Sad but true: Bill Moyers Journal has shuffled off the air and into the archives of PBS and the Paley Center for Media. From a story in the Columbia Journalism Review:

In 1948, when he was fourteen years old, Bill Moyers heard Lyndon Johnson give a rousing speech at a courthouse in Marshall, Texas. Without a megaphone or a loudspeaker, LBJ mesmerized the crowd. “I remember the sheer presence of the man,” Moyers has recalled. “And I thought, ‘That’s what power is. And this man is reaching this audience. And he’s got this audience. And he’s telling this audience something that’s very important.’ ” Years later, through a different medium—television—Moyers would achieve a similar kind of power, and he has yet to abuse it. Moyers’s conversational ease, his earnest delivery, his fierce intelligence—all of it has transformed him into our leading television intellectual, and a worthy successor to Edward R. Murrow.

Yes, the former press secretary to one of the most reviled presidents of the 20th century — reviled especially by the left — has become one of the icons of the very same left that once chanted, “Hey, hey, LBJ. How many kids did you kill today?”

Moyers somehow escaped being tarnished with the disaster that was the Johnson Administration and went on to a career as a staple on PBS, playing the role of the Guilty White Southerner (he was born in Oklahoma, but raised in Texas); it’s a wonder he didn’t end up editing the New York Times.  With his trademark combination of folksy unctuousness and schoolmarmish hectoring, he became the go-to guy for people who wanted to feel good about their best and most noble liberal impulses. (more…)

Wisconsin Congressman Ron Kind (D) is holding Listening Sessions in his district during this latest recess.  On April 5, Mr. Kind spoke with constituents in the courthouse in Pepin County and some of his comments have raised concerns. When questioned on the topic of his yes vote for the Health Care bill, the Congressman was noticeably irritated. One attendee pressed on the number of constituents who asked him to vote no vs those who wanted him to support the bill. He would not give numbers and then reportedly said:

When I know better than the rest of you, I will vote how I want to vote.

That’s an interesting take on the relationship between the voters and an elected official. I’m guessing that the Congressman’s Listening Sessions should be defined as meetings where the people listen to him tell them what he is going to do for them.

Another reported exchange between the voters and Mr. Kind involved the recent Supreme Court ruling on campaign finance rules.  As you might expect, the Wisconsin Democrat was not a fan of the ruling and seemed resigned to the reality of the decision, remarking:

Thanks to that pesky First Amendment, we probably won’t be able to overturn that decision.

Excuse me?  That “pesky First Amendment?” (more…)

Mark McGwire, America’s tarnished baseball hero, the mythical Paul Bunyan with a bat, the man who went in front of a bunch of showboating, preening congressmen and infamously said that he wasn’t there to talk about the past, finally opened up last week  and talked about the past, about steroid use and about breaking the hallowed single season home run record while juiced to the hilt.

And the reaction, outside of the expected cacophony of sports press making the same arguments in an insular world, caused such uproar that you could hear a mouse whisper.

As McGwire begins to earn back some respect for finally coming around to publicly admitting what everyone who has followed baseball for the past decade already knew, the credit goes to Ari Fleischer, the man behind the curtain pulling the strings on McGwire’s announcement.

This time, Fleischer’s plan worked. (more…)

White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs faced pointed questions from two reporters during a briefing on Wednesday regarding President Obama’s about-face on transparency in the health care bill debate. A sampling:

Reporter: During the campaign, the president on numerous occasions said words to the effect of, quoting one, “All of this will be done on C-SPAN in front of the public.” Do you agree that the president is breaking an explicit campaign promise?

Watching Gibbs dodge and weave with answers varying from “we covered this yesterday” to “the president wants to get a bill to his desk as quickly as possible”  is at once nauseating and fascinating. Not only did he not answer the question — what, be honest and lose his job? — but his deameanor implied that answering such questions is beneath his dignity and not worthy of the time. I’ve noticed this on more than one occasion.

Certainly it’s the press secretary’s job to make his boss look good – but it’s a reporter’s job to play devil’s advocate. Why did only two reporters in the room press Gibbs on the transparency issue? George W. Bush was constantly criticized for being too secretive – and yet here we have a direct promise of transparency being broken, and only a couple of reporters dare to ask why. Perhaps they’re worried about being denied access if they ask questions that are too probing, as happened during the campaign. (more…)