Crying ‘Gotcha’

[applegrove]

Crying ‘Gotcha’

By MARK LEIBOVICH at the NY Times

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/10/magazine/crying-gotcha.html

"SNIP..................



If there is one thing politicians agree on, it’s that there are no bad answers, only “gotcha” questions. Whenever reporters, being reporters, ask something unwelcome, or surprising, or even just dumb — any kind of query that requires a politician to say something a politician would prefer not to say — that’s a “gotcha.” The victims are not pleased.

“Enough with the media’s gotcha game,” tweeted Scott Walker (or whoever tweets for Scott Walker) earlier this year after two Washington Post reporters asked him whether he believed President Obama was a Christian and the Wisconsin governor answered, “I don’t know.” Walker’s equivocation drew suspicion that he might be peddling nativist uncertainty about the president’s true beliefs and loyalties, maybe even Muslim ones. A spokeswoman for Walker later clarified that “of course the governor thinks the president is a Christian” and complained that “gotcha questions” were “distracting” everyone from Walker’s real achievements. If only reporters would just soft-serve their questions for candidates like ice cream, then we could enjoy the unimpeded eloquence of our political candidates, free of distraction.

“Gotcha” — the collapsed form of “got you” — first appeared as a random pop-culture accouterment in the 1970s (a decade of random pop-culture accouterments). Merriam-Webster defines “gotcha” as “an unexpected usually disconcerting challenge, revelation or catch.” There was an arcade game called “Gotcha.” It was also the title of the “Starsky and Hutch” theme song. The term is best delivered with a punch (or in all caps, with an exclamation point), suggesting some element of surprise, ambush or sudden twist. It packs a certain glib comic-book sensibility.

Then politicians adopted “gotcha” and (being politicians) promptly stripped it of its fun. It became a marker of grievance, umbrage and exasperation. Upon leaving the White House in 1987, Larry Speakes, Ronald Reagan’s White House press secretary and a onetime reporter himself, lamented the “battle of wits” between government officials and the press. “There is in the press corps, since Vietnam and Watergate, many times, an automatic presumption that the government is lying,” Speakes said in an interview with The Times. “And a government spokesman is forced day in and day out to prove he isn’t lying. And too much of it boils down to: How can we get ’em to say what they don’t want to say? Somehow we need to get away from this ‘I gotcha’ syndrome.”




...................SNIP"

[okaawhatever]

1. What do we have to do to get journalists to write and research stories instead of trolling for click

bait? I only ask because it's kinda important, you know, since most of the free world relies on journalists for information.

[applegrove]

3. I think this is an important story. The shorthand politicians use

to snow the viewing public when they get asked a good question is the meta of good journalism wouldn't you say? You'll never defeat the sociopathic political class out there without a very perceptive big picture take that is shared with the public.

[okaawhatever]

4. I can barely imagine a politician being asked a good question. The press corps is derelict in its

duty to ask tough questions and truthfully report the answers.

I absolutely think politicians should be accountable to the public for their decisions and votes, and it requires good journalists to accomplish that. I harbor no illusions that today's journalists can accomplish that.

[hfojvt]

2. does it involve paintball?