Commander-in-Chief Rewind: Mishandling the News Media

By Eric Seidel, CEO
The Media Trainers®

Are these really the same people who ran Barack Obama’s brilliant campaign? And is this president the same man who, as a candidate, talked about bringing an end to a politically polarized Nation’s Capitol?

It's too difficult to refrain from commenting on this “war” between the White House and Fox News. You can tolerate such stupidity only so long. And it is stupid.

By declaring war on Fox, the administration serves the best interests of Fox. Now all the other networks, as well as other national and local media nationwide are talking about Fox. You can’t buy that kind of exposure. And where does any administration, Democrat or Republican, get the right to ordain which media are legitimate news organizations. Additionally, where does their chutzpah originate to tell other networks not to follow administration stories that Fox breaks.

Especially interesting about that suggestion is that it came right after senior editors at both the Washington Post and New York Times admitted they failed to follow up the two major Fox stories on green jobs czar Van Jones and ACORN. Apparently, those mea culpas alarmed administration insiders.

There are other stupid things about this White House campaign. Fox dominates the cable news ratings by better than 2 to 1. Yet senior advisor David Axelrod and chief of staff Rahm Emanuel fired shots on separate networks a couple of weeks ago. That followed the first volley from Obama communications director Anita Dunn. And then, Valerie Jarrett, one of the president’s closest associates and advisors, joined the fight on CNN (click on video below). Ironically, she chose the network that comes in 4th in a four network race and where the smallest audience was watching.

There’s been some conjecture that the White House picked this fight now in order to divert attention from other things, like health care reform. But, has this ill-conceived offensive actually backfired and validated Obama’s fiercest critics?

Instead of their ongoing boycott of Fox News, the president and his senior aides could get a lot more mileage by making themselves accessible to the number one cable network. Since Fox has the largest, most diverse audience, it simply makes much more sense to reach out to all those people instead of alienating them.

Some other observations. If the administration continues trying to divide and conquer...that is, convince other news media to ostracize Fox, it might just find itself arming a bigger army of defenders. After all, the others have to figure if today it's Fox, tomorrow it might be us.

And, in the video below, CNN's Campbell Brown asked Jarrett if she believes MSNBC, often accused of being an administration lackey network, also is biased. Jarrett evaded the question and then proceeded to make vague accusations that Fox has aired inaccurate, inflammatory stories. Brown, a veteran reporter formerly with NBC News, failed to press Jarrett on the MSNBC question, and did not ask for specifics on Jarrett's claims against Fox. As a result, her timidity provided more evidence to CNN's own critics that it, too, is "carrying water" for the president.

You've Got 30 Seconds!

Click on this picture!

By Eric Seidel, CEO

The Media Trainers®

Have you noticed how time-constrained live interviews have become on the cable news networks? Tight formats, "hard breaks" and very interruptive news anchors are making it more difficult than ever to clearly make a point.

Typically, you get little if any warning just how quickly they need you to respond before you’re gone and they’re off to something else. So, you need to go into these situations armed with messages you can get in quickly and concisely, even on some of the most complex topics.

For instance, healthcare reform. Now there’s an issue that lends itself to snappy, short sound bites! Well, Southern Co. CEO David Ratcliffe was asked to do just that recently on Fox Business Network.

Telling Ratcliffe they had only 30 seconds left, anchor Alexis Glick asked how healthcare reform will impact his company. Hard to know, the CEO responded, too complex an issue, just like climate change.

By tying in climate change, Ratcliffe slightly repositioned the issue. He targeted specific audiences possibly watching this interview. Perhaps some Congressional leaders and critical committee staffers heard him saying that right now there’s a lot of confusion about both healthcare and climate change legislation. He wants more clarity, and also wants them to understand the economic impact of their actions on Southern Co. and its customers. It was a message that other CEOs for many companies in various industries certainly must've appreciated.

By the way, Ratcliffe said it all in about 32 seconds. Not bad, considering he had no clock to go by and probably no indication he would get a question on such a complex topic with an unrealistic window of time limit. (See for yourself; click on video below.)

Let the Media Help Say It for You

By Eric Seidel, CEO
The Media Trainers®

It’s the National Retail Federation vs. Wal-Mart. Despite the federation’s 2500 membership roster, this has the feel of David vs. Goliath.

So, when you’re at an apparent disadvantage of that degree, what can you do? Get some help from the news media, of course.

These two seemingly aligned organizations are on opposing sides of healthcare reform. Wal-Mart, often at war with unions and their attempts to organize the massive retailer’s workforce, has “partnered” with one of its most aggressive and long-time antagonists, the Service Employees International Union in favor of employer-mandated healthcare. The federation says that would be a job killer and put many retailers out of business.

The federation’s Sr. VP for Government Affairs, Steve Pfister, recently carried that message to target audiences watching Fox News Channel’s Your World, and took advantage of some questions from substitute host Stuart Varney.

Varney: “Maybe Wal-Mart did because it knew it could do it and it would put unbearable pressure on its direct competitors.”

Pfister: “Well Stuart, you said that, I didn’t, but I think there might be some truth to the comment you just made.”

And Varney said it for him, giving Pfister an opportunity to simply second that emotion. Then Varney opened another door of opportunity for the Retail Federation executive.

Varney: “Do you think they are trying to buy and curry favor with the unions; a good PR move, for example.”

Here Varney is alluding to the effort by unions to get federal legislative relief to sidestep secret ballot votes in shops they try to organize.

Pfister: “…in terms of currying favor with the unions, in addition to healthcare reform, I would submit to you that the SEIU’s number one priority as well as the rest of organized labor is the card check issue, and I’m not going to suggest that there’s a quid pro quo because I think that would be fool hearty to try to cut a deal on providing healthcare coverage to ward off card check…”

Pfister’s not-so-subtle message to Wal-Mart: if you think you can stop union efforts on card check by aligning with them on healthcare, you’re fooling only yourself, at the expense of your fellow retailers. (Click on the video below to see this segment of the interview.)

While news people often ask questions that seek conflict and controversy, there are times when you can use those questions, as Pfister did, to your advantage without necessarily being the primary message sender.

Wrestling With Pigs

By Eric Seidel, CEO
The Media Trainers®


(From the editor: Any bona fide journalists reading this should not take offense. I used to be one of you, and I’m proud of it. Those who deal wisely with the news media know how to do it without getting into the slop.)

Certainly you’ve heard the old refrain that when you wrestle with a pig in mud, only the pig enjoys it. That highly graphic image often has been applied to dealing with the news media. Of course, news most often is negative, with the exception of so-called positive stories that break through because they’re unusual.

Let your emotions get out of control and people watching might condemn the pig for being rude to you, but you’re still not above the fray. You’ve been dragged into the mud. And, your mission—to get messages to important audiences—most likely will fail.

And that’s what happened to BusinessWeek’s online “Ethics Guy” Dr. Bruce Weinstein (a Ph.D.) in a recent interview about whether healthcare is a right. His interviewer on the Fox Business Network was Stuart Varney. Weinstein believes the government has a moral responsibility to provide healthcare to all. Varney is a Brit by birth and is someone who has experience with socialized healthcare.

It was that word—socialism—suggested by Varney that set off Weinstein. Weinstein pounded the desk and raised his voice. His rising anger was palpable. He even attacked Fox’s two cable networks. Varney was doing his job and even smiled at one point during Weinstein’s meltdown. (Click on video below to see for yourself.)

Who won? I'm not sure that question is even relevant. My evaluation is Weinstein allowed himself to be sucked in and derailed from his overall message because he failed to control his feelings.