The Control Room: How Television Calls the Shots in Presidential Elections
Author: Martin Plissner
Who will determine what Americans are thinking when they cast their votes in the year 2000?
Martin Plissner, former political director of CBS News, has played a central role in the network coverage of every presidential campaign since 1964. In The Control Room, he shows how all the elements of our nation's greatest contest -- the primaries, the conventions, the counting of the ballots --are shaped by the networks' struggle for supremacy in today's media-intensive age. From the earliest announcements to the final swearing-in, those inside the control rooms determine what Americans care about when they enter the polling booths and whom the country ultimately sends to the Oval Office.
Publishers Weekly
Plissner, the former executive political director of CBS News, offers a spirited, if not entirely persuasive defense of how network news organizations cover presidential elections. Beginning in 1952, the first year that TV reporters roamed the floor at the Republican and Democratic conventions, Plissner traces the growing influence of the men in the network control rooms. Though he quickly dismisses the notion that TV producers and reporters form "a small and unelected elite," he acknowledges some of the dismaying byproducts of TV news coverage: feeding frenzies in New Hampshire and Iowa, nominating conventions with second-by-second scripts, obsessive polling to track the presidential "horse race." But these trends don't really seem to bother him, and he offers a weak defense of the tenor of campaign coverage: networks cover the horse race because it is "the only thing a good many viewers want to know in the first place." Plissner does better when he sticks to anecdotal evidence, as when he recounts the backstage maneuvering that led to Dan Rather's explosive 1988 interview with George Bush, in which Bush finally snapped: "How would you like it if I judged your career by those seven minutes when you walked off the set in New York?" At such points, the book is gripping. Ultimately, however, Plissner never goes beyond engaging eyewitness accounts to offer meaningful analysis of how the networks cover campaigns. He should have taken off the gloves and cast a more critical eye on his own profession. (May)
Library Journal
Plissner, the recently retired political director of CBS News, examines the role of television networks in transforming presidential elections. He argues that, given the pursuit of ratings (and the financial rewards that follow), campaigns have become almost exclusively creations of and responses to the demands of the networks. Lacing his narrative with inside stories and personal anecdotes, Plissner disputes theories of political bias in the news, arguing instead that while the "men and women who call the shots at the network news divisions do have an agenda," it is not to propagandize in favor of one party but to attract "the largest possible viewership at the lowest possible cost." On the proper relationship of the press to politics, Plissner says, "Prove all things, hold fast to that which is good." Admirable words but difficult to achieve--especially given the high stakes of the television ratings game. An elegant, persuasive book.--Michael A. Genovese, Loyola Marymount Univ., Los Angeles
Kirkus Reviews
A CBS veteran's look at television coverage of presidential elections is more entertaining than reflective. As executive political director of CBS News, Plissner (now retired) was in a very good position to observe the impact of television on politics. While he concedes that impact has been major—no surprise there—he argues that those on the political left and right "who worry about this worry too much." Employing his insider's perspective to unveil the factors that determined what went on the air, Plissner offers a pastiche of media history, first-person accounts, and second-hand reporting very much in the television tradition of "just the highlights, please." Nevertheless, these snippets are revealing as well as amusing, effectively portraying television's coverage over the years of party conventions, the election-night race to call the winner, election-year polling, presidential debates, and the nightly news. The competition among networks is always at the forefront, with only the financial bean-counters reining in efforts to score journalistic coups and come out on top in the ratings. We also see a progression in the relationship between the media and politicians. Party conventions, for example, initially involved gavel-to-gavel coverage, which produced conventions increasingly managed for television consumption, which resulted in boring conventions that receive decreased coverage because there is no news. This example suggests a problem with Plissner's belief that we need not worry about the medium's impact on politics. Even granting his contention that television's election-coverage agenda is commercial rather than political, the reader may still wonder why the authorbelieves media bias is therefore benign. Indeed, the idea that television's power is wielded without regard to its considerable political impact is most discomfiting; more introspection on this thorny subject would have been comforting. Not a book to pick up for insightful analysis, but the stories will amuse most readers.
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The Occupation: War and Resistance in Iraq
Author: Patrick Cockburn
A National Book Critics' Circle Award Finalist: A compelling, masterly portrait of a country ravaged by foreign occupation.
In March 2003, Patrick Cockburn traveled secretly to Iraq just before the invasion, and has covered the war from inside the country ever since. In this devastating, courageous and highly acclaimed book, he describes the fighting on the ground as Saddam's armies collapsed, the looting of Baghdad, the many failures of the US occupation, the springs of the resistance and how it turned into a full-scale uprising, and the country's collapse into civil war. In this new edition, brought completely up to date in a new chapter, Cockburn explores the impact of the "surge" of US forces into the country. Book of the Year for 2006 in the Guardian, Observer, Evening Standard, Mail on Sunday and Glasgow Herald.
The New York Times - Barry Gewen
Patrick Cockburn, now a correspondent for The Independent of London…knows the Middle East well. He has reported from Tehran and Lebanon, lived in Israel, and been visiting Iraq since 1978. His eye for the telling detail lifts The Occupation above the usual journalist's account of the Iraq war.
Library Journal
This is a lively and highly informative book on the American war in Iraq and the follies of occupation. Veteran journalist Cockburn (Middle East correspondent, the Independent) has been visiting Iraq for almost three decades and has written probing reports on the country. Out of the Ashes: The Resurrection of Saddam Hussein, which he coauthored with his brother, Andrew Cockburn, remains one of the best journalistic accounts of Saddam Hussein's rejuvenation as a political leader in the aftermath of the first Gulf War. Cockburn's latest book takes the reader through the often bewildering array of forces and personalities that are shaping developments in post-Saddam Iraq and makes them comprehensible to Western readers. The author was in Iraq when U.S. forces invaded that country and toppled its regime. Cockburn's account of the evolving conflict, the emergence of the resistance movement, the increasingly sectarian nature of the conflict, and the jockeying for power among the Shia, Sunni, and Kurdish communities is informed by his keen personal observations and understanding of the complexities and horrors of daily life in Iraq. Highly recommended for both public and academic libraries.-Nader Entessar, Univ. of South Alabama, Mobile Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.
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