Media analysis: WashPost rally coverage

[LiberalEsto]

You have to hand it to the corporate minions at the Washington Post. Once again they managed to downplay a major public rally in the nation's capital.

The lead article in today's Post is, naturally, not about the hugely well-attended "Restore sanity" rally. Instead it's about the elections. The headline: "GOP HOLDS EDGE AT FINISH." The sub-head: "Democrats Play Defense." I imagine the Post thinks that if it really wishes hard enough, clicks its ruby slippers three times and prints headlines like this, fairytales could come true.

The article about the rally is deliberately placed below the front page center fold, with a photo that carefully avoids depicting the size of the crowd. Instead, it shows only a dozen or so people standing behind a temporary railing, one person holding a large and pointless sign saying "GOD hates Snuggies". The camera is angled up toward these people, which means they block the vast crowds behind them. By shooting from this angle and including only that one sign, the photographer successfully makes it look like the rally was nothing but a small gathering of nuts.

But wait, that's not all. Underneath the headline "Sanity and fear, meeting in the middle", the article starts with the following paragraph:

"Jon Stewart and Stewart Colbert, the founding fathers of fake news, drew throngs of exuberant supporters to Washington on Saturday for a joint rally that crowded streets, taxed the transit system and flooded the Mall."

Okay, the sentence does make the point that the rally drew lots of people, but as usual, the Post avoids giving any kind of number from fear of legitimizing this gathering.

To call Stewart and Colbert the "founding fathers of fake news" is disingenuous to say the least.
Not only does a large segment of the country's young people call Stewart's program their main source of news, making the claim of fake news an insult to these viewers, but the sentence also avoids citing the glaring example of Fox News as the be-all and end-all of manufactured news. Give me a break.

There were more photos accompanying the continuation of the rally article on page A-14. None of the 4 photos makes the slightest effort to depict the vastness of the crowd, which had people hanging from trees, flooding cross streets and being turned away because the Mall was deemed at capacity. About halfway through the article, the Post reported, "Authorities would not estimate the crowd size, though the National Park Service decided to open an extra section of the Mall that was not included in the initial 60,000-person rally permit, according to Bill Line, spokesman for the Park Service."

Gee, thanks for letting us know there were more than 60,000 people, WashPost!

The paragraph adds: "By 2 p.m., Metro ridership had already reached 330,000, comparable to an entire day's tally for a usual Saturday, according to Metro spokeswoman Angela Gates."

Since the article likely went to press sometime late in the evening, wouldn't it have been appropriate for the Post to check back with Metro and see what the ridership tally was at 6 p.m., or 8 p.m.? Heaven forbid they might actually do a bit of extra phone dialing to get a more recent ridership count.

The Post described the start of the rally as "a variety show of shtick and song" and noted that the crown was "overwhelmingly white." The rally overall, it reported, was a "mass demonstration of noncommittal cleverness, quirk and irony." At LEAST the rally wasn't a mass demonstration of stupidity like certain teabagger events.

I should mention that the headline on Paqe A-14 says "On the Mall, a rally to end all fake-news rallies". Fake news? I guess the Washington Post is itself so well-versed in the production of fake news that the paper believes it recognizes fake news when it thinks it sees fake news.

Overall, I'd say the Post article did a thorough job of minimizing and trivializing what some veteran crowd observers have described as one of the larger political gatherings on the Mall in recent years. I didn't go this time because my arthritic ankle was acting up. But I've been to some humdingers of rallies on the Mall starting in November of 1969, through the Million Mom March and many others. And from the crowds I saw depicted in honest photos of this rally, I can sincerely say that it looks as big as some of the largest I've attended.

Just to make certain that the Post's points about the rally ("shtick") were hammered home, it sicced one of its more conservative local columnists, Robert McCartney, on the story in the Metro section to denounce the event as "decidedly partisan and decidedly liberal". How horrible. Liberals. Eek.

McCartney raised the point that "it's self-delusional to think progressive policies are going to be achieved just by agitating nobly for a more positive style in politics." Oh wait, reason and positiveness and progressive views are out of style. The political fashion trend, led by the teabaggers and disrupters of congressional town hall meetings, is stupidity, demagoguery and violent threats. Silly of me to forget.

McCartney thinks Stewart contradicts himself by promoting reason in politics while also having fans with the audacity to want the liberal side to win. Dearie me! What is McCartney thinking? Are progressives stomping the heads of young women with opposing views? Are liberals shutting down town hall meetings by throwing pitched tantrums for health care reform? Just who in heck does McCartney think is creating all the noise and rage and general nastiness flooding the political realm?

I gather from his column that McCartney wants us wimpy liberals to ball up our fists and start slugging it out with the right-wing nuts of the nation. Oh, wouldn't that make swell political fodder? The libbies and the teabaggies smiting each other to the death, while the fake-news corporations lap it all up to sell papers.

I plan to use today's Post to clean up dog poop. At least it's useful that way.

LiberalEsto thinks she's qualified as a media analyst because she spent more than two decades as a newspaper journalist (back when real newspapers existed) including 11 years at a major metropolitan daily. Not the Post, thank heaven.

[abelenkpe]

1. Media has been skewered by Stewart for years

and like a bunch of pathetic babies they decided in advance to snub the rally that illustrated how much real people are sick of their ineptitude, their fear mongering and lies. That's all.

Edited to add: The whole rally was an illustration of how they've lost control of the conversation.

[boston bean]

3. the right wing is constantly skewering the "librul" media, but they covered the Beck Rally

All freakin day and for a week.

So, I think it goes a bit beyond that. Possibly they don't want the left in this country to have a voice. They are corporately owned and a lefty voice isn't really all that welcome.

[geckosfeet]

2. And WAPO is stooping to lower the bar for 'real' news even lower than it already is.

Talk about inaccurate reporting - fake news segments have been around 'forever'.

Rowen and Martins 'Laugh In' had one of the first weekly fake news segments.

Saturday night Live had one for years (?do they still do that?).

Stewart and Colbert have taken it to a new level but they are standing on the shoulders of giants.

[handmade34]

4. what happened yesterday

was REAL (very big!!) news and sadly it isn't getting the coverage it deserves... I was there; it was massive and it was relevent and it was intelligent

[kath]

5. And yet the right continues to shriek that the WP and the NYT are part of the "liberal media",

& probably the worst of them all.
:banghead: :banghead: :banghead:

[Bitwit1234]

6. Since I have posting rights on the Washington Post blogs

I gave them a hum dinger one about the republican bent of their article and the fact that they men toned sanity. I said well we can be sure it was a stomp on the head type of one like the tea bags and republicans like to pull. But then you along with the rest of the republicans love the kind of violence the right urges and pulls.

[LiberalEsto]

7. Sweet.

Nevertheless, I don't suppose they'll take our messages to heart and change their evil ways.

[malaise]

8. A super OP

K & R