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President Barack Obamaâs hundredth day in office is approaching, and, as Howard Kurtz wrote on Friday (a.k.a. Day 95), itâs time to âget ready for all kinds of ephemeral verdicts that will inevitably be washed away by the tide of history.â
The media have been ready for weeks. There have been slide shows (showcasing the skills of White House photographer Pete Souza), lists, glossy âspecial editionâ magazines, and expert opinions galore. On Wednesday (The Big Day!), the merry media will cover Obamaâs press conference. It is, quoting White House senior advisor David Axelrod, a âHallmark holiday.â Itâs Bo, with a semblance of seriousness. Itâs campaign frenzy, grafted onto a new presidency.
Thereâs no real reason why one hundred days should be the marker for reflection on the presidency. Minus its place in historic tradition, the hundred-day marker, with its intrinsically celebratory or judgmental coverage, is completely arbitrary. (Joe Klein didnât have to wait until now to write, cleverly but glibly, âBarack Obama doesnât do much poetry anymore.â) And as Kurtz and others have pointed out, itâs far too soon to yell âSuccess!â or âFailure!â and any attempt to do so will appear premature.
But, for better or for worse, the â100 daysâ marker exists, and isnât going to go away. (We can say that the media should stop caring about the first hundred days, but the media won’t stop caring about the first hundred days. It’s a theme that’s too big to fail.) So we might as well take stock of where we are. Tempered reflectionâa good-faith assessment of what the administration and Congress have accomplished, of what has been put on the table (vs. what has been temporarily pushed off) and how those things are currently holding up under (admittedly short-view) scrutinyâis still a good thing. Coverage that’s smart, substantial and fair, reporting style and image only as they relate to substance, can still be valuable.
Now, itâs true that the Obama administration, recognizing a media circus when it sees one, has smoothly and coolly hijacked the 100-day train and decided to put its primary spokesmanâObama himselfâfront and center, knowing the crowds will come; thatâs the smartly self-aware storyline that both The New York Times and Politico have emphasized. But an inordinate focus on the Obama folksâs PR skills (a given by now) leaves less room for substantive and rational assessments of the administrationâs actions. Just because the White House chooses to engage in skilled image-making in the lead-up to Wednesday (an official photo release, the press conference, the casual remarks from staffers downplaying the significance of the event), doesnât mean that reporters canât still assess what has been accomplished.
After all, itâs important to note that while governance isnât a race, the past hundred days have seen plenty of swift and decisive executive action. Itâs not ridiculous to judge Obama on what he has done so far.
But in doing so, perhaps the press can take the hundred-day mark, swivel the spotlight, which seems trained on Obama-the-person-who-could-maybe-might-do-it-all, and turn it onto the issues themselvesâthe budget, the stimulus, the oversight, the transparency decisions, Ledbetter, where we are on health care and energy. It may be virtually impossible to avoid celebrating, judging, or shooting down the mesmerizing cult of personality that has driven so much Obama coverageâthe can he do it all, can he be post-partisan, will he disappoint lines of thoughtâbut this is one situation wherein sober, understated reporting on the facts more than the person, may yield the most helpful, and least bait-driven, results.
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