The AP's Fournier considered role with McCain campaign
By Steve Benen Wednesday Jul 30, 2008 3:15pm
The practice of jumping between the political and media worlds is not especially uncommon, and journalists routinely leave news outlets to pursue opportunities in professional politics. David Axelrod, the Obama campaign’s chief strategist, used to be a reporter. Linda Douglass, up until recently employed by National Journal, also joined Obama’s team. In perhaps the most well-known example, Tony Snow left a media job to join Bush’s White House, and then went back to the media.
That said, this is slightly more troubling than most.
Before Ron Fournier returned to The Associated Press in March 2007, the veteran political reporter had another professional suitor: John McCain’s presidential campaign.
In October 2006, the McCain team approached Fournier about joining the fledgling operation, according to a source with knowledge of the talks. In the months that followed, said a source, Fournier spoke about the job possibility with members of McCain’s inner circle, including political aides Mark Salter, John Weaver and Rick Davis.
Salter, who remains a top McCain adviser, said in an e-mail to Politico that Fournier was considered for “a senior advisory role” in communications.
“He did us the courtesy of considering the offer before politely declining it,” Salter said.
That Fournier would consider a role with the McCain campaign is not especially surprising; his political leanings have been increasingly apparent of late. We learned two weeks ago that Fournier exchanged emails with Karl Rove about Pat Tillman, in which Fournier wrote, “The Lord creates men and women like this all over the world. But only the great and free countries allow them to flourish. Keep up the fight.” Fournier was also one of the journalists who, at a gathering of the nation’s newspaper editors, extended John McCain a box of his favorite donuts (”Oh, yes, with sprinkles!” McCain said).
But Fournier is the DC bureau chief of the Associated Press. He’s chiefly responsible for directing the AP’s coverage of the presidential campaign. And yet, Fournier’s objectivity is hardly above reproach — he considered an offer to work for one of the two candidates.
I’ve been highlighting some of the unusually bad coverage of the presidential campaign from the AP. It’s been striking, in part because it’s unexpected — the AP has not exactly earned a reputation of being the Fox News of wire services. For the AP to do so many poor reports in such a short time made it seem as if the outlet had undergone some kind of deliberate shift, orchestrated by Fournier.
Earlier this month, we learned that Fournier is executing a kind of experiment in campaign reporting.
Fournier is a main engine in a high-stakes experiment at the 162-year old wire to move from its signature neutral and detached tone to an aggressive, plain-spoken style of writing that Fournier often describes as “cutting through the clutter.”
The idea sounds like it has merit, but there’s a problem in the execution.
In March, for example, Fournier wrote an item — whether it was a news article or an opinion piece was unclear — that said Barack Obama is “bordering on arrogance,” “a bit too cocky,” and that the senator and his wife “ooze a sense of entitlement.” To substantiate the criticism, Fournier pointed to … not a whole lot. It was basically the Republicans’ “uppity” talking point in the form of an AP article.
But the AP’s coverage has deteriorated since — and it goes beyond just the AP giving John McCain donuts and McCain giving the AP barbecue. There was the slam-job on Obama that read like an RNC oppo dump, followed by a scathing, 900-word reprimand of Obama’s decision to bypass the public financing system in the general election, filled with errors of fact and judgment.
When Obama unveiled his faith-based plan, the AP got the story backwards. When Obama talked about his Iraq policy on July 3, the AP said he’d “opened the door” to reversing course, even though he hadn’t.
The AP’s David Espo wrote a hagiographic, 1,200-word piece, praising McCain’s “singular brand of combative bipartisanship,” which was utterly ridiculous.
The AP pushed the objectivity envelope a little further with a mind-numbing, 1,100-word piece on Obama “being shadowed by giant flip-flops.”
The AP flubbed the story on McCain joking about killing Iranians, and then flubbed the story about McCain’s promise to eliminate the deficit. It’s part of a very discouraging trend for the AP that’s been ongoing for a while now.
And then, as these examples pile up, we learn that the journalist responsible for directing the AP’s coverage of the presidential campaign considered joining one of the candidate’s campaign teams.
Did it not occur to the Associated Press that this might raise questions about the objectivity of the wire service’s coverage?
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Just more evidence that the "Mainstream" Media is...
Harmful If Swallowed
sorry but
John McCain Had Attack Ad Ready in Case Barack Obama Did Visit Troops
What the McCain campaign doesn?t want people to know, according to one GOP strategist I spoke with over the weekend, is that they had an ad script ready to go if Obama had visited the wounded troops saying that Obama was... wait for it... using wounded troops as campaign props.
So, no matter which way Obama turned, McCain had an Obama bashing ad ready to launch.
Just goes to show, you know your media is fucked up when the reporters are the part of the news and not the ones reporting it.
Whoever hired this guy better give his employment a second thought if they don't want the AP to become a political joke and lose all credibility.
The mainstream media is no longer ruled by journalistic principles. As is increasingly apparent, the mainstream media is the communications arm of the corporations which own them, and "reporters" are merely spokespeople from corporate communications.
Until we pass campaign finance reform (CFR) we will not be able to change the rules that allow this. We need a long-term grassroots campaign to elect committed CFR representatives and keep them in Congress until we have the supermajority necessary to bring about CFR. Otherwise the corporations will continue to run this country, and the mass media will continue to obediently communicate their talking points.
Very troubling
A good decision for Fournier - he can do so much more for McSurge by working "behind the scenes".
Quit moaning about the MSM here, start calling and phoning them.
Also, write to your newspaper if they use AP. Write to the TV stations. Start causing them grief where they do business.
This is much worse than Tony Snow going back and forth. IMHO
And it explains AP's right-wing leaning lately.
McCain is running on the Old Pathetic Angry and Forgetful Card
So once again MSM would never report such a thing about such a propaganda tool...good thing we can learn it here..( I wonder why FOX& The Turd has not offered him a job yet...)
Sounds like he already has a job with the McCain campaign.
From now on I will check any political story I see originating with the AP and I will also take it with a grain of salt. It troubles me to say that, but it's of their own doing.
I doubt Fournier really declined the offer. Take a look at this piece of tripe:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/07/30/ap-mccain-has-trouble-wit_n_115...
Not only do they bend over backwards to excuse McCain's "breezy nature", they actually catalog Obama's gaffes, while only referring to McCain's elliptically.
The fix is in! The rubes will vote for Murdoch and Zell's tax cuts whether they want to or not:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/04/14/murdoch-zell-appointed-to_n_965...
pissed off patricia @ 13:
I would add CBS, CNN and FOX to the list.
Damn that Liberal media! (one of the biggest fallacies of the last few decades)
he has his job because murdicKKK is on the board at AP along with another wanker from the rich reich.
canary in a coal mine @ 15:
Those are already on the list, that's what is so disheartening about adding one more.
canary in a coal mine @ 15:
also remember the symbiosis between Yahoo and AP. Yahoo sold out the chinese protester and he got ten years for pretty much nothing.
This is....weird. I thought the merger of political parties with the press was a characterisitic of EBIL regimes like the USSR, PRC, or German Empire, not the USA. When exactly did the media become basically Pravda or the Volkshiger Beobachter?
for those who like to keep score on the msm...
http://www.thenation.com/special/2006_entertainment.pdf
and the AP, well, looky here:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/16/business/media/16ap.html?_r=2&oref=slo...
Fournier and McCain discussing Obama the elitist for 3 minutes at the AP McCain-donut luncheon this april:
FOURNIER: You made a vague reference in your speech to senator Obamas comments recently about working class voters, do you think the senator is an elitist?
MCCAIN: Oh I dont know, I think those comments are elitist. I think that anyone who disparages people who are hardworking, honest dedicated people who have cherished the second amendment and the right to hunt... blablabla..
FOURNIER: If those comments are elitist, which you say they are does that make him an elitist?
MCCAIN: I dont know because I dont know him very well. I dont know senator Obama very well. I can only look at his remarks…. blablabla..
FOURNIER: You’ve served with him for a couple of years, you ever see uh.. elitist behaviour?
*Now even McCain seems puzzled about the absurd persistence of questions on Obamas "elitism".
MCCAIN: Ah.. I.. I know that.. that his positions that he has taken on many of the issues, I dont if you could call it elitist... blablabla
Yeah Fournier is much more valuable to McCain directing the AP election coverage than working directly for his campaign.
to 21 Samson...
Ahhh, I don't know if NYT or The Nation actually can provide a meaningful examination of problems with the reporting by MSM...esp NYT....they have been part of the problem since the buildup and propping up the illegal war in Iraq...jus sayin'
Another AP hagiography:
Andrew Taylor's hacktacularly fellatious ode to Ted Stevens
Let the AP know what you think: info@ap.org
I did:
Well, Andrew, since you're not practicing journalism, perhaps you should find work as a porcine lipstick artist...you're good at that :)
;-}
enigma4ever @ 23:
no doubt there, about the NYTimes... but, that said, did you actually go to the links?
if the nation's chart is wrong please let me know. and the NYT story is illuminating.
yeah, he considered joining mccain's campaign but decided he could be "more effective" at teh AP.
General_Rennenkampf @ 20:
shortly after noxin. the rapid consolidation really began during raygun. Clinton help seal the deal.
BaScOmBe hearts Lara Logan and Rachel Maddow @ 27:
Hm, I'd put the media in the government's pocket thing as having begun in the 60s around the time of the Gulf of Tonkin, but yeah, I see your point.
canary in a coal mine @ 15:
Pretty soon we'll all have to become adept at reading the news between th lines, as the russians and others learned to do under the influnce of Trud, Isvesstia and Pravda. Soviet citizens developed a very elaborate code by which they interpreted the 'news' with which they were presented everyday by the Soviet propaganda machine--which was far more effective in the West than ever it was behind the Iron Curtain.
May I issue my daily reminder:
Children, please, repeat after me--In the Corporate State, corporate media are-by definition--State Media. They are ALWAYS tools of the status quo, of hegemony, of power.They will ALWAYS represent tie interests of their CorpoRat paymasters. To expect anything else is naive at BEST...
woody, tokin librul @ 30:
You're right on this. I'd just dispute that media was ever anything different from the invention of mass media in the 19th Century onwards. Remember that the media's already invented one war.
Help! Anyone have a telephone number for AP? I'd like to give them a call, as would my friends and mi familia.
I bet if a Democrat offered him a job and he turned them down then I'm sure you guys would've probably complimented him. Apparently Crooks and Liars liberals are not much different from right wing Republicans. You both view people as one-dimensional and one-sided. Your common mantra: If you're not with me then you're against me.
I'm a liberal and, yes, a mainstream reporter (first time I've admitted that here). The reason why is that I always thought _ now hope _ liberals were capable of actually viewing a person and issue in holistic, multi-dimensional manner leaving aside bias. Liberals were practical people who held facts higher than anything else. But I think I just described my fellow reporters, not liberals. Increasingly, I've been discontented reading "liberal" views on these blogs because they're no different in attitude and idiotic responses than right wing nutters, who paint everything in black and white terms.
You're better than that. At least I'm hoping.
Vincennes @ 33:
Liberals are people, too. Liberalism is also as varied as conservatism. I'm probably somewhat more conservative on quite a few things than many commentors here, but probably a helluva lot more liberal than they are in others. Yes, some liberals are prone to black-and-white thinking. It comes with the territory of humanity, much variation and different styles of thinking.
General_Rennenkampf @ 34:
Ha, I guess I'm being as intolerant about my comments of what a liberal should be as the C&L liberals here are in judging Fournier. Point taken.
I thought news organizations were supposed to avoid even the appearance of impropriety.
Wait, that was before Dubya set such a great example of humility and honesty.
It has been apparent recently that the AP has been spinning their stories to the right. The language that they employ in their articles has evolved to subtle and not so subtle jabs. This morning I read an AP article that suggested that McCain's recent gaffes were just slips of the tongue due to the campaign process and that Obama's been as guilty of gaffes as McCain. If briefly mentioned his Surge/Sunni Awakening history gaffe and the Check Republic gaffes as inconsequential details better left to subordinates. I was stunned as I read and reread this piece because it confirmed my suspicions about the AP. They used to be a credible news organization. It is very disappointing to see.
Fournier IS working for McCain, just as he worked for bush. Google search Bush/Bosnia to see Fournier carrying water for the republicans by asking the Governor of Texas to share his foreign policy expertise on the war in Bosnia,where Bush openly criticized the Clinton administrations conduct of the war. The was no other reason for the interview but to advance Bush as a national candidate. This could be called prostitution, but would taint the term.
Widespread, leftybydesign and Clair Thomas ... I have a request. If you're going to make such statements please back them up by examples of what you see is bias by the AP and other news organizations. At least then there is a basis for a "constructive" argument, so to speak and I _ and others _ have the opportunity to refute your argument or make the case for ours.
That's what I've been trying to say on this blog. You can disagree with me but you can't make across-the-board statements without backing them up. You can't say the AP is a mouthpiece for the rightwing or that it is incompetent without citing numerous, varied examples and then explain why those examples illustrate your point.
Otherwise you sound like nothing more than a crazy person ranting on the street. I would like the discourse on this blog to be elevated. If not, then I could hang out with my friends and here the same thing over a beer. At least I'd be enjoying the beer.
He looks like your typical GOP sociopath. Pasty, balding, middle-aged and effette.
News Bias in the Associated Press
When the AP takes sides
Fournier's Sizzle Overcooking AP's Cred Stake
Not hard to find at all, really...not to impugn the noble professionals whose noble ideals make them impregnable to the ignoble editorial demands of the self interested corporate nobility to serve the corporate interests over the inconvenient and costly demands of the truth...no bull would be noble, but in the real world of corporate media it don't pay. The further up the pay scale, the better the players know the game, and the ones who won't play by the owners' rules don't make it that far. Soooo, what do you think that says about the ones that make it to the top, hmmmmm?
You wanna really do some good, climb as high as you can and then have the balls to turn "people's witness" on their asses. Otherwise, resign yourself to a mediocre career or sell your soul and us out. Good luck to ya...
;-}
Vincennes - Glenn Greenwald regularly exposes the corporate media's right wing bias over at his blog as does Media Matters. While I won't make a blanket statement about AP, it would appear that there is plenty of evidence to support the claims made herein about Fournier. That you choose to become so defensive about it and take it so personally suggests to me that you would be better off going for that beer, because you seem to be unwilling or unable to recognize the corruption of the medium that is taking place all around you.
You may be an objective journalist as may be your friends and colleagues. But that doesn't mean that people who assert that the corporate media has become a propaganda arm for the rich and powerful are wrong. It simply means that you're the exceptions to the rule.
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