The White House press corps needs to join the awkward squad

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2017/mar/05/white-house-press-needs-to-join-awkward-squad

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Time for an inter-round summary. After an emollient sort-of State of the Union address, what about the State of the Media? Is it as “thin-skinned and narcissistic” as “blabbermouth Donnie”? (That’s a returning Jon Stewart’s sour verdict.) Is President Trump – more believed than press and broadcasters on one recent survey, less prone to exaggerate than the media and other elites on another – actually winning his battle for public opinion?

At the moment, you’d settle for a no-score draw because Trump’s popularity remains confined to the Republican base that elected him: but there are still ominous signs for the media. Does anyone, out in Ohio or Iowa, worry that the 45th commander-in-chief won’t break bread or crack jokes at the White House correspondents’ dinner? That’s narcissism squared.

And how exercised, for that matter, should we be when the great and good of US journalism (plus the Guardian and the BBC) aren’t invited to a White House briefing? Since the press seems think that Trump and his apparatchiks tell nothing but lies, you might count this non-invitation a boon of truth.

So much of the apparent problem is institutional. America’s reporters and editors are shielded by the first amendment. The constitution of the land, with specific rigour, makes them part of the country’s democratic establishment – like judges, politicians and the rest.

They aren’t lone rangers hounding the powerful. They think they have rights. The right to attend White House press conferences. The right to have questions answered. The right to be respected. The first amendment is terrific tool, but also a curse. It fuels affront, wounded dignity. It makes protest seem introverted, hurt feelings and privileges denied: which is nothing to do with journalism’s basic job.

A press that yelps when this president insults it face-to-face is a press that ought to calm down. Democracy’s future doesn’t hang on whether CNN or the New York Times gets question time with Trump. Briefings – attention, Westminster’s lobby correspondents – are a way of managing news, not revealing it. They don’t confer lost trust on the people waving the mics.

To be sure, loss of trust – or more accurately, credibility – is a real media problem. Trump does his “enemy of the people” act. Little Sir Echoes from Copeland to Stoke sing the same tune. But wailing plaintively about an obvious political ploy doesn’t do the trick.

Some of the things Trump says strike a chord. When he declares that the media “shouldn’t be allowed” to use anonymous sources, he’s right (up to a point). Clearly there’s a lot more to emerge about Trump links to Moscow: but until the actual details of contacts with Jeff Sessions put it centre stage, the muzziness of the allegations could be batted aside. Equally, claims of chaos in the Oval Office – and its “fine-tuned machine” – only bite if you can see beyond the covert-briefing wars.

If reporters aren’t trusted in general, then they won’t trusted not to manufacture allegations without due details attached. Fakery and anonymity are brothers under the radar.

Anybody who saw the incredible, puffing Michael Crick (aged 58) running down Whitehall shouting unanswered electoral-expenses questions at stony-faced Theresa aide Nick Timothy will get the point. That’s a lone ranger doing his job. That’s a colonel of the awkward squad you can trust.

American journalism has plenty of squaddies, too. The question – as the press conference door slams shut – is whether they’ll be seen for what they are: the embodiment of a job under pressure that needs to do more of its business out in the open for all to see.

• There are mystifications, damned mystifications and statistics. Take a couple of prime examples from the last few days.

This year’s Oscars – Hollywood at its supposedly most entertaining – attracted 32.9 million TV viewers in the US (a 4% drop on 2016) while the first presidential address to Congress attracted a whacking 43 million. Showman Trump wins again, then. Just think what would have happened if they’d opened the wrong envelope and Hillary had won …

And as for the mystifications of hard money and soft heads, Rupert Murdoch has offered £11.7bn to buy up Sky (if ministers and regulators will let him). Last year Sky made £1.5bn profit. Meanwhile Snapchat sets its worth at around $28bn as it floats. Last year Snapchat lost $515m; the year before $373m. Indeed, it’s never made a profit. Now, what am I offered for a badly scratched head?