NORTH CAROLINA — As the results of the Super Tuesday primaries put Republican candidates in the headlines, President Obama is making his own bid for news coverage today. Obama is traveling to the town of Mount Holly, where he will speak at a Daimler Trucks manufacturing plant. He is expected to address the twin themes of energy and the economy, highlighting policy programs that encourage more fuel-efficient vehicles.
Mount Holly is 12 miles west of Charlotte, where Obama will formally accept his party’s nomination at the Democratic National Convention in early September. The convention location, and a recent string of visits by Obama and his allies, are widely viewed as strategic moves to bolster Democrats’ chances in a key swing state: North Carolina barely fell into the Obama column in 2008—the first time a Democrat won the state since 1976—and 2012 will be close.
That strategic frame, and the horse race emphasis that accompanies it, have shaped some of the advance coverage of Obama’s quick official visit to the state. On the eve of the president’s arrival, one news report, from the McClatchy Washington bureau, carried the headline, “Is Obama running scared in North Carolina?” (The story ran in print in The Charlotte Observer as a three-paragraph box with the headline, “GOP rips visit.”)
At the other extreme is coverage that plays these visits as pageantry or theater. Just five days ago, Charlotte media gave Michelle Obama strong visual coverage during a fundraising visit that coincided with the CIAA basketball tournament. Mount Holly sits in the shadow of the Charlotte media market, and the Obama campaign must be hoping for plenty of television and print coverage that frames the president in small-town North Carolina.
But other approaches exist. Journalists can use their moment in the national spotlight of a swing state to go beyond horse race language, and beyond the rhetoric Obama is sure to deliver at a scripted appearance, to probe the issues that matter here.
Reporting and writing well about issues like energy independence and the global economy requires skill and time, but it can be done. Mount Holly’s hometown newspaper, The Gaston Gazette, owned by Freedom Communications, provided a great example of how to tell the complex manufacturing story in late February. Ragan Robinson’s report starts simply:
If you live in a manufacturing community, you’ve talked about and heard about and lamented for decades the loss of jobs overseas.
And the chances are good you’ve heard a lot about the idea that the U.S. rewards companies for moving plants and jobs to other countries.
More difficult than agreeing we need jobs and industry in this country—and this community—is understanding why we lose them in the first place. Or how in the world we ever passed laws that actually reward companies for shifting production to foreign economies.
And that’s where the debate gets touchy, mainly because that’s where it gets political.
At the moment, the Daimler Trucks plant in Mount Holly serves as a poster child for a U.S. resurgence in manufacturing jobs. But with context, the economic story becomes more complex. This one company’s history illustrates issues surrounding global trade policy, U.S. worker resentment of those from other countries, and falling wages.
“Even if there are successes, we should also recognize that there are still many problems facing the state’s labor market,” said John Quinterno, who runs a public policy research firm, South by North Strategies Ltd., in Chapel Hill. He hopes that journalists go beyond business ribbon-cuttings, explaining jobs and trade in a broader policy context. “This is a global dynamic,” he said in a telephone interview Tuesday.
Part of the Daimler Trucks story
That context might come through a close look at the company whose plant Obama will visit today. Daimler Trucks North America, a division of a German company, makes the Freightliner brand of trucks. Freightliner plants are one of the few places in right-to-work North Carolina with a history of union activism, with a wildcat strike in Gaston County in 2007. For some, the 2007 strike brought back painful memories of deadly textile mill strikes in 1934.
"North Carolina has a long tradition of bidding low on labor costs, using that technique to lure textile mills from New England starting in the late 1800s; Mount Holly was one of those towns that grew up around a textile mill. But that strategy has historically failed to deliver a long-term solution."
Speaking of context ...
1) I just looked up the employment data for Mount Holly, and it appears as though textiles are still the source of more jobs in the area than any other industry. I think one would have to acknowledge that luring northern textile manufacturers in the 19th century turned out to be a fine long-term solution if they're still a staple of Mount Holly employment in the 21st.
2) The starting Daimler wages you cite are low by historical standards for auto workers, but they're actually very close to the starting wages for GM workers under the contract imposed during the bankruptcy and bailout, which are also capped.
This isn't to say that labor doesn't get screwed, but a) the screwing is no longer weighted so heavily to the South and right-to-work states, and b) screwing labor generally does work out pretty well for owners except when labor gets really pissed off and shuts down the machines long enough to inflict some real pain, which happens less and less.
What it is to say is that I think the broader context you're really after is the labor-capital conflict in general (in which labor is getting its ass horribly kicked), and the role that the transformation of agriculture from family farms to agribusiness has played in that conflict, and that's a lot to ask of any reporter on deadline whether or not they parachute in.
Having said all that: yes, political reportage in this country really, really sucks.
#1 Posted by Weldon Berger, CJR on Wed 7 Mar 2012 at 02:18 PM
Global policy affects the everyday lives of those who live in
'middle America.' While this seems a simple statement to make, the call for a self-governed, active journalism is a whisper amongst the louder voices that claim to report on 'what the people want to read.' While the adage goes 'there's no such thing as a dumb question,' I'd argue that for journalists, this does NOT apply. This article points to the importance of asking the right questions, the ones whose answers provoke more curiosity.
Journalism's first act is not reporting. Journalism's first act is the question. Journalism is fundamentally about acting as a filter for information and then communicating its relevance to an audience. Thus, journalism as a learned profession should be very attentive to its local accountability. A journalist is justified in their prying by their correlating responsibility to bring clarity to clouded subjects. Depth over breadth should be the standard.
For 'middle America,' or small-town campaign stops, this means that journalists should analyze all scales of information with the task of making them relevant to a population. Recognizing that global trade policy affects the tides of employment in Mount Holly, N.C. and communicating that to the population is difficult. But patronizing political pageantry and the journalism that perpetuates it underestimates the value of each community. Journalism is not simply a window through which people see the 'news.' Rather it is more like a fun-house mirror, which hides, shapes, or expands its subject. Journalists are agents in creating information. With that power comes the great responsibility to acknowledge that, which questions are asked inherently filters the content on which a journalist can report. A responsibility to maintaining depth in reporting is often overshadowed by the urgency to produce what advertisers like to see. But to whom is the journalist accountable? National conversations don't rest solely in a supra-state level. And local reports are not geographically contained in their implications or insights. The journalist, as the people's examiner is responsible to shape political conversations away from pageantry and towards an interplay between these levels to create meaning.
#2 Posted by Sarah Acuff, CJR on Wed 7 Mar 2012 at 04:10 PM
Hi Weldon,
Thank you for the comment.
On your first point:
American and Efird is the big textile employee remaining in Mount Holly. Ruddick sold it in late 2011 to a private equity form that plans to make it more "Asian-centric." Indeed, textiles employed people in Gaston County for many years, and some companies morphed into making other textile-like products, like tires. But textile employment in North Carolina has been dwindling for years, and the quality of life was such that most "lint-heads," or textile employees, longed to escape or urged their children to get out if they could. Often, the escape valve was military service and things like the GI bill. (The best copy desk chief ever at The Charlotte Observer was the son of mill workers.)
On 2. Interesting and good to know.
On the conclusion: Often when labor gets screwed, so do government budgets (and then taxes), in the form of safety-net programs. So should taxpayers pay now (with grants to business) or later (on safety-net programs)? And capital pays when? So yes, it's a lot to ask of reporters on deadline. But North Carolina has at least six months in the spotlight. I'm looking forward to issues stories with Carolina flavor, beyond barbecue and sweet tea.
#3 Posted by Andria Krewson, CJR on Wed 7 Mar 2012 at 06:52 PM
Sarah,
Thanks for the supportive thoughts. It double-posted, and I'm unsure how to get rid of that. But thanks.
#4 Posted by Andria Krewson, CJR on Wed 7 Mar 2012 at 06:57 PM
Sarah, I wouldn't quarrel with much that you've said other than the question of to whom journalists are accountable. Ultimately they're accountable not to readers but to whoever pays the bills. You're not going to see GE paying for a lot of complex anti-globalization reporting.
#5 Posted by Weldon Berger, CJR on Wed 7 Mar 2012 at 07:14 PM
Andria, thanks for the response, much appreciated.
Capital pays when and what it's compelled to pay. I had occasion yesterday to recall what Richard Addington said about the Bush administration's appetite for new executive branch powers either poached from the other branches of government or simply invented: "We're going to push and push and push until some larger force makes us stop." Same philosophy.
I agree with most of what you've said and sympathize completely with your desire for better coverage; it's only that I don't think most reporters are equipped to do what you want or would have the time for it even if they were, or would get a lot of support from their editors even if they did.
It takes some commotion to move them off the schneid. For example, late last year I searched the Google News archives to check the frequency in institutional press sources of the phrase "income inequality" during the period between September 18 of last year, when the Occupy protests began, and December 7, when Obama made his Teddy Roosevelt-lite speech in Osawatomie, and then I compared it year to year to the same three-month period in the previous four years. Here's what I found.
2007: 116 instances.
2008: 112 instances.
2009: 54 instances.
2010: 106 instances.
2011: 3,270 instances.
The equality gap wasn't much worse last year than it was in any of those other years, but reporters didn't pay much attention to it (and neither did the president) until after Occupy got in their faces about it nonstop for weeks. The issues you're talking about are more complicated and at least as political (not necessarily Republican/Democrat political but socialism/capitalism political) and the press aren't adept at handling either of those things.
#6 Posted by Weldon Berger, CJR on Wed 7 Mar 2012 at 08:40 PM
Open notes from a Newseum scan Wednesday of N.C. front pages:
The death of the Gourd Lady in Hickory was more important than a presidential visit 40 miles away. Probably as it should be. Many smaller papers focused on local news and sports and didn't put this visit on their fronts.
The metro papers in the populous Piedmont corridor (coinciding lots with Rep. Mel Watt's 12th district) put the visit and art on the front page, except for Greensboro (John Robinson's old paper). Greensboro did a centerpiece on a Whole Foods, a business with local impact and maybe local advertising.
Wilmington, down east on the coast, recently sold by the NYT, put the McClatchy "running scared" story on the front and referred inside to the visit.
The local Gaston Gazette did a visually great dance between the iPad announcement and the visit on its front page.
Shelby, a sister Freedom paper to the Gazette, used "Mr. Clean" in quotes to refer to Obama in a headline. That kinda bothers me, can't say why, except no politician can live up to that nickname.
At least two stories used in multiple places framed the visit as a sign of a recovering economy. Why I think this happens: It's an election year. The economy is recovering *for journalists* and people who do messaging. It's a media bubble, unless some of the ad revenue is invested in the media long term. No guarantee that'll happen.
AP had two different writers on the event. Why? One appeared to come from a business or energy background, so maybe that's it. The other used the line, "Some Freightliner jobs pay $24 an hour with benefits." That seems woefully misleading; I'd bet those are the jobs under the old union contract, and it's unfair to lead new job seekers into thinking they can get that kind of pay.
The Charlotte Observer and the Gazette both gave Republicans space to respond to the visit, quoting or running a prepared response.
(Caveats: All based on fronts uploaded to the Newseum, which isn't all N.C. papers.)
TV coverage general feeling: The local stations in general did a good job of going beyond pageantry. Haven't surveyed broadly, so won't unfairly give a shoutout to anyone except Jeremy Markovich of WCNC, who tweets, storifys and rocks.
Alt media: Haven't surveyed, will aim to do so later. Generally got the feeling that this was a MSM event wiithout lots of alternative access. Getting credentials and planning among the freelancers/alt folks just didn't have enough payback for this onetime deal. I bet, though, that Mary Curtis will weigh in at some point at the Post's "She the People."
The DNC convention itself, for alt media, will be quite different.
#7 Posted by Andria Krewson, CJR on Thu 8 Mar 2012 at 01:59 PM
Thanks Andria. Here's seven minutes of coverage of the president's visit from WCNC: http://www.wcnc.com/home/Mount-Holly-gets-ready-for-Presidents-Visit-141702923.html Can't speak to coverage from other TV stations, but extra points to Ben Thompson for mentioning that in 2008, Obama lost to McCain by 25 percentage points in Gaston County (where Mt. Holly is located). A hat tip as well to Dianne Gallagher for her coverage of the Republican response.
#8 Posted by Jeremy Markovich, CJR on Thu 8 Mar 2012 at 02:35 PM
So with a few exceptions you're not enthralled by what you've seen so far?
I had an occasional White House correspondent for a while (then he got a real job). Entering questions into the record seemed useful even though the responses were most often gobbledygook. I still think it's a good forum for the kinds of issues you're raising because it's not a one-off deal, like a press avail at an event--you can come back to questions and you know the history of previous responses. The institutional press correspondents there hate to look as though they have an agenda so there's a lot of stuff that they place off limits to themselves, and of course there's a lot of stuff that's simply not on the radar. They leave a good-sized niche to fill.
About poaching industries with incentives and lowball wages as a long-term solution--I don't mean to say that it's a good solution in terms of doing justice to all parties, just that it seems to have been an enduring one.
Anyway. Thanks again.
#9 Posted by Weldon Berger, CJR on Thu 8 Mar 2012 at 03:59 PM
Adding ... very much agree with your remark about the disconnect between the traveling press and economically injured citizens.
#10 Posted by Weldon Berger, CJR on Thu 8 Mar 2012 at 04:02 PM
As you note, I'm no longer at the News & Record so I have no first-hand knowledge of the front-page decision. However, were I still there, I would have done the same thing. The opening of the Whole Foods is a big deal, as is the president in Mount Holly. But the president's visit there was on the 6 p.m, 6:30 p.m., 10 p.m. and 11 p.m. news all before my paper hit the streets.
Why would I publish news that everyone has heard?
Besides, Charlotte may as well be Chicago as local as we try to be. (Oops. It's not "we" any longer. As long as "they long to be.")
Good post, Andria.
#11 Posted by John Robinson, CJR on Fri 9 Mar 2012 at 07:59 AM
Thanks, John.
So I guess that's the point: Greensboro's delivering the stories for its local audience that they wouldn't get anywhere else.
So what vehicles (and staffs) are best to tell the national politics stories when they come to North Carolina?
Also, go away, spam comments.
#12 Posted by Andria Krewson, CJR on Fri 9 Mar 2012 at 08:24 AM
Great analysis--and this is going to be the real trick for reporters wanting to cover a battleground state. The McClatchy headline was attention-grabbing at best (you had to really read down into the article to get that point, with no real serious counterpoint by the other side), but in the coming months I hope what we won't see is a lot of simplistic reporting on a very complex political environment in North Carolina. Here's hoping reporters do their deep homework before launching unnecessary and irrelevant attention-grabbing headlines.
#13 Posted by Michael Bitzer, CJR on Sun 11 Mar 2012 at 08:09 PM