Mickey Mouse-ing the Vote
''I'm Ted Koppel and thisssssssss.... is 'Nightline.''' If you remember that line, or the Saturday Night Live
exaggeration of it, then you are old enough to know who Ted Koppel is, and why he might be bored by a debate with too
little blood on the floor. 'Nightline' was born out of the hostage crisis in Iran, the grandfather of dozens of less
successful crisis-turned-long-running-shows-posing-as-"serious journalism." Geraldo would love to have done the same
with the OJ Simpson trial, but alas, it was not to be.
Koppel, of course, succeeded beyond his own wildest dreams; but his Geraldo-esque roots were showing recently when he
bared his ample sensationalist teeth over the guest list at the Democratic candidates' debate in Durham, NH. Consider
this series of events: the week prior to the event, Koppel is reported to have complained that only six of the
candidates should be invited. How can you create conflict on such a crowded stage? Of course, conflict is the goal
here-always has been. Wake up, America. The media's bleating about having to cover candidates that aren't "serious" is,
neatly, the opposite of the truth. A lot like a Bush press release.
The truth is that serious is anything but what they want to cover. How can we sell soap, the reasoning goes, off of an
intricate discussion of public policy? No, let's get some elbows swinging, spit flying - no hostages, unfortunately, but
what can you do? And as everyone knows, from the Bible to Terminator III, the easiest stories to sell are ones that can
be quickly boiled down into two antagonists. Safe, simple, and to formula: that's the rule.
What ABC and Koppel didn't count on was what Ted himself called "a zinger" during the debate. Dennis Kucinich, and then
others, tore Koppel a new one over his obsession with the horse race aspect of the campaign. Koppel was clearly pissed,
and tried to cover his chagrin with a liberal dose (no pun intended, trust me) of his own arrogance. When Moseley-Braun
joined Kucinich's line of attack, Koppel remarked sardonically, "It's good to see I can unite the democratic party!"
What he meant, I guess, was that he had lost the audience, which roared its approval of the candidates' taking the media
to task. Actually, it was Kucinich's brave stance that turned the debate and galvanized the audience (and/or party,
depending on how much stock you put in Koppel's characterization).
Alas, no good deed goes unpunished, and the next day it surfaced that ABC was revoking its embedded reporters from the
campaigns of-you guessed it--Kucinich, Braun, and Sharpton. The civil rights leader had further earned the once
carrot-topped host's ire with what was arguably the best diss of the night: In response to Koppel's smarmy kingmaking,
Sharpton took no prisoners. Koppel insultingly asked why anyone should pay attention to candidates like him, who were so
low in "the polls." Sharpton shot back: "you're not so high in the polls yourself--this is no Saturday Night Live--but I
still showed up!"
Several regular press stories acknowledged that Kucinich got the most applause of the night--he seemed to really strike
a chord with his rejection of the media's obsession with polls, money and endorsements. And yet, his campaign is
apparently so unnewsworthy that ABC has decided to arbitrarily narrow the field before any real voter casts the first
actual vote. If this weren't symptomatic enough of the Mickey Mouse way in which Disney's news division is trying to
manipulate the campaign for its own advertising dollars, I predict there will be even more egg on important faces in the
months to follow. Kucinich will gain more votes in Iowa and New Hampshire than many of the campaigns deemed more worthy
of coverage by the Wise Men of ABC.
Web activity ( www.kucinich.us, for those interested), the pulse of anger in the activist core of the party, and what is happening on the ground all
indicate that the Ohio congressman is poised to become the surprise of the 2004 campaign. Seabiscuit, David and Goliath,
Horatio Alger--literature and history are also replete with the story of the underdog. And that's as good a story as you
can get. Too bad Ted Koppel doesn't get it: he might get a new show out of it if he did.
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- © 2003 Daniel Patrick Welch. Reprint permission granted with credit and link to danielpwelch.com. Welch lives and writes in Salem, Massachusetts, USA, with his wife, Julia Nambalirwa-Lugudde. Together they run The Greenhouse School. A writer, singer, linguist and activist, he has appeared on radio [intervie w available here] and can be available for further interviews. Past articles, translations are available at danielpwelch.com. Links to the website appreciated.
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