Do they see that we see?

• Author: Douglas, Susan
• Position: Pundit Watch - anti-Clinton media analysis - Column

Here's some advice for the next President, based on the mainstream media's treatment of Bill Clinton to date. Do not defend the civil rights of any minority groups, especially those about whom four-star generals or right-wing talk-show hosts are phobic. Do not go out of your way to appoint women or minorities to important Cabinet positions, since this is reverse discrimination against the rightful holders of these offices, rich white men. Don't tell the American people the truth about the economy--or about anything else, for that matter. If you have a smart, accomplished wife who cares about social justice, ditch her immediately and get one who likes to spend her time in Bloomingdale's or riding to hounds. Most importantly, don't give one of the most articulate, frank, and visionary speeches heard by Congress in recent history, for this will really bring out the most myopic, puling commentary the privileged, out-of-touch, neocon Washington press corps can muster.

The big story--one I am sure will go down in history--about Clinton's early days on the job is the enormous discrepancy between the general public's willingness to follow Clinton's leadership and the media's almost pathological determination to trash his every move. When Ronald Reagan came into office, the pundits insisted, repeatedly, that the new President and his economic package deserved a chance. Apparently such indulgences are now outre, for the members of the pundit peanut gallery have given virtually everything Clinton has done a derisive raspberry. In the process, all too many of them seem as unlike regular people, and as out of date, as Howdy Doody.

It's a good thing, for example, that so many of us grew up on The Little Rascals and Looney Tune reruns; otherwise, we'd never understand the incessant yet anachronistic references to "castor oil" rolling off the lips of America's pundits as they characterize Clinton's economic package. We were supposed to think of Alfalfa's face screwed up in freckled distaste as, for example, David Gergen insisted, even before Clinton delivered his State of the Union address, what a "tough sell" and an "upward climb" Clinton had set for himself--because there was "no way," as Nina Totenberg put it, "his economic plan can be liked." Polls showing a majority of Americans well aware of the need for increased taxes and cuts in spending made no dent in the "tough sell" dirge.

According to the pundits, Clinton has blown it on everything. "In the...