a three-month stretch where the campaign really matters, where the run-up to Iowa and New Hampshire probably will determine the nominee in each party. I suspect that millions of ordinary folks (that is, those who have lives) will begin tuning in around December, having ignored most of the sound and fury of the previous 12 months.

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New York: Last week, it was widely reported that Rudy Giuliani last week proclaimed he was "the only Republican candidate for president who could beat Hillary Clinton." Is it too much to ask even one reporter to note that Giuliani is the only Republican candidate who has lost to Clinton?

Howard Kurtz: Um, except that's not true. Rudy dropped out of the Senate race against Hillary in 2000 after being diagnosed with cancer. Republican Rep. Rick Lazio ran against Hillary instead. So they have faced off.

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Washington: Re: Iran. While your basic point is correct, there is actually no consensus that Tehran will be ready to begin building nukes in a couple of years, as you assert. The IAEA and some U.S. intelligence studies say five to 10 years. While that may seem a trivial difference, it's not -- particularly for governments deciding whether to take pre-emptive action. So it's critical for you and other commentators to be cautious in assessing Iran's progress.

Howard Kurtz: I agree. In saying that Iran was progressing toward nuclear weaponry -- and what I meant was the capability to produce such weapons, I should have made that clear -- I did not put a timeline on it. Experts seem to agree that the next two years is crucial -- but then, as we've seen, experts are sometimes wrong.

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Alexandria, Va.: This confusing line ran in yesterday's front-page IED story: "Ten senior officers or retired officers, each of them intimately involved in the counter-IED fight, were asked to review the findings for accuracy and security considerations." Does that mean that these people were allowed to read the story before it went in print "for accuracy and security considerations," or were they just consulted about the crux of the story? I can't imagine The Post does this often.

washingtonpost.com: Special Report -- Left of Boom: The Struggle to Defeat Roadside Bombs (Post, Sept. 30-Oct. 3)

Howard Kurtz: I don't know. Usually when journalists ask potential sources about "findings," they mean they have provided summaries of evidence or conclusions and asked people to respond. It generally doesn't mean that these sources were given an actual draft of the story, a practice that remains quite rare in the news business.

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Alexandria, Va.: I'm concerned that the media doesn't seem to be aware of how unaware most Americans are about political details that are totally obvious to reporters, newscasters, etc., and those who follow politics (like Washington Post readers!) "We report. You decide." only works if you give lots of context and detail. Example: On another chat this morning there was discussion about how bad it looks for Bush to be vetoing spending bills now when he didn't under a Republican Congress. But, believe me, unless the news points out Bush's history many people will be unaware of the contradiction.

Howard Kurtz: I'm sure you're right on that point. There's always a tension between putting in every last detail for people who haven't been following the news closely and boring to death regular readers who know all the background. Online, I suppose, we could just have a link saying "for more information, click here so we don't have to clutter up this story with tedious B-matter."

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Anonymous: First, I miss you during my commute. I was one of the few regular listeners to Washington Post Radio, and am now back to rock-'n'-roll stations. ... Second, I'm surprised that following the shootings at Delaware State and today in Memphis, that the media hasn't tracked down Newt Gingrich and the others who were advocating letting students carry guns in the aftermath of the Virginia Tech tragedy.

Howard Kurtz: Well, we did have more than a handful of listeners on the radio, but not enough to persuade our corporate partner to give the thing more time to grow.

On the gun issue, if there's one thing I've learned since Columbine, it's that mass shootings and school shootings don't tend to change the minds of advocates on both sides. One side sees further evidence of the need for gun control, and the other side sees further evidence of the need for self-defense.

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New York: Howard, are you available to pitch for the Mets next year?

Howard Kurtz: I was a first baseman, but I couldn't have done any worse, could I?

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re: Baltimore and bloggers: You might also point out to Baltimore that some of the bloggers you quote are from the right, such as InstaPundit, NRO, etc. In drawing a contrast between Huffington and Limbaugh, I think Baltimore was suggesting that blogs are on the left and radio call-in shows are on the right, so that your reliance on one and not the other contains a bias. Because you feature rightward bloggers too, that suggestion is not accurate.

Howard Kurtz: Totally inaccurate. I have a long list of liberal, conservative and middle-of-the-road blogs and Web sites that I draw from regularly. That person must not have been a regular reader. Or maybe he's been listening to too much talk radio.

Thanks for the chat, folks.

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