ON DEADLINE: Flaying media nothing new in politics

Amid the relics of a career in political reporting I have a campaign pin that reads "Eastern Liberal Press," a gibe meant as an accusation. I got it 44 years ago.

John McCain's campaign officials reached into a well-worn political playbook to denounce the media in their version of that Republican standby.

They are doing it with a twist. Tee up a rumor from the Internet blogs or the supermarket tabloids, call just enough attention to it to push it on responsible journalists, then denounce the news media for dealing in rumor and personal matters. That way they could eclipse valid reporting and questions about vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin's record in politics.

The Democrats, too, have been trying to punish coverage they didn't like, using the Internet and e-mail to do their own press bashing by deluging critical appraisals with electronic insults.

This year's GOP tactics are tinged with irony because McCain made his name and his earlier campaigns in the media, once bantering that political reporters were part of his base. He was a regular on TV talk shows, the all-but-guaranteed guest when a producer needed one. He's made a record 13 appearances on "The Daily Show" with Jon Stewart, Comedy Central's sarcastic, often savage, take on politics. But this month, he canceled an interview on "Larry King Live" to punish CNN for harsh questions about Palin's foreign policy experience.

As a political reporter who was being growled at by conservatives nearly 50 years ago, I watch all this with both amusement and concern. It reminds me of my earliest campaigns, when Richard Nixon thought that reporters were kicking him around and when some people in Barry Goldwater's camp dealt with us like enemies they had to tolerate. That's where I got the liberal press badge. Goldwater himself didn't believe it; he told me that I'd always reported fairly on him. But he used it, denouncing the press on his campaign stages because it was guaranteed to stir up the crowds.

It still works. Instead of the press, the target now is the media, a term elastic enough to be stretched from ideologically driven bloggers to supermarket tabloids to major newspapers and television networks.

Steve Schmidt, McCain's senior strategist, used the ploy with a reverse twist at the Republican convention to accuse the news media of dealing in gossip, innuendo and personal matters about Palin, Alaska's governor.

In the process, the McCain camp has promoted rumors which, in another era, would not have made print or serious TV reporting. Standard procedure then was for the campaign involved to ignore such stuff, knowing that to address or deny it would only draw unwanted attention. But when a supermarket tabloid produced a vague and undocumented story that Palin once had an affair, Schmidt issued a news release threatening to sue - and guaranteeing that there would be at least brief mention of the story in mainstream media. Then he attacked them.

It was not the news media that first reported that Palin's unmarried, 17-year-old daughter was pregnant. It was the McCain campaign, blaming its own disclosure on Internet rumors that Palin's youngest child actually was her daughter's baby. The timing of that news release, on opening day of the Republican convention, made certain that it would draw maximum coverage.

So it did, and Schmidt then denounced all the personal matters as a "faux media scandal."

The Democrats aren't as good at the game because they haven't been playing it as long and in part because they were supposed to be the beneficiaries of a liberal bias in the news media. This time, they are quicker to take offense and go on the attack at reporting and analysis that raise problems for them. The Obama campaign has been known to freeze out news organizations that produced copy not to their liking. Their bloggers sometimes stir up protests and dump them in Internet streams.

But the Republicans are the pros. When President Eisenhower denounced "sensation-seeking columnists and commentators" at the 1964 GOP convention, delegates jeered and shook their fists toward the press stands. The legendary Peter Lisagor of the Chicago Daily News said they might be placated by a sacrifice from a conservative newspaper. "Throw them somebody from the Chicago Tribune," he cried.

There was an echo of that night when Palin said in St. Paul, Minn., last week that she didn't care what the elite media thought of her because she wasn't going to cater to them anyhow. That set delegates to chanting and gesturing toward the press section. "Tell the truth," delegates shouted.

They'd already been warmed up by performers like former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, who said personal questions about Palin were "really indecent." And Fred Thompson, the former Tennessee senator, who said the Palin nomination put "the other side and their friends in the media in a state of panic."

Actually, it put political reporters into a state of questioning, looking into the career and the record of an unknown nominee. That's their job.

There were television talkers who validated some GOP complaints by questioning how Palin, mother of five, could care for her family and run for vice president. It came largely from female commentators, all working women, some with children of their own. Hypocrisy like that arms the attackers.

Like McCain campaign manager Eric Davis, who denounced "a cycle of piranhas called the news media."

There'll be more of this, on both sides. And if it inhibits questioning reporters, the media bashers will have done their work.

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EDITOR'S NOTE - Walter R. Mears has reported on national politics for The Associated Press since 1960.