Covering Katrina: Has a More Critical Press Corps Emerged?

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Fri, 9 Sep 2005 13:02:37 -0700

Covering Katrina: Has a More Critical Press Corps Emerged?

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MEDIA ADVISORY:

Covering Katrina:

Has a More Critical Press Corps Emerged?

 

September 9, 2005

 

 

One of the most noted trends in the media coverage of Hurricane Katrina

has been the aggressive and critical tone some journalists have adopted

towards the White House and Bush administration officials.

 

A headline at the online magazine Slate read, " The Rebellion of the

Talking Heads " (9/2/05). " Katrina Rekindles Adversarial Media " is how

USA

Today put it (9/6/05)—implying, of course, that an " adversarial " press

really existed in the first place.

 

Of course, this new attitude was not universal. After George W. Bush

told

ABC's Diane Sawyer, " I don't think anybody anticipated the breach of

the

levees " (9/1/05), many outlets questioned Bush's nonsensical claim,

pointing out that such predictions were common. But on the front page

of

the next morning's New York Times (9/2/05), readers saw the headline

" Government Saw Flood Risks, But Not Levee Failure, " which essentially

defended Bush's position.

 

The Times also defended Bush against critics who thought his reaction

to

the crisis was insufficient. A photo of Bush accepting a guitar from a

country singer at an event in Calfornia--the day after the levees broke

in

New Orleans and the Gulf Coast had been ravaged--seemed to illustrate

that

point. But Times reporter Elisabeth Bumiller took issue with the fact

that bloggers " circulated a picture of Mr. Bush playing a guitar at an

event in California on Tuesday to imply that he was fiddling while New

Orleans drowned. " Bumiller's rebuttal: " In fact, the picture was taken

when the country singer Mark Wills presented Mr. Bush with a guitar

backstage at North Island Naval Air Station in Coronado, Calif., after

Mr.

Bush gave a speech marking the 60th anniversary of the Japanese

surrender

in World War II. " Times readers were left wondering what exactly was

wrong with the original presentation.

 

But Bush's response was not the only one that was criticized. Some

reporters seemed astonished when FEMA director Michael Brown said that

his

agency had only heard about the gathering crisis at the New Orleans

convention center on September 1, leaving ABC anchor Ted Koppel to ask

him

(9/1/05), " Don't you guys watch television? Don't you guys listen to

the

radio? " But two days later, ABC's Cokie Roberts seemed to stick up for

Brown: " Well, I'm not sure who knew about it. Because, you know, nobody

had heard about anything but the Superdome up until that point and I'm

not

sure who knew that people were at the convention center. It's on the

river

so there was no, there was no directive to go there. " Roberts must

have

missed earlier media reports regarding the crisis at the convention

center, like a CNN interview with a New Orleans police officer about

moving people to that site on Aug. 31.

 

One of the primary--and visible--sources of frustration for many

reporters

on the scene was the slow pace of rescue and relief support. But not

all

reporters were downbeat about the White House's efforts. MSNBC's Chris

Matthews, for example, declared on August 31: " Tonight, under the

direct

command of President Bush, the full force of the federal government is

mobilized. A superpower of resources, manpower and know-how heads on an

historic rescue mission to the Gulf Coast. " Matthews later added that

Bush " seems very much like the old Harvard Business School kind of guy

that he is, the president of the United States, today, because he

delegated very clearly. " The Washington Post editorialized the next

day

(9/1/05) that " the federal government's immediate response to the

destruction of one of the nation's most historic cities does seem

commensurate with the scale of the disaster. At an unprecedented news

conference, many members of President Bush's Cabinet pledged to

dedicate

huge resources to the Gulf Coast. "

 

In fact, some media figures even offered optimistic predictions for

Bush--

a clean slate of sorts. Washington Post columnist David Broder wrote

(9/4/05), " We cannot yet calculate the political fallout from Hurricane

Katrina and its devastating human and economic consequences, but one

thing

seems certain: It makes the previous signs of political weakness for

Bush,

measured in record-low job approval ratings, instantly irrelevant and

opens new opportunities for him to regain his standing with the

public. "

 

At the same time, media coverage has focused on how the White House has

been scrambling to repair its reputation, with top Bush advisers Dan

Bartlett and Karl Rove leading the concerted PR effort ( " White House

Enacts a Plan to Ease Political Damage, " New York Times—9/5/05). That

strategy was explained to the Times by an anonymous Republican who

" said

that Mr. Rove had told administration officials not to respond to

Democratic attacks on Mr. Bush's handling of the hurricane... the

administration should not appear to be seen now as being blatantly

political. " That source was granted anonymity " because of keen White

House sensitivity about how the administration and its strategy would

be

perceived. "

 

But the very next paragraph would suggest that the White House strategy

would in fact be " blatantly political " --as the Times put it, " In a

reflection of what has long been a hallmark of Mr. Rove's tough

political

style, the administration is also working to shift the blame away from

the

White House and toward officials of New Orleans and Louisiana who, as

it

happens, are Democrats. "

 

That might explain how the Washington Post (9/4/05) managed to report

that, according to a " senior Bush official, " Louisiana governor

Kathleen

Blanco " still had not declared a state of emergency " by September 3.

In

fact, that declaration had come on August 26, as the Post later

explained

in a correction.

 

Apart from that kind of PR spin, the overriding concerns of race and

class

should have played a key role in a story where such realities were

impossible to dismiss or ignore. Though some outlets devoted

significant

attention to the roles of race and class--particularly in New

Orleans--by

some counts it was not nearly enough. A study by Think Progress

(9/4/05),

a project of the liberal Center for American Progress, found that

stories

focusing on race and class were in short supply on CNN, MSNBC and Fox

News

Channel--just 1.6 percent of stories focused on race or class issues.

 

And certain comments were simply considered beyond the pale. During a

September 2 telethon, rapper Kanye West declared that " George Bush

doesn't

care about black people " and that America is set up " to help the poor,

the

black people, the less well-off as slow as possible. " NBC edited his

remarks for the West Coast feed of the show and issued a press release

distancing the network from his words. NPR reporter Juan Williams,

appearing on Fox News Sunday (9/4/05), also dismissed West's comments:

" There are some people who are going so far as to say this week, 'Oh,

the

president doesn't care about black people,' because there were so many

poor black people on the screens around the country as the victims of

this

tragedy. Well, I can tell you, I think that's ridiculous. I think

that's

kind of spouting off on people who don't know the president, don't know

this administration, don't know the people who work there. " Apparently

West would think differently if he knew more White House staffers

personally.

 

Amidst the devastation of Hurricane Katrina, many mainstream

journalists

seemed to display a skepticism towards official statements and

government

spinning that has been absent for much of the last five years. While a

press corps that openly challenges the political elite would be a

positive

development, readers and viewers should question why reporters who are

demonstrably angry and are covering this story aggressively have been

so

rarely moved by other events. What if there was widespread media

outrage

about White House fabrications about Iraq's weapons of mass

destruction?

What if reporters were similarly outraged by the destruction of Iraqi

cities like Fallujah, where civilians who survived the siege had to

live

without power and drinking water?

 

In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, a more aggressive press corps

seems

to have caught the White House public relations team off-balance-- a

situation the White House has not had to face very often in the last

five

years. Many might wonder why it took reporters so long; as Eric

Boehlert

wrote in Salon.com (9/7/05):

 

 

" It's hard to decide which is more troubling: that it took the national

press corps five years to summon up enough courage to report, without

apology, that what the Bush administration says and does are often two

different things, or that it took the sight of bodies floating facedown

in

the streets of New Orleans to trigger a change in the press's

behavior. "

 

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