Is the Press Softer on George W. Than They Were on Clinton?
KURTZ: Welcome back to RELIABLE SOURCES with John Harris and Rich Lowry. John Harris, you stirred up quite a fuss by writing that press coverage of President Bush is way softer than that of Bill Clinton, and attributing it in part to the lack of what might be called a left- wing conspiracy. Explain.</s>HARRIS: Well, you know, I write as somebody who is a veteran of the Clinton wars, if you will, I spent six years covering the guy. And the origin of the piece was that my phone was ringing off the hook with former Clinton aides, you know, essentially whining about things President Bush was doing and saying, "Can you imagine if we had done that what the reaction would be"?</s>KURTZ: Take China, for example. Very certainly.</s>HARRIS: Yeah, it was an example, and there was a whole bunch. And I was kind of in the difficult position of I essentially agreed with them, that the reaction would have been different. And I said, "What is the reason"? I don't know if the media has been soft on President Bush. I don't think there's any less willingness to ask questions or to cover things. But I do think what's different is that when things are reported, the reaction and echo of those stories is much, much less. And I think the reason for that is that, you know, there is a professional noise industry on the right to stir up controversy, or when there are controversies to exploit them for maximum benefit...</s>HARRIS: ... care about on the left, but they're not as organized. They're not as methodical.</s>KURTZ: You're a noisy guy. Isn't John Harris right, that there are an awful lot of conservative pundits, talk show hosts, agitators, bomb throwers, who did help make life difficult for President Clinton and that Bush doesn't seem to suffer from that, at least so far?</s>LOWRY: Well, sure. If the point is that there is a burgeoning alternative conservative media, the answer is yes, of course there is. But, often times this alternative media goes against the grain of the mainstream media and is paddling upstream, you know? Unless I'm forgetting something, I don't think the right-wing conspiracy had very sympathetic coverage or press during the Clinton years. And the fact is, one, there's a study out recently, the first hundred days of Bush coverage versus the first hundred days of Clinton coverage, and that said Bush's coverage has been a little more critical than Clinton's was. Specifically when it comes to policy issues, because reporters are not sympathetic at all, in any way, to the Bush policy agenda. Whereas, in their hearts, I think they were more sympathetic to the Clinton agenda. And also we have to consider, you know, if Bush had had high profile suicides or controversial firings in these early months, I think the tenor of the coverage would have been, you know, drastically different. And Clinton had all those things in his early months.</s>KALB: John, when I read your piece, your controversial piece, let me use that adjective, I thought it was brilliant. And then, a moment later, I was...</s>KALB: And a moment later I was smitten by a second thought, which essentially is this, and let me overstate it. Didn't you do a portrait of the media as a stenographer for the right-wing? Just taking down what the right-wing was saying critical of the president, and publishing it everywhere? That they had abdicated journalistic responsibility and, as I say, had simply become a stenographer?</s>HARRIS: No, by no means. And some people did interpret it that way, so that's probably fair to my point to not make that point. Or, as Rich points out, there was plenty of critical coverage of this right-wing noise machine. That's not our job, to be stenographers. But the question is, we do, when there is a big fuss, cover a big fuss, and people can succeed in creating a big fuss and, I think, effect the prism through which political leaders are viewed. And, they also have the ability, having control of Congress doesn't hurt with the investigative power of that, to take stories that might, under some circumstances, go away, or might become big, ongoing scandals. The travel office is a good example of that. It's a genuine story that you could, under some circumstances, imagine people saying, "Well, what the heck." Or you could imagine, under other circumstances, it becoming a big, ongoing story.</s>KALB: Yeah, but you've got to pick and choose. After all, you simply don't grab hold of a, what is it, a press release, and publish it because somebody said it. Let me go on to the next one: does Hillary have a point? Think about it. Was there a vast, right-wing conspiracy doing in Clinton?</s>LOWRY: Conspiracy is a very strong word. But were there people on the right who were bitterly opposed to Bill Clinton from the beginning and wanted to do everything they could to oppose him? Of course there was. Are there people on the left who are doing the same thing right now? Of course there are.</s>KALB: Is it comparable?</s>KURTZ: Speaking of people on the left, what do you make of folks who say, and I have been deluged by e-mail on this subject since I wrote about it, who say, "You know, the press isn't liberal. It's conservative. You people are doing the bidding of your corporate masters. You're cozying up to Bush. You're getting seduced by getting nicknames." There is some anger out there among people who you would think would like the so-called "liberal press" who now say the press has gone conservative. You don't buy that?</s>LOWRY: No, I don't buy it. One, if you look at the evidence, the coverage of Bush's policy has been fairly critical. I don't see...</s>KURTZ: But certainly not him personally.</s>LOWRY: Well, right. Because what is there to criticize about him personally? I mean, he's a...</s>KURTZ: So, if you get in less trouble than Bill Clinton...</s>LOWRY: ... he gets into less trouble. And, John, I think perhaps a mistake you're making is kind of looking at the coverage of Clinton retroactively. You know, during most of the Clinton administration, most of the Clinton scandals, the main media spin we had out of those scandals was that Dan Burton is a dangerous nut. It's only after Lewinski and after, especially, the pardons, that now we look back and say, "Oh, we all agree that Clinton was ethically challenged"...</s>KURTZ: Equal time. You've got about 20 seconds to respond.</s>HARRIS: Well, I don't buy it, because if you look at the, just the opening hundred days, and I went back and read some of the briefings. You know, George Stephanopoulos just getting raked over every single day by a really surly press corp. And I don't think Ari Fleischer gets that treatment. Again, though, on the conspiracy point, it's not a conspiracy. It's legitimate and it's out there in the open. Everyone can see it. Yes, there's anger on the left. It tends not to be as organized and methodical.</s>KURTZ: The question is how much the press needs to be effected by that. But that's a question for another day because we are out of time. John Harris, Rich Lowry, thanks very much for joining us. Well, let us know your thoughts about presidential coverage and pressure from the right and left. Our e-mail address is reliable@cnn.com. And when we come back, some baby talk from "Bernie's Back Page."