11/02/00 4:10 p.m.
Lions vs. Lambs
The media sets the tone.

By Tim Graham, director of media analysis at the Media Research Center

edia pollsters have started asking people whether a candidate is spending more time attacking or explaining. This is another great formula to let the media know whether their perpetual story line — of Republican lions clawing at Democratic lambs — is working.

On CBS's The Early Show on Monday, co-host Jane Clayson took their latest poll results to Rep. Rick Lazio: "I want you to respond to some numbers. A new CBS News/New York Times poll shows…people think you are attacking Mrs. Clinton more than explaining your positions. In fact, 60 percent think you're attacking, 27 percent think you're explaining, exactly the opposite almost for Mrs. Clinton. Does it seem that way to you?"

This is a great poll for CBS, whose ratings-disabled morning show much prefers segments on making bruschetta with Martha Stewart to the onerous task of actually covering a political campaign. But it's hardly fair to Lazio, or most other candidates who find themselves getting the short side of this slimy stick.

As media scholar Thomas Patterson, among others, has pointed out, the average voter does not follow the candidates around from appearance to appearance, speech to speech, commercial to commercial, getting an accurate portrait of their campaign's percentage of positive and negative messages. The average voter gets their impressions from watching the media, who routinely slice out the nastiest-looking or sounding political soundbites and creating the public impression that all candidates do is pound each other. For Lazio, the media have created the image of "Little Ricky Gets Rough," as a Time headline so delicately summarized how "Darth Vader with dimples" (the New York Times) had the audacity to walk over to Hillary Rodham Clinton's podium in a regrettable piece of John McCain Soft Money Theatre.

In the presidential race, the media's aversion to Republican ads (symbolized by the "RATS" tempest in a teapot and last week's cheesy "Daisy" rip-off ad) have attempted to sow the impression that George W. Bush is happier attacking Al Gore than explaining himself. The only correction to this impression is watching long-form appearances, especially the debates, where Gore's sighs and slights drew few zingers from Bush.

This kind of heightened political sensitivity to the appearance of negativity is leading candidates to turn somersaults explaining how they've never criticized their opponents. On ABC's Good Morning America Monday, ABC reporter John Yang suggested: "As this race comes down to the final days, it's taken a little bit of a nasty turn. Last night I sat down with the Vice President and asked him about that, and he said he's not the one responsible for it." Gore claimed: "I have avoided any negative personal attacks. Governor Bush thrives on them. I mean, he does that all the time. I don't like that kind of campaigning. I don't like it when I'm the recipient of it. I don't want to inflict that on others."

Yang just broadcast these claims. No "truth squad" was drafted. He didn't air one of the recent Democratic phone calls claiming "The air in Houston is so filthy that my two kids are frequently not allowed to go outside for recess. Governor Bush has accepted $1.3 million from corporate polluters and he's allowed them to keep polluting while my kids suffer."

Focusing on negativity is one way that network anchors can seem tough on the Democrats, without ever questioning the cost or desirability of their liberal proposals. For example, the toughest questions that NBC's Matt Lauer and Katie Couric have offered Democrats in the fall campaign dealt with negativity. On October 13, Lauer asked Joseph Lieberman: "Let me read you a couple of words and phrases that have come out of the Gore-Lieberman campaign in the last couple of days. 'Bush's bumbling babblings,' 'Bush lite,' 'Bush bloopers.' These are all part of advertisements, websites or documents from the Gore-Lieberman campaign in the last week." Lieberman replied: "Well, you know, it's a big campaign. I have not said any of those words and I won't because they certainly border on the personal."

On the October 20 Today, Couric asked Gore: "Let me ask you very simply, do you think Gov. George W. Bush is smart enough to be President of the United States?" Gore replied: "I have, I don't want to raise any questions about his capacity." Couric shot back: "Well your surrogates are, your surrogates are questioning him." Gore protested: "Not on my behalf. Not on my behalf."

Reporter Eric Black of the Minneapolis Star Tribune noted "the Democratic National Committee sent an e-mail that same day to its wired supporters to 'be sure to check out' a new book-length collection of Bush's gaffes and blunders, written by Paul Begala," the cut-and-paste Bush-bashing paperback Is Our Children Learning? Gore told NBC "I do not raise any questions about his capacity." Black wrote these tactics are "insults to the electorate's intelligence."

In the last few days of this campaign, Bush and Gore are trading television ads on Social Security. Here's a vignette that underlines how very inattentive people might tell network pollsters Bush is more of an attacker, while Gore is an explainer. On Wednesday morning, NBC reporter Claire Shipman, indistinguishable in style from a Dee Dee Myers, asserted Gore aides told her they "now believe Florida could be the centerpiece of a Gore win. They think that's largely because of message: heavy on Social Security." Shipman showed a clip of what she said was a "very effective" ad, an ad which declares that George W. Bush's Social Security reform proposals threaten "current" benefits. Scaring the elderly with phony ghost stories? No critique of negativity or accuracy invade Gore's presentation.

The night before, NBC's Campbell Brown offered a differing take on Bush's response ad on MSNBC: "In stark contrast to the warm and compassionate message on the road, on the air the Bush campaign today released his harsh new attack ad that accuses Vice President Gore of lying about Bush's Social Security plan."

Shipman was still transmitting Gore's message on Wednesday night, showing a clip of Gore's new ad explicitly asking about Bush, "Is he ready to lead America?" Shipman didn't use words like "harsh," "personal," or "attack ad." Gore aides were preparing a "tougher message… At the same time, the campaign doesn't want to appear too negative."

With coverage like this, are "harsh" poll results on Republican negativity surprising?