One of the biggest surprises of this cycle has been the extent that the words and deeds of surrogates and acquaintances has played in the presidential campaign. From Bill and Michele to Samantha Power, Gerry Ferraro and Mark Penn people who are not the candidate have been the goats or distractions of the hour at various points in the process. Given this propensity for highlighting surrogates I should not have been surprised to see a piece on Chelsea Clinton in the WaPo. Chelsea has been touring the country speaking to young people and recently became a mini-headline herself when she refused to give an answer regarding how her mother dealt with the Lewinsky saga. However, I do not think that this piece was worth while and seemed somewhat spiteful.
If you read this article closely you get the repeated inference that Chelsea Clinton is:
A) Not cool enough
B) Not talking enough to the Press
C) Not talking to the Press Enough about her personal life
D) Not talking enough to the Press
If you see a theme developing here you are right on target. The idea that Chelsea is not open enough to the press has become a constant harping. If you ever watch Verdict with Dan Abrams and Chelsea is discussed you will hear all about this. It has become one of the media’s side quests in this election. A silent obsession with Chelsea has built up over the course of the campaign. It is further proof that all the media really cares about is access and getting the chance to tell that unique untold story. The figure Chelsea is an intriguing character and a possible gold mine of a human-interest piece. She is a celebrity that people really do not know all that much about unlike her parents who have books written about them. She carries the air of mystery that draws reporters like moths to the flame and unlike John McCain apparently sees the cost benefit of revealing her life as not worth granting that access.
The piece that has me bothered is Too Solemn for Her Generation by Ian Shapira. The central theme of the piece (other than the self serving press angle) is that Chelsea is just not cool enough or hip enough to connect to the youth crowd. Someone who is the same age as Chelsea and who really is cool and "gets it" writes the article as a Peer Review. There are constant musings like this one after a quote describing how impressed people are with her poise and maturity in the public eye:
But I wonder. What do we really know about Chelsea? Not that much, given her famous secrecy about her personal life, which only fuels my curiosity -- and my reporter's skepticism. What does she do as an employee for Avenue Capital Group, a hedge fund run by a donor to Clinton-related causes? Don't we need to know more about this national figure -- other than that she wants her mom to be president -- to take her views on policy seriously?
Snip...
To many, she comes off more like a simulacrum of a young person -- or some grandparent's idealized vision of a young person -- parachuting into the college scene, where most voters prefer the other guy.
The article is rife with these accusations that she is some how inauthentic as a young person. The expectations seem to be that she should act more like a frat boy. She should be funnier and she should be looser. It is a critique of her style. She is too much the adult or maybe she just is not as great as Bill is. After all that seems to be more inline with what the author wants to see. This is what the author wants to see.
Her tone was more that of a reprimanding scold than a camera-savvy surrogate wooing the college crowd. Wouldn't it have been smarter politics to deflect the question with harmless sarcasm? "I really don't feel like talking about Monica," she might have said, "but thank you very much for the personal and intrusive question." Or, if humor isn't appropriate, what about: "I know that question may be on your minds, but I'm not ready to talk about such a personal issue, and I may never be."
Maybe she could have handled it better but that is not proper basis for calling her out. She is accused of being inauthentic repeatedly. I am the first to admit that I am very cynical when it comes to consuming information. I personally fit the description the author gives of a Chevy Chase movie loving, Daily Show and Colbert watching, facebooking, Onion reader. None of that means that I would act like that in front of crowd of college students or potential voters. Just because I fit that mold in my non campaign personality does not mean that that is appropriate at all for me to act in that manner when on the campaign trail. In fact, I would probably end up acting just as Chelsea does. Maybe I would do some press interviews or maybe not.
That might be what upsets me most about this piece. I am like Chelsea in the way I choose to carry myself. When I read how the way she campaigns in her mothers behalf is somehow lacking I take it personally. Just like this quote while true is also somewhat insulting.
"This younger generation [is reacting] against spin in every aspect of life" said Peter Levine, 41, the director of CIRCLE, a nonprofit group at the University of Maryland that researches young people's civic and political engagement. "They have irony about the powerful, but not idealism. There's no urge to tune out. Rather, you get earnest efforts to do something authentic ."
The piece loves to insinuate that she is inauthentic and in being so fly’s in the face of my generation’s yearning for authenticity. While I do loathe spin, I think that it is important to remember the context. Chelsea is out there on behalf of her Mom and is tasked with staying on message. She is not the center of the campaign and should stay on a positive risk free message. If it were me, loathing of spin or not, I would try to stay poised and on message. Missing from that quote is the realization from people of my generation that adult level behavior and decisions are part of our authenticity. We have serious choices and work ahead in many areas and sometimes frat boy will not get that done but being serious about policy and the election will. That is what I take personally that you cannot treat serious things seriously and be considered cool or young.
I suspect that the author takes something personally as well because, whenever Chelsea is not being attacked for not being cool enough, the author points out the lack of press accessibility. For example:
Like a lot of voters, I haven't seen the Chelsea Express firsthand; since she doesn't give media interviews, I have to get a sense of her bearing the way so many twentysomethings get our news: by watching YouTube clips, some shot by students, others by television networks.
And
So if, perched in a challenging yet comfortable job, she is trying to give back, maybe her campaigning fulfills that yen? Either that, or, um, her work as a board member of New York's School of American Ballet?
We can't know, of course, because she won't discuss her work publicly. The only time I even came close to talking with Chelsea was when she was a high school senior touring Princeton, where I was a freshman and a reporter for the Daily Princetonian. Word leaked to the newsroom that she was down the street at the bookstore, and a few of us scampered over to see if we could wrangle a comment on her college leanings.
I peeked over a bookshelf and caught a quick glimpse. But then I left. It felt weird. This was the first daughter, whose parents fiercely kept her away from the media. Who was I to try and intrude?
The author wants Chelsea to act a certain way and do things typical of some on the campaign trail. Part of that is Press interviews. However, I do not recall ever seeing it written that doing interviews was required to advocate for your mom. Part of me is glad to see her stiff the media this way. Most do a piss poor job with that access so maybe not having it will improve their job performance. For my part I think Chelsea is doing just fine and I do not find fault with her. She seems like an intelligent and mature person and somebody I can relate too even if she does not show her love of John Stewart to the world. Do we really need more Britney style news in the world? Leave Chelsea alone.