Announcing the 2007 P.U.-litzer Prizes

By Jeff Cohen and Norman Solomon, AlterNet. Posted December 26, 2007.

Many journalists qualified for the 16th annual P.U.-litzer Prizes, but only a few were able to win recognition for turning in one of the truly stinkiest media performances of the year. As the judges for this uncoveted award, we have done our best to confer this honor on the most deserving.

And now, the winners of the P.U.-litzers for 2007:

SPINNING FOR ANOTHER WAR AWARD -- Michael Gordon of the New York Times

Continuing where he left off before the Iraq invasion, when he used unnamed official sources to produce wildly inaccurate Page 1 articles on Iraq's alleged weapons threat, Gordon in February wrote a front-page story with the stunning claim that Iran's supreme leader had approved sending lethal explosives into Iraq to attack U.S. soldiers. (Even President Bush soon backed away from the claim.) Readers might have had trouble assessing Gordon's charges -- which were, as usual, almost entirely based on anonymous sources: "United States intelligence asserts ... Administration officials said ... Some American intelligence experts believe ..." After analyzing the article, blogger Jonathan Schwarz speculated that "Gordon is not an actual person, but rather a voice-activated tape recorder."

"SOMETHING ABOUT A RETRO MACHO MAN" AWARD -- Chris Matthews, host of MSNBC's Hardball

With a worshipful media wind pushing actor and former senator Fred Thompson toward the presidential race in June, Matthews lauded Thompson's "sex appeal" and "star quality." The hardballer was nearly rapturous as he said: "Can you smell the English Leather on this guy, the Aqua Velva, the sort of mature man`s shaving cream, or whatever, you know, after he shaved? Do you smell that sort of -- a little bit of cigar smoke? You know, whatever."

Four years earlier, when George Bush flew onto an aircraft carrier to celebrate "Mission Accomplished" in Iraq, Matthews had gushed at length about the president's looks and how Americans love "a guy who has a little swagger. We like having a hero as president. We're not like the Brits."

"AMERICANS DON'T WANT UNIVERSAL HEALTHCARE" AWARD -- Jeff Greenfield of CBS, et al.

Reflecting what became mainstream media's conventional wisdom in the wake of Michael Moore's "SiCKO" documentary, CBS correspondent Greenfield explained that the U.S. lacks a universal healthcare system not because of the powerful insurance lobby -- but because "Americans are just different." He quoted an academic who said Americans, unlike Canadians and Europeans, don't want government involvement in healthcare: "It's a cultural difference."

Actually, CBS's own poll of Americans had found 64 percent supporting the view that the federal government should "guarantee health insurance for all" -- with 60 percent approving of higher taxes to pay for it. A CNN poll found 64 percent American support for the idea that "government should provide a national health insurance program for all Americans, even if this would require higher taxes."

"3-H CLUB" PRIZE -- Too Many to Name

At the same time they're imposing their own fixations on candidates, elite political reporters like to pretend that they have absolutely no idea why the candidates are struggling to overcome those fixations. A Dec. 11 Washington Post article deadpanned: "[John] Edwards has faced challenges of his own, namely 'the three H's' -- his expensive haircut, his hedge fund work after the 2004 election, and his sprawling homestead."

Dozens of news reports in major outlets have deployed the "three H's" shorthand, many implying that Edwards -- unlike the wealthy candidates who never mention the poor -- is a hypocrite when he discusses poverty. In July, the Post's John Solomon devoted an entire investigative article to Edwards' pricey haircuts: "It is some kind of commentary on the state of American politics that as Edwards has campaigned," mused the reporter, "his hair seems to have attracted as much attention, as say, his position on healthcare." Gee, how did that happen?

RISKY DEMOCRATS AWARD -- Los Angeles Times, Washington Post

If you believe certain political pundits and reporters, Democrats are continuously pushing "risky" proposals that are off-putting to the American public. In November, a Los Angeles Times report -- headlined "Democrats Calculate Risk on Tax Hikes" -- called proposed Democratic tax hikes on wealthier Americans "a major political gamble." (Unmentioned was the fact that Bill Clinton raised taxes on the rich and was re-elected, or that a Gallup Poll shows 66 percent of Americans think "upper income people" don't currently pay enough taxes.) Days later, a Washington Post report was headlined "Climate Is a Risky Issue for Democrats; Candidates Back Costly Proposals." (Unmentioned was the Post's own poll showing that 70 percent of Americans think the federal government "should do more" on global warming; only 7 percent said "it should do less.") Listening to press corps cautions may heighten Democratic timidity, but it hasn't won many national elections.

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Jeff Cohen is author of Cable News Confidential: My Misadventures in Corporate Media and the founder of the media watch group FAIR, which provided research for this article. Norman Solomon’s latest book is Made Love, Got War: Close Encounters with America’s Warfare State.

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