Doonesbury Creator Hates Journalists Who Troll for 'Obvious or Inane' Interview Questions from Public

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By Tim Graham (Bio | Archive)
April 23, 2009 - 12:50 ET
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Garry Trudeau, the leftist author/artist of the comic strip Doonesbury, gave an interview about Twitter to the Mediabistro blog WebNewser, where he displayed his snooty distaste for "populist pandering" to the little people. When asked if any TV news stars were particularly annoying on Twitter, he unfurled a general pet peeve instead: asking for "obvious or inane" interview questions from the public. Without irony, Trudeau suggested journalists were like pilots or surgeons:

Not in particular (hey, I like TV news folks -- married one! [longtime NBC liberal Jane Pauley]), but in general the most baffling are the reporters who solicit their followers for questions before interviews. Please. You're supposed to be professionals. Do pilots and surgeons ask for suggestions?

If you can't think of a few good questions, you and your producer are in the wrong business. It's not about getting fresh, out-of-the-bubble perspectives, as they would argue: most questions sent in are obvious or inane. It's really about flattering the followers, populist pandering.

This is rich territory for Trudeau to trudge upon, considering some of Jane Pauley’s inane questions. (To Hillary Clinton, 1992: "You prepared Chelsea: Bad things may be said about Daddy. Was Chelsea at all prepared for bad things being said about Mommy?" And: "What do you not do perfectly?")

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Obviously, a media professional should have the ability and creativity to construct their own interview questions. Journalism is an important field. But no one should compare it to flying a 747 or performing brain surgery. To assume that people in the general public don’t have intelligent questions for a president or cabinet member would seem to presume that the public isn’t really wise enough to cast an intelligent vote.

Elitist liberal, thy name is Garry Trudeau.

[Image borrowed from About.com: Political Humor]

—Tim Graham is Director of Media Analysis at the Media Research Center.


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Not Elitist, But Media is Stupid

April 23, 2009 - 12:58 ET by Mitchell Blatt

I'm a journalism major, and I don't think journalists should have to ask for advice on what kind of questions to ask.

The problem is that journalists could use advice, because their favorite questions to Obama are about what it was like growing up in Hawaii and how he feels about racism, and that kind of stuff.  So Trudeau is right that journalists too often ask obvious or inane questions, but most of the time it's because of their own incompetence.

 

EDIT: This is not to say either that the public doesn't often have good questions for politicians, but a good journalist has a feel for the public vibe, not just the liberal vibe.

 "Elitist liberal, thy

April 23, 2009 - 15:07 ET by Chris Norman

 "Elitist liberal, thy name is Garry Trudeau"

1970s/early 1980s relevance, thy name is Garry Trudeau.

 

The "Mainstream" Media: By liberals. For liberals.

Words of wisdom

April 23, 2009 - 16:25 ET by zoro7957

.............from a man living his life vicariously through a cartoon strip..........

Trudeau -- the oldest "ho" on the block

April 23, 2009 - 18:23 ET by lgeubank

Do newspapers still publish Trudeau? He has acquired the status of the oldest ho on the block; still peddling his tired old wares, still selling out himself and any pretense of humor to his lefty-liberal pseudo-religion. He gets more disgusting and irrelevant as time goes by.

Trudeau doesn't associate LBJ w/ Vietnam

April 23, 2009 - 18:39 ET by Gary Hall

From an interview in a CA local a few years back:

Question: I’ve grown up with every president since JFK. I remember how froth-at-the-mouth furious Nixon made people; and there was Reagan, who had people pulling out their hair. But compared to George W. Bush, Nixon and Reagan seem like wise men, even sages. But how do you see it? From your perspective, who is the scariest? And how do you keep yourself from getting so sputtering mad that you can’t be funny? Is that tough?

 Answer [Trudeau] Well, you can’t leave Carter and Clinton off the list of presidents who made people apoplectic. But to me, Bush is the scariest because he is easily the most radical. Nixon still caused the most harm — 30,000 Americans and many more Vietnamese died needlessly on his watch — but don’t count Bush out. There are still plenty of countries to take down.

Just for the record.. In the Vietman War, which is LBJ's war, 36,000 American servicemen died in Vietnam during the LBJ escalation of the war. 20,863 died between the time Nixon took over and the end of the war. 

Gary Trudeau - a man of nothing.

Gary... While it's

April 23, 2009 - 19:11 ET by Jer

Gary...

While it's certainly fair to call Vietnam Johnson's War [although his three predecessors also had a hand in its origin], by the end of his term public support for our continued involvement had eroded to the point that a.) Johnson declined another run for the presidency and b.) announced the initiation of peace negotiations with the North Vietnamese.

Richard Nixon was elected on the basis of his pledge to end the war ["via a secret plan"], and in the view of many the protraction of the conflict for several more years resulted in tens of thousands of American casualties which could have been avoided by an earlier withdrawal.  Accordingly, Vietnam was, with some justification, transformed into "Nixon's War".

Jer

Jer Why is the Left Opposed to American Victory?

April 23, 2009 - 21:51 ET by upcountrywater

Cut off funding to Viet Nam

Reagan VS 0bama

Jer.. on Vietnam

April 23, 2009 - 22:15 ET by Gary Hall

Jer.. you're taking way too many liberties here.

Johnson took us from something in the area of 10,000 advisors (that's the official version +/-) to around 536,000 troops by 1968. Nixon ran a platform of ending the war. In November of 1969 President Nixon announced his policy of "Vietnamisation", meaning that American ground troops would be gradually withdrawn and South Vietnamese troops would take their place.

In 1972 Nixon announced that troops would be reduced to 69,000.

The rest is history.

In regards to your other point - for goodness sakes, you could call it French's war, for that matter.

My point here was about Garry Trudeau, and the fact, that like so very many on the left side of the isle, they are able to rewrite any aspect of history to fit their radical agenda without any fear of being caught by the national mainstream media. Trudeau either lied, or is an ignorant idiot. Take your pick. The media could care less - as long as Nixon is made out to be the worser of the two. It did not have to be Nixon - the MSM is happy any time they can make a Republican out to look worse than any Democrat. Truth has no bearing.

Nixon did end the war. It was ugly.

OK?

(;~/  Gary

Gary...you & the Pesky Facts

April 23, 2009 - 22:27 ET by Blonde

Not to mention LBJ and his weekly Tuesday lunch selecting bombing targets.

Micromanaging at it's very worst.

Kind of like Obama, and the pirate thing.  I've received a few e-mails about that....it will be interesting to hear the truth of the matter....if what I am hearing is true, The Cowardly Lion has nothing on the O.  Time will tell...but these stories always get out.

 

 

I hope he fails, too.

 

 

Well, Gary, calling it the

April 23, 2009 - 22:34 ET by Jer

Well, Gary, calling it the French War wouldn't be inappropriate in the proper historical context.  Of course, the Truman administration and subsequently the Eisenhower administration were underwriting the French military in Indochina to the tune of about 80% leading up to its defeat at Dien ben Phu [sp?] in 1954.

Otherwise, I generally agree with your comments.  Unsurprisingly, Trudeau, as an unabashed liberal, is somewhat naturally inclined to view Nixon as the more villainous.

Jer

Dooms Bury ~ Hmmmm what a has been.

April 23, 2009 - 20:48 ET by pahuber

Forever more.

Garry Trudeau is still alive?

April 23, 2009 - 20:58 ET by R D Helm

Funny, I thought he was as dead as his cartoon strip.

No joke.

-Dave

This coup has gone on long enough. The time to put it down is NOW.

It's Still The Best Written Comic Strip Out There,,,

April 23, 2009 - 21:39 ET by The7Sticks

...along with Pearls Before Swine, Get Fuzzy and Zippy The Pinhead. As for Blondie, I usually cut that out and feed it to the dog along with a side helping of Family Circus and some Mary Worth for dessert. Then I let him use Garfield for his private needs. Mainly to masturbate to it.

I'm kidding, the dog's neutered and he just poops on Garfield. Yeah, like a dog can masturbate. Well, maybe Brian. Who's leg do you have to hump to get a dry martini around here?

Sad...Trudeau is about as

April 23, 2009 - 21:51 ET by RR GOP

Sad...Trudeau is about as relevent and edgy as the Michael "Meathead" Stivic character on All In the Family....hmmm, or even Maude I guess...

Funny that these types lambaste Conservatives for 'living in the past' but they themselves are actually the most pathetically, psychotically, and irrationally tied to their salad days of long ago.

One of the 34% who thinks George W. Bush was a great President. One of the 61% who wants to bring back the stock and pillory (yep...approval for Congress now at 39%...do you believe that!?).