Kathianne
02-10-2016, 06:44 AM
Really, she's beyond Nixonian:
http://gawker.com/this-is-how-hillary-clinton-gets-the-coverage-she-wants-1758019058
This Is How Hillary Clinton Gets the Coverage She Wants (http://gawker.com/this-is-how-hillary-clinton-gets-the-coverage-she-wants-1758019058)
Hillary Clinton’s supporters often argue (http://www.salon.com/2016/01/25/lena_dunham_slams_media_for_rabidly_sexist_coverag e_of_hillary_clinton/)that mainstream (http://thinkprogress.org/politics/2015/04/10/3645639/will-media-coverage-hillary-clinton-just-sexist-time-around/)political reporters (http://mediamatters.org/blog/2016/02/08/clinton-coverage-goes-off-the-rails-again/208433) are incapable of covering her positively—or even fairly. While it may be true that the political press doesn’t always write exactly what Clinton would like, emails recently obtained by Gawker offer a case study in how her prodigious and sophisticated press operation manipulates reporters into amplifying her desired message—in this case, down to the very word that The Atlantic’s Marc Ambinder used to describe an important policy speech.
The emails in question (https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/2707953-Marc-Ambinder-Philippe-Reines-Emails.html), which were exchanged by Ambinder, then serving as TheAtlantic’s politics editor (http://www.businessinsider.com/the-atlantics-popular-politics-editor-marc-ambinder-is-headed-to-the-national-journal-2010-8), and Philippe Reines, Clinton’s notoriously combative spokesman and consigliere, turned up thanks to a Freedom of Information Act request we filed in 2012 (and which we are currently suing the State Department (http://politburo.gawker.com/gawker-v-department-of-state-1691327528)over). The same request previously revealed that Politico’s chief White House correspondent, Mike Allen, promised to deliver (http://gawker.com/emails-show-politico-s-mike-allen-promised-positive-cov-1744201426) positive coverage of Chelsea Clinton, and, in a separate exchange, permitted Reines to ghost-write an item about the State Department (http://gawker.com/emails-top-clinton-aide-secretly-wrote-item-for-mike-a-1757323650#_ga=1.206556059.906054481.1454075687) for Politico’s Playbook newsletter. Ambinder’s emails with Reines demonstrate the same kind of transactional reporting, albeit to a much more legible degree: In them, you can see Reines “blackmailing” Ambinder into describing a Clinton speech as “muscular” in exchange for early access to the transcript. In other words, Ambinder outsourced his editorial judgment about the speech to a member of Clinton’s own staff.
On the morning of July 15, 2009, Ambinder sent Reines a blank email (https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/2704594-January-31-Reines-Emails.html#document/p924) with the subject line, “Do you have a copy of HRC’s speech to share?” His question concerned a speech Clinton planned to give later that day (http://www.cfr.org/diplomacy-and-statecraft/conversation-us-secretary-state-hillary-rodham-clinton/p34589) at the Washington, D.C. office of the Council on Foreign Relations, an influential think tank. Three minutes after Ambinder’s initial email, Reines replied with three words: “on two conditions.” After Ambinder responded with “ok,” Reines sent him a list of those conditions:
From: [Philippe Reines]
Sent: Wednesday, July 15 2009 10:06 AM
To: Ambinder, Marc
Subject: Re: Do you have a copy of HRC’s speech to share?
3 [conditions] actually
1) You in your own voice describe them as “muscular”
2) You note that a look at the CFR seating plan shows that all the envoys — from Holbrooke to Mitchell to Ross — will be arrayed in front of her, which in your own clever way you can say certainly not a coincidence and meant to convey something
3) You don’t say you were blackmailed!
One minute later, Ambinder responded:
From: Ambinder, Marc
Sent: Wednesday, July 15, 2009 10:07 AM
To: Philippe Reines
Subject: RE: Do you have a copy of HRC’s speech to share?
got it
Ambinder made good on his word. The opening paragraph of the article he wrote later that day, under the headline “Hillary Clinton’s ‘Smart Power’ Breaks Through (http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2009/07/hillary-clintons-smart-power-breaks-through/21344/),” precisely followed Reines’ instructions:
...
http://gawker.com/this-is-how-hillary-clinton-gets-the-coverage-she-wants-1758019058
This Is How Hillary Clinton Gets the Coverage She Wants (http://gawker.com/this-is-how-hillary-clinton-gets-the-coverage-she-wants-1758019058)
Hillary Clinton’s supporters often argue (http://www.salon.com/2016/01/25/lena_dunham_slams_media_for_rabidly_sexist_coverag e_of_hillary_clinton/)that mainstream (http://thinkprogress.org/politics/2015/04/10/3645639/will-media-coverage-hillary-clinton-just-sexist-time-around/)political reporters (http://mediamatters.org/blog/2016/02/08/clinton-coverage-goes-off-the-rails-again/208433) are incapable of covering her positively—or even fairly. While it may be true that the political press doesn’t always write exactly what Clinton would like, emails recently obtained by Gawker offer a case study in how her prodigious and sophisticated press operation manipulates reporters into amplifying her desired message—in this case, down to the very word that The Atlantic’s Marc Ambinder used to describe an important policy speech.
The emails in question (https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/2707953-Marc-Ambinder-Philippe-Reines-Emails.html), which were exchanged by Ambinder, then serving as TheAtlantic’s politics editor (http://www.businessinsider.com/the-atlantics-popular-politics-editor-marc-ambinder-is-headed-to-the-national-journal-2010-8), and Philippe Reines, Clinton’s notoriously combative spokesman and consigliere, turned up thanks to a Freedom of Information Act request we filed in 2012 (and which we are currently suing the State Department (http://politburo.gawker.com/gawker-v-department-of-state-1691327528)over). The same request previously revealed that Politico’s chief White House correspondent, Mike Allen, promised to deliver (http://gawker.com/emails-show-politico-s-mike-allen-promised-positive-cov-1744201426) positive coverage of Chelsea Clinton, and, in a separate exchange, permitted Reines to ghost-write an item about the State Department (http://gawker.com/emails-top-clinton-aide-secretly-wrote-item-for-mike-a-1757323650#_ga=1.206556059.906054481.1454075687) for Politico’s Playbook newsletter. Ambinder’s emails with Reines demonstrate the same kind of transactional reporting, albeit to a much more legible degree: In them, you can see Reines “blackmailing” Ambinder into describing a Clinton speech as “muscular” in exchange for early access to the transcript. In other words, Ambinder outsourced his editorial judgment about the speech to a member of Clinton’s own staff.
On the morning of July 15, 2009, Ambinder sent Reines a blank email (https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/2704594-January-31-Reines-Emails.html#document/p924) with the subject line, “Do you have a copy of HRC’s speech to share?” His question concerned a speech Clinton planned to give later that day (http://www.cfr.org/diplomacy-and-statecraft/conversation-us-secretary-state-hillary-rodham-clinton/p34589) at the Washington, D.C. office of the Council on Foreign Relations, an influential think tank. Three minutes after Ambinder’s initial email, Reines replied with three words: “on two conditions.” After Ambinder responded with “ok,” Reines sent him a list of those conditions:
From: [Philippe Reines]
Sent: Wednesday, July 15 2009 10:06 AM
To: Ambinder, Marc
Subject: Re: Do you have a copy of HRC’s speech to share?
3 [conditions] actually
1) You in your own voice describe them as “muscular”
2) You note that a look at the CFR seating plan shows that all the envoys — from Holbrooke to Mitchell to Ross — will be arrayed in front of her, which in your own clever way you can say certainly not a coincidence and meant to convey something
3) You don’t say you were blackmailed!
One minute later, Ambinder responded:
From: Ambinder, Marc
Sent: Wednesday, July 15, 2009 10:07 AM
To: Philippe Reines
Subject: RE: Do you have a copy of HRC’s speech to share?
got it
Ambinder made good on his word. The opening paragraph of the article he wrote later that day, under the headline “Hillary Clinton’s ‘Smart Power’ Breaks Through (http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2009/07/hillary-clintons-smart-power-breaks-through/21344/),” precisely followed Reines’ instructions:
...