A day and a half before the Vice Presidential debate, seemingly the entire conservative blogosphere has, at pretty much the same time, decided that Gwen Ifill is an absolutely unacceptable choice as moderator. (Matt Drudge is presently blaring the news on his Bat-signal.) The reason: she’s writing a book, to be published on Inauguration Day, titled The Breakthrough: Politics and Race in the Age of Obama.
I, of course, am in the tank for Obama, and so have no business stating an opinion on the matter. But I actually think Ifill’s critics have a point—one—though it’s not the one they’re most emphasizing.
* Ifill does have a conflict worth disclosing, but it’s commercial, not political. Simply, she’s going to be selling a book that will probably be more timely and marketable if Obama wins. This is not a unique situation: political journalists write books, many of which will be affected in the market by the resolution of the events they are covering. But Ifill has made no secret of the project. As Michael Calderone points out in Politico, she discussed the book with the Washington Post’s Howard Kurtz a month ago. If the McCain campaign was really recently and suddenly blindsided with this knowledge, which I doubt, they would be incompetent—the campaigns negotiated the approved moderators along with all the other terms of the debates. Still, people should know about it and take it into consideration when they watch her, Palin and Biden.
Having said that:
* Michelle Malkin and others further claim that Ifill’s writing the book amounts to an endorsement of Obama. They cite remarks Ifill has made about some of the black politicians she profiles, but their most emphatic argument is the title and the fact of the book itself. Please. The fact that a black man has a serious shot at becoming President is a breakthrough—as would be the case for a woman, a South Asian American or an avowed atheist. (This would apply as well to Colin Powell, whom Ifill covers in the book too.) What’s more, given that fact, the changes in America’s racial politics are therefore news. That’s not “pro-Obama”; it’s simple news judgment.
* But let’s say Malkin, Newsbusters and the rest are absolutely right about Ifill’s beliefs. Let’s say she plans to pull the lever for Obama, that she thinks he walks on water and turns it into wine. The only reason this is a disqualification is if you subscribe to the ludicrous belief that reporters should not hold opinions. I’m sure Gwen Ifill has political preferences, as does Charlie Gibson, Katie Couric, Brit Hume and probably Ann Curry. I’ve said it before, but: any journalist (or anyone) who can follow politics and American issues day after day for years and have no opinions or preferences is a moron, a Chance-the-Gardener-like savant. The obligation of reporters is not to hold no beliefs, it’s to show no favor. If anyone can critique her actual work in this campaign as favoring one side, have at it. As far as I’ve seen, she’s been assiduously even-handed in that typically staid PBS way, but if you disagree, show me the interviews that indicate otherwise.
* The fact that the preceding is an issue, by the way, is precisely why I’m so obsessive about the idea that journalists should disclose their votes. If it were routine for political reporters to acknowledge that they were human beings and citizens, no one could fetishize the shocking idea that one of them could actually have an opinion.
* You may have noticed that Gwen Ifill is black. Malkin makes a point of saying that she’s not challenging Ifill because of her race. And I believe her. Michelle Malkin and McCain’s beat-the-press strategists would attack any moderator, white, black or green, if it helped them define the field to their advantage. (The McCain camp reportedly threatened to boycott any debate with an NBC moderator, but agreed on Tom Brokaw as the one acceptable option.) But it’s not like Malkin needs to draw that connection for her audience to infer Ifill’s race as evidence she must be an Obama plant. And—in fairness to Malkin—it’s not like that would cross no one’s mind even if she never wrote a word about Ifill. There’s no taking identity politics out of this campaign or the coverage and it cuts many ways. Being a woman may have freed Katie Couric to be tough with Palin—it shouldn’t have mattered, but it is what it is.
* But look, I’m talking about this as if these are actually objections of principle. This, like so many attacks on the media, is about working the refs (trying to get Ifill to “prove” in the debate that she’s not out to get Palin) and working the judges (getting viewers to assess the debate from the frame of Palin having been unfairly set up—so that any tough question or bad answer only becomes proof that the fix was in). This is part of our politics now, and we should get used to this kind of pre-game show.