Beyond Broder

David Broder, of course, is a -- if not the -- pillar of the dread Washington Media Establishment. At the same time, it's become so fashionable to mock him these days, one has to wonder if he really is such a pillar. Everyone's doing it, after all. Under the circumstances, it's worth noting that given that we live in a country of 300 million, that one man has ridiculous opinions is hardly surprising. What is surprising is that he has this column on The Washington Post and makes frequent appearances on Meet The Press. And what's much less fashionable than Broder-bashing is noting that Broder would be irrelevant if not for the way key gatekeepers -- Tim Russert, editors at the Post, executives at NBC News -- keep rammig him down the throats of Americans interested in politics.

And what, I have to wonder, is Broder's economic value to the Post? At the margin, how many readers would the Post lose if it didn't carry his column? I have a hard time imagining it's a large number. And yet, to harshly condemn Broder's enablers would simply reduce one's own chances of having op-eds appear in the Post and so forth. Unless, of course, one were a conservatives. Conservatives, after all, can regularly slander both "the media" as a whole and any number of specific media organizations without ill effect.

4/26/07 8:20PM del.icio.us this incoming links

Comments

Better understanding of this otherwise impenetrable mystery might be had, if you think of the journamalism group as a *tribe*, along the lines of which digby, et al considers conservatives and liberals.

Specifically, it needn't be about money. The tribe-picture is intended to begin to answer the question sure to follow.

Posted by: sherifffruitfly on April 26, 2007 08:34 PM

Well, yeah. But don't tribes have a way of ousting their crazy nuts into irrelevance? Broder is must be eighty by now. And he's downright embarrassing. Isn't there a volcano somewhere?

Posted by: sangfroid826 on April 26, 2007 08:40 PM

Nonsense, Broder is an asset. Controversy is the best buzz generator. Having Glenn Greenwald as a WaPo columnist just wouldn't be the same.

Posted by: Korha on April 26, 2007 09:00 PM

You 'slandered' the Atlantic and then got hired by them.

Posted by: otto on April 26, 2007 09:01 PM

OT, but what's up with Hillary's campaign adviser on Scarborough?

Are all hot blondes Republican?

Posted by: gregor on April 26, 2007 09:01 PM

"What is surprising is that he has this column on The Washington Post and makes frequent appearances on Meet The Press."

It's worse than that.

If they had David Broder and a genuine liberal for balance I wouldn't mind. Very often Broder is invited on Meet the Press as a "balance" for Kate O'Beirne or Bob Novak or Bill Safire. In other words he gets the "liberal slot" on TV talk shows.

Check the Washington Post op-ed page today. They have Broder, Will, Novak, Lieberman. Not one liberal. Not one war opponent.

Posted by: DonB on April 26, 2007 09:02 PM

"And what, I have to wonder, is Broder's economic value to the Post?"

Broder amplifies the WP editorial page. Broder's views are identical to whatever the editorial page is saying.

Same with Meet the Press. Tim Russert knows that Broder is speaking for the Washington Media Establishment.

Posted by: DonB on April 26, 2007 09:09 PM

You 'slandered' the Atlantic and then got hired by them.

Yup. One wonders how Yglesias keeps moving up the journalism ladder if it is true that all the things he says is bad for his career.

Posted by: Al on April 26, 2007 09:12 PM

For a brief moment in the early 1970s the Washington Post was a national paper. Other than that, and to this day, it has mostly been the rather provincial paper of a southern capital city. Let's stop dignifying it as anything more. I haven't noticed in the last 25 years that it's editorial board is any more inciteful than the Jackson Clarion Ledger. It's nowhere near the paper that the Atlanta Constitution is. Broder is the dean of a regional city paper. D.C. doesn't have the vote, and the editorial board of it's paper is should be equally insignificant. Accept that, ignore him, and move on. (But continue reading its amazing reporting. Who lets them into print? Many local papers have excellent reporters.)

Posted by: sab on April 26, 2007 09:14 PM

Check the Washington Post op-ed page today. They have Broder, Will, Novak, Lieberman. Not one liberal. Not one war opponent.

I guess Harold Myerson doesn't exist. Ah well.

Posted by: Al on April 26, 2007 09:16 PM

Read the first sentence you quoted again, Al. Sound each word out, if necessary.

Posted by: SomeCallMeTim on April 26, 2007 09:21 PM

Is it just me, or did Sir Charles have an extra-large helping of hater-tots for dinner tonight?

Possibly it's not a good idea to have a no-championship-winner comment on the playoffs?

Posted by: sherifffruitfly on April 26, 2007 09:24 PM

Which comment, SCMT? And I'm not good at sounding things out. What's your point?

Posted by: Al on April 26, 2007 09:30 PM

sab errs by forgetting that the Washington Post is important to those in the Washington Poliitcal establishment and how they interpret the world. It is the script for the national drama.

Posted by: graeme on April 26, 2007 09:31 PM

Fuck. I just realized that you're right. The "Columns and Blogs" page doesn't include Myerson. The right page, though, does. FUCK!

Toronto's going to win the series.

Posted by: SomeCallMeTim on April 26, 2007 09:39 PM

Bob Novak was a war opponent.

Posted by: James Kabala on April 26, 2007 09:40 PM

It is valuable to know what the Media establishment narrative is. Broder's plainspoken, even dull, paint by the numbers version of it tells us things - the way thermometers tell us things. What it has told me, in the last couple of months, is that the whole narrative - the Bush-as-war-leader narrative of 9/11, the war on terror narrative, the Dems can't get it together narrative, the Karl Rove is a genius narrative (yes, like a victorian novel, the narrative has many subplots) is out of their hands. I get a cold and cruel pleasure from watching Broder cry about it. Also, I like how, in obeisance, Washington Post reporters in their Q and As like to refer to him as a legend. I wonder what Legend he is? The Blair witch project? or the Sleepy Hollow one?

Posted by: roger on April 26, 2007 09:44 PM

how many readers would the Post lose if it didn't carry his column?

Pick any one WaPo columnist and/or reporter and the answer is the same.

Posted by: SoCalJustice on April 26, 2007 09:51 PM

The power of branding -- Broder is The Dean. He'll probably be The Dean until he's in assisted living with people brushing his teeth and wiping his butt for him.

Posted by: John Emerson on April 26, 2007 10:00 PM

Novak may have been against the war, but he spent all his time tearing down its opponents. I'd sure rather have him as an open enemy.

Posted by: aleks on April 26, 2007 10:12 PM

he spent all his time tearing down its opponents.

Maybe, but he sure hasn't been a friend to the Bush administration either.

Posted by: Mark Adams on April 26, 2007 10:51 PM

Robert Novak is a member of Opus Dei, an extreme right wing neo-fascist organization. He's nothing but slime off the bottom of the cesspool.

Posted by: SLC on April 26, 2007 11:03 PM

SLC,

How exactly is Opus Dei "neo-fascist"?

Posted by: Mark Adams on April 26, 2007 11:28 PM

SLC,

Two of the most politically prominent members of Opus Dei are Ruth Kelly and Paola Binetti.

Kelly is a member of British Parliament and is Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government and Minister for Women. She is a member of the Labour Party.

Binetti is an Italian senator and member of the Center-Left La Margherita party.

Posted by: Mark Adams on April 26, 2007 11:36 PM

how many readers would the Post lose if it didn't carry his columm?

I think that this is like the Imus controversy. Certainly one of the things that made life difficult for MSNBC and WFAN was the fact that a lot of female and minority employees weren't going to tolerate management keeping Imus around.

Similarly, the value Broder provides is not in WaPo readers, but rather in the moral support he gives to a lot of journalists working for the WaPo and the greater DC area. To ax Broder would be like the WaPo telling their reporters "there will be consequences for mindlessly mouthing 'bipartisan' platitudes." That's the exact opposite message the WaPo wants to send, internally.

Posted by: Constantine on April 27, 2007 08:21 AM

Did you all see today's (27 April) Wapo? Broder still hearts McCain. After getting the brush-off from John conservative-support-seeking, tax-cutting-raises-revenues, Jerry-Falwell-and-Bob-Jones-University-rule McCain, Broder gets the old "straight talking" McCain back. His heart must be all a flutter. As the Dean says: "Candor, even belatedly, becomes him." He is, like, so awesome!

Posted by: Castorp on April 27, 2007 08:29 AM

today in the Washington Post, Broder lauds McCain's re-boarding the straight-talk express. I hadn't realized one can get off and on it so easily. He probably needed the liar's local to get where he was going, and then needed Broder to justify it. One hand helps the other.

Posted by: della Rovere on April 27, 2007 08:34 AM

Posted by: della Rovere on April 27, 2007 08:35 AM

>>You 'slandered' the Atlantic and then got hired by them.

>Yup. One wonders how Yglesias keeps moving up the journalism ladder if it is true that all the things he says is bad for his career.

They fear our Matthew sooooooooooooooo much they hired him just to avoid his rapier-like wit.

Either that, or they just assumed any perceived slander was due to misspellings and typos.

Posted by: Njorl on April 27, 2007 11:22 AM

**Are all hot blondes Republican?**

No, but the ones who can afford the priciest hair colorists are.

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