Press corps should take lessons from Oprah
By MARGARET CARLSON /
SYNDICATED COLUMNIST
Sunday, February 5, 2006
On "The Daily Show" on the eve of the State of the Union speech last week, Jon Stewart juxtaposed interviews with President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney conducted by the Washington press corps and clips of Oprah Winfrey bringing author James Frey to heel.
Under Oprah's questioning, Frey had to admit he made up big chunks of his so-called memoir, "A Million Little Pieces." When he tried to wriggle out of it, she stopped him as if squashing something slimy. "You mean, you lied," she said.
Cut to "The Daily Show,"' and Cheney fairly beaming as CNBC's Lawrence Kudlow lobbed softballs at him. ("Isn't the economy kind of an underrated story?")
What a waste of Oprah's time exposing the likes of James Frey when there are so many government liars who need exposing. To cite one not-so-trivial example: If we had to pick one person to interview the president, and the choice was between Oprah and The New York Times editor who approved all those stories about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, I'd choose Oprah any day.
Once again, Bush got a pass from the Washington pundits commenting on a speech that gave fanciful names to problems -- the Advanced Energy Initiative, the American Competitiveness Initiative -- without proposing solutions. We are caught up in a ritual, like sports commentators in love with the game. No one called Bush on the tone ("forceful" and "commanding" were the buzz words) or its lack of accountability or substance.
It was hardly civil, as he urged everyone to be, but even more combative than last year, when he was so full of himself after his re-election.
It's not civil to persist in calling those who disagree with your strategy in Iraq defeatists who are insufficiently supportive of the troops. Or to suggest that those who question warrantless wiretapping don't want to intercept the calls of al-Qaida members about to fly into the World Trade Center. Bush could only call himself civil by comparison with henchman Karl Rove, who on Jan. 20 insinuated the Democrats harbor a pre-9/11 mentality that would kill us all.
Saying it doesn't make it so. Bush said talent and technology, ethanol and batteries are going to reduce dependence on Mideast oil by 75 percent by 2025.
Really? He just passed an energy bill that broke the bank but does nothing of the sort. Exxon Mobil has reported $36.1 billion in profits in 2005, the most in U.S. corporate history. Alternative-energy companies, meanwhile, are searching in vain for some federal leadership.
I would particularly like Oprah to parse the evening's big headline phrase, "addicted to oil." She practically wrote the language of substance abuse and rehabilitation, but she wouldn't be fooled for a second that Bush's admission means anything that may lead to recovery.
No one's been asked to drive less or turn down the thermostat. There's no new transportation policy or any move to correct one of the biggest energy mistakes -- the failure to put SUVs under the same gasoline mileage requirements as cars.
The words "global warming" didn't pass the president's lips in his speech, even though the Southwest is in an extended drought and experts warn we've reached the tipping point, where if we persist in doing nothing about greenhouse gases, New York will be under water in a decade.
What an opportunity missed, the Super Bowl of presidential addresses with a huge audience, when the president could ask for anything. And he asked to strengthen the doctor-patient relationship and use more corn in our fuel.
"Addicted to oil" will end up on the same ash heap of history as "axis of evil" and last year's doomed proposal to overhaul Social Security, Bush's mention of which prompted Democrats to give the only sarcastic standing ovation I've ever witnessed. Democrats didn't have much to be proud of last year, but they at least stopped Bush from tinkering with Roosevelt's shining domestic achievement.
It would be fine for Bush to sprinkle bromides in his speech if he faced up to harsh realities. Democracy isn't fostering either regional stability or American security, and maybe we should think twice about spreading it, particularly by force.
Bush proudly toted up 122 democracies as compared with 24 in 1945 without noting the newest ones aren't quite what we had in mind. While he noted that "democracies in the Middle East will not look like our own because they will reflect their own traditions," he didn't admit that those traditions are brutal, inimical to America, and embrace the belief that suicide bombers are going to heaven.
Hamas taking control of the Palestinian legislature is bad enough, but does Bush have any qualms about Iraq? All those purple fingers waving after voting are a heartening visual but they may bring yet another theocracy, riven by violence and wedded to Iran, which is itself led by a democratically elected radical jihadist pledged to annihilate Israel and us with nuclear weapons.
How could Bush go on for almost an hour and barely mention Hurricane Katrina, after his government's disgraceful failure to aid those stricken?
As for health care, Oprah, with her unerring ear for human interest, would pounce on him for his ludicrous Health Savings Accounts, a fanciful name for a tax shelter for the Healthy Rich like herself, those least aggrieved by our current system. Of course, there's no money left to do much else, as Bush's earlier effort cost $700 billion, not $400 billion, and enriched insurance and drug companies while managing to drive seniors crazy.
If Bush had put all this in a book, Oprah would have called him and his publisher on the carpet. But Bush has only the Washington press corps and the enfeebled Democrats to answer to. As long as he sticks to speeches, he's free to leave the truth in a million little pieces.
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Margaret Carlson writes for Bloomberg News from Washington; mcarlson3@bloomberg.net
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