At its core, modern commentary is not really about insightful analysis, nor does it give much of a positive value for correct predictions. It’s about the spectacle of things, since being as wrong as wrong can be has an entertainment value all its own, especially if one is preaching to an audience which wants to hear all the wrong things. When we as a culture decided the news media was just like Burger King, where anyone can have it made their way for ratings or clicks in the name of balance, the die was cast toward varying degrees of sophistical bullshit.
And, no matter what happens, the pundit class moves on. Sure, we can shame them online in tweets and YouTube videos, but it rarely seems to get people thrown off TV.
It’s interesting how this dynamic remains true across different mediums, as everything seems to devolve to the lowest common denominator. There was a time when a positive or negative review by a newspaper’s film critic was significant, and seen as something significant. The opinions of Pauline Kael, Vincent Canby, Roger Ebert, Gene Siskel, etc., were seen as something of a bellwether for both shaping public opinion, highlighting works worthy (or not so worthy) of spending two to three hours of one’s life on, and giving professional insight into the topic. However, the current state of studio movie-making makes these sorts of reviews largely irrelevant. Sports commentary is riddled with blowhards who know jack about shit, and various columnists thought to be friendly with certain teams or officials and slant coverage and opinion in their favor. There are various fashion editors at major newspapers, tabloids, and blogs who think they’re the second coming of Joan Rivers.
The decline of both media relevance and credibility has impacted how people treat these opinions.
So, I thought I would open the floor and posit a question: Who would be your picks for the worst pundits? And why?
More than a decade ago, professor Philip Tetlock, of the Wharton School, who specializes in decision-making and social and cultural psychology, published “Expert Political Judgment: How Good Is It? How Can We Know?” It was based on a long-term study of two hundred and eighty-four people who make their living “commenting or offering advice on political and economic trends.” He asked them a range of questions, such as “Would the United States go to war in the Persian Gulf?” He amassed more than eighty thousand predictions and then waited for history to yield a verdict. In his now-somewhat-famous conclusion, Tetlock reported that human beings who hold forth on the state of the world to come are, by and large, “poorer forecasters than dart-throwing monkeys.”
Among the types of pundits and punditry one will find online, in print, and on television:
- The Weather Vane: This pundit is a creature of polls and conventional wisdom. Tough immigration measures may be great on Tuesday and bad on Wednesday because of the poll that came out on Tuesday night. These pundits can only be shamed out of a position by vox populi, because they have no core convictions on which they base their opinions or analysis of the American people’s opinions. Whichever way the wind is blowing is where this person will point, and they’ll regurgitate whatever the poll says in a more wordy, non-insightful 90 second blurb, and get a check from whichever media company dumb enough to pay them for it.
- The Contrarian: Usually a column written by an idiot or a media appearance by a blinded ideological partisan. This person rears their head any time a big news event occurs in order to tell us: “We have it all wrong.” Down is up, wet is dry, and black is white. This person might claim getting one’s ass kicked is a “good thing.” They may also feed on and like being on the opposite of reality, or have a conspiratorial mindset about how reality is “liberal lies” someone out there in the deep state wants people to believe. A clear tip-off of this type of pundit is they resort to arguing the rage of losing will be a positive for their perspective in the long-run. They’re happy the village is being destroyed in order to save the village.
- The Sycophant: No matter what is said, no matter what is done, this person’s viewpoint is set in stone. President Trump could advocate genocide and I’m sure I can name two or three Fox News personalities who would have no shame arguing how genocide is great.
- The Celebrity: Any time the opinion of someone who knows nothing about nothing other than being famous for one reason or another is given a platform and treated as serious business by a cable news network. This is not to say celebrities can’t have opinions, or shouldn’t be able to speak out about issues which are important to them and the world. It’s just an issue of the weight given to these opinions. When Fox gives time to Curt Schilling or Ted Nugent to pontificate about tax policy, it might be outside their expertise of throwing a baseball and playing “Wang Dang Sweet Poontang.”
- The Child: Any media pundit who has their job because of who their mommy or daddy is. Does anyone really believe Meghan McCain would be on The View every morning offering commentary if her father wasn’t John McCain? Is her takes really so intelligent or scintillating ABC thinks we just gotta have it? Hell nah. Although, I guess it could be worse. We tend to elect people to Congress and the presidency based solely on their mommy or daddy, or wife or husband. So stuck on morning TV might be the safer of those options.
- The Concern Troll: No matter how bad things may get for Republicans, no matter how bad their policies poll, there can always be an anonymous source the Washington press corps can be counted on to find saying they’re “worried” about something ranging from irrelevant to preposterous. There will always be a “Democrats in disarray” story published when things are getting too good. The sort of twisted journalistic need for “balance” dictates this sort of thing, because they can’t just report awful things are awful. The pundits needs to give the other side of things, even when there is no other side to things.
- The Pretender: Any journalist or pundit who implies they know more than they do. This covers anyone who goes on TV and talks about what they “heard” in the vaguest of terms. When invariably this turns out to be wrong, they seem to forget about their previous insider info.
- The Expert Who Isn’t An Expert: Any time a military expert with a rank and no experience (and possibly lying about their record) gives their take on how to fight a battle, or someone brought on to talk about the economy who knows as much … or less about supply and demand as you or I.
- The Fool: Any pundit given the spotlight because they’ll say something stupid, because it’ll generate controversy and publicity. And everyone involved knows they’re stupid, except the stupid person. Don Lemon knew Jeffrey Lord was an idiot, knew what he was saying was bullshit, and knew Lord was defending the indefensible every time he was in one of their nightly panels. It didn’t stop Lemon or CNN.
- The Panel of Ignorant Voters: Any time Frank Luntz is asked to assemble a group of people who are undecided on a subject where 90 percent of the country had no problem coming to an opinion. This is also true for any cable news focus group composed of people who seem to be able to hang out in a diner during the middle of the day while the rest of the world is working. These people’s opinions are usually coveted by media pundits, but are largely based on nonsensical notions and emotions if one actually listens to their reasons for why they “like” what someone is saying.