I, like many viewers who chanced upon last Friday's live televised Presidential Q&A at the Republican House Caucus Retreat in Baltimore, and those who caught replays later, sat absolutely riveted. For a Democrat like me, the exchange satisfied so much pent up yearning for the Republicans' unchallenged dissembling to be hoicked up for all to see in disinfecting sunlight.
After about the umpteenth re-viewing, I realized two ironies:
- President Obama said nothing there that he had not said previously in other formats.
- As much as I have claimed to hate Reality TV (and therefore religiously avoid watching any such shows), I loved the Adrenaline rush from this piece of political theater.
So what should we do to reset the media fake narrative about Democrats going forward?....
More after the jump...
Inasmuch as the traditional media has quickly closed ranks to tell us not to believe what our lying eyes saw last Friday at the Presidential Q&A at the House Republican Caucus Retreat in Baltimore; that the event showed President Obama on the defensive 9according to CNN pundits and the Faux News masters; and even "better" the event proved to be an unqualified victory for Republicans eager to show that they are the "party of ideas" (and it was obvious that the word "ideas" was the poll-tested Luntzian gem that every questioner used liberally in every sentence at the event, intended to saturate the electoral ether).
The only way this event serves Republican propaganda purposes even as Frank Luntz concedes that President Obama "won" the encounter, is that we let it be a one-time event frozen in quirky political lore. We shouldn't. We should seize the very sweat-or cringe-inducing (depending on your point of view) high-wire potential of this format and make it a part of our political arsenal. We need to use this format to claim valuable real estate in the public square, from which ours and this administration's message have been all but sidelined. It would be a killer use of the Presidential bully pulpit. I will explain how later, below. But first, the strategic core of what happened on Friday.
The reason the Q&A part of this event was a hit, beyond its sheer novelty, is precisely because it tapped right into our current pop-cultural zeitgeist of public dress-downs and cut-downs of Simon Cowell-like fame, that Reality TV formats feed us viewers. This style of cut-throat competitiveness, and unvarnished real-time adversarial confrontation in public, is the latest edition of the Jerry Springer "anticipation of a train wreck" spectacle effect writ large that we have been consuming, only in this case more unpredictable.
Prepared Remarks
Q&A
If you listened to the entire 90-minute Presidential Q&A session, the Q&A portion restated almost verbatim everything that President Obama said in the prior 20 minutes of prepared remarks, right down to statistics and pointed assertions about Republican obstructionism, the lack of workable GOP plans, the politics of demonization, and GOP members taking credit at ribbon-cutting events for Stimulus-funded projects that they had voted against wholesale. The Q&A answers were no different substantively from what the President had said in his State of the Union address, or at teh Tampa townhall on Jan 28.
So what was it about the this particular Q&A session itself that kept us transfixed? It was not the questions or the answers per se that mattered, for they were already known in one form or the other. It was the adversarial setting that made the difference. It was also the political context of the moment that gave it urgency. After all President Obama brought Republicans to debate him last year at the healthcare forums and economic forums that he held at the White House. But there was no media heat to those sessions. Now it is different:
- Adrenaline Hype: The event created the high stakes collective suspense of watching to see who would blink first; of hearing imaginary amplified pumping heartbeats not unlike the fake "Who wants to be a millionaire" soundtrack. It has been treated as if it was an adrenaline-overdrive battle of wills.
The Reality: But was it really a battle of titans as the commentary even from our side made it out to be? No, this reaction is actually myth-making. Infact, the Republican House is actually a house of weasels hiding behind talking points. And the President knows that they are, and thus made sure that his cameras were rolling just so the opposition did not create their own ginormous mythical narrative unchallenged, and to capture the hollowness of their arguments for the records.
- "Obama on the brink of doom" memes: A contentious reading of this event is that it was yet another iteration of the unspoken yet nagging "doubt" that some in the media harbor about President Obama's "ability" to be head honcho, hence the second-by-second scrutiny of his actions to see how he "performs" in myriad situations as if he was an anthropological research specimen, or lab exhibit (just like the human exhibits of the world fairs of the 19th and early 20th centuries). I remember Candy Crowley's and the entire merry band of network anchorpersons revolting "can he lead on foreign policy" concern trolling when candidate Obama went abroad to Iraq, Germany, the UK, and France during July 2008.
The Reality: Some think that President Obama went to Baltimore to find "bi-partisanship." I don't think that was his mission at all. He went there to try to make Republican intransigence politically costly to them as far as Independent voters are concerned. As Rachel Maddow said during their analysis, Republicans have managed to get away with their obstructionism without any political consequences. Of course, no one is exposing it in ways that are damaging to them. So far any Democrats talking about it has been labeled a "whiner." So President Obama seized the opportunity to take care of his own business.
So, how do we "co-opt" the psychological advantages of the Q&A reality tv format? We turn the format into one of the tools of democratic (with a small 'd') governance, hopefully sans the antics (at least from our side), and dare the Republican legislators to participate. The invitation should be loud such that they pay a political price if they do not participate
Messaging:
Thus far, the White House has tried, with varying levels of success and failure, to use the campaign messaging formats to involve the populace in this administration's activities:
- They pioneered the You Tube video releases of the traditional weekly presidential radio addresses.
- They continued using town-hall style appearances of the President to puncture the near media coverage blackout of this administration's achievements and activities. These were great in the beginning when the media cared about reporting further on the stories of the people who actually asked the President questions. Of course, with the advent of the teabagger townhalls, Obama townhall attendees were given short thrift and no longer considered "real Amurrcans."
- Cool features on Whitehouse.gov, event livestreams, behind-the-scenes videos, Flickr photostreams etc, all of which are intended to bring the White House as close to the public as possible. The result is that as time went on only ardent supporters have consistently patronized these sites and apps.
How will the Presidential Q&A event format be different from the townhall format that the White House has used up until now? The adversarial ingredient unscripted is key. Once every two months during the legislative session, bring ordinary citizens, Democratic and Republican lawmakers together with the President as both presider and participant, to debate key policies. No media moderators. I think the President can perform those dual roles well. Let progressive proposals, conservative proposals be subject to questioning by the people. Let all parties defend their positions. The presidential spotlight takes these policy debates out of the segregated think tank caverns and wonkish public policy forums, and puts everything out into the televised open.
I suggest this strategy, very mindful of the high potential for it disintegrating into a dog and pony show that turns off voters. Or, what Ezra Klein cautioned yesterday at the Families USA Future of Health Care forum, about some political factions' tactical use of calls for "transparency" to kill any action on policy initiatives they oppose.
Nevertheless, I think such a high profile public airing of such a highly charged policy debate as healthcare Reform may be well worth it, since there has been complaints that the Healthcare bill was not negotiated on CSPAN in its entirety (including the dealmaking part).
If for nothing at all, the public participating will "feel empowered" rather than dictated to. Some of the anger being channeled to tea-parties will find some useful outlet.
Lawmakers will have to explain their positions in the heat of real-time exchanges rather than the charade we see on the floor of the House or Senate. Those present would have to defend their intended voting positions to the people. Following these sessions, lawmakers can then go back and vote for legislation according to their chamber's procedures. Sure it is high risk fraught with potential missteps and some mischief makers running over the rules of decorum. But is that not the reason why we elect them to represent us?
And hopefully, the "reasoning" public will realize that not every serious issue is reducible to the bumper sticker feel-good pablum that the right likes to feed the flock. They might also give progressive policies a fair hearing rather than the current situation where they are walled off from ever knowing about our policies' benefits.
The left too will have to re-examine its positions with candor and accept that sometimes people do not want them, no matter how right we feel they we are.
Just my thoughts. What do you think?