Did humor save the left at its darkest hour?
How did Stephen Colbert become a progressive political force? Theodore Hamm discusses "The New Blue Media," the rise of netroots and their role in the next administration.
By Charly Wilder
Read more: Democratic Party, Books, Satire, Michael Moore, Politics, Interviews, The Onion, Jon Stewart, Authors, Books Interviews, Daily Kos, Stephen Colbert
From "The New Blue Media"
May 30, 2008 | When future historians write of the long months between the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, there will most likely be a chapter about the overwhelming failure of the mainstream political media to properly question the Bush administration during the buildup to a failed war. Journalists who should have acted as government watchdogs instead acted largely as yes men, spuriously debating what should be done about Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction.
In that recriminatory chapter, there will likely be a section about the exceptions: left-leaning, often satirical media outlets like "The Daily Show" and the Onion, whose headlines in the run-up to the invasion included "Bush Won't Stop Asking Cheney if We Can Invade Yet" and "Bush Seeks U.N. Support for 'U.S. Does Whatever It Wants Plan.'" These exceptions are the focus of
Salon spoke to Hamm about the emergence and growing influence of these media outlets and about the future of progressive political discourse.
In "The New Blue Media" you chart the emergence of media entities like the Onion, Air America, Michael Moore, liberal bloggers, "The Daily Show" and "The Colbert Report." Other than the fact that they are all left-leaning, what makes them a cohesive group or phenomenon?
The project actually originated in the campaign that most of us would like to forget, 2004. The netroots -- MoveOn and the blogosphere, which was still kind of young at that time -- had essentially backed Howard Dean, but then when Dean imploded and John Kerry became the electable nominee, pretty much everyone on the liberal-leaning left rallied to support him. MoveOn, Michael Moore, Air America, when it was launched in 2004 -- they were all kind of joining together, sometimes directly at particular events, or by appearing on each other's shows and by doing other kinds of cross-promotions, and so there was a constellation of different new media outlets that were pushing Kerry in 2004.
In the section on Air America, you mention that certain corporations like McDonald's and Hewlett Packard refused to advertise with the network, and you suggest that corporate pressure could be a possible danger for progressive media outlets aspiring to reach the levels of commercial success attained by right-wing media figures, such as Rush Limbaugh and Bill O'Reilly. I wonder if you think the failure of Air America has more to do with the fact it was on the left or with the way it delivered those leftist views?
I think the reason it failed was because of its business model, trying to start as a national network, rather than starting with syndicated programming. And had it retained some of the attempts at comedy, that might have made it more appealing as well. They were also delivering the same kind of mush that was being put forth by Kerry and the Democrats in 2004. Air America didn't really create anything that new or independent, and then it wasn't entertaining, at the same time.
I was interested to read just how entrenched the Clinton camp was in the early development of Air America and in Al Franken's other projects.
Sure, and that put the network so clearly in tandem with the Democratic Party that they weren't really offering anything independent. And you know, you see that on the right. Limbaugh and company obviously are in alignment with the Republican Party, but they also depart on issues that they hold dear -- immigration and so on. There was a spirit of independence lacking in Air America.
And you see that spirit of independence more in the netroots movement. Can you explain what you mean by netroots?
The netroots are the grass roots of the Democratic Party that are organized online, the Internet-based activism that started with MoveOn and mydd.org [now mydd.com] and some of the early blogs, like Daily Kos. The netroots have maintained a spirit of independence, but it fluctuates there as well.
In some ways, the netroots seem sort of like the progressive or left-wing answer to what the Republicans and the Christian Coalition did in the 1980s. That kind of grass-roots politics has been echoed on the Web.
Yeah, and it's starting to happen on the right, but up until this current campaign, it's still been liberal terrain or left-leaning terrain. There are definitely influential right-wing Web sites -- I wouldn't really define the Drudge Report as a blog -- but in terms of organizing and activism, the left still holds the advantage. The netroots are media watchdogs too. They counter the right-wing noise machine. They are challenging the mainstream political media, and when they are challenging the Democratic Party, which obviously needs to be challenged on Iraq and many other issues, that is when they are most effective.
It is ironic, then, that the outlet you find to be the most successful as a media watchdog is the one that has become the most mainstream: "The Daily Show." How is it that "The Daily Show" and "The Colbert Report" have become such huge phenomena but have still kept to what you see as the spirit of the "new blue media"?
Because they are asking the questions that the mainstream political media won't. They are best seen as ongoing works of media criticism. The very fact that Colbert playing a faux Bill O'Reilly now wields nearly as much influence throughout the political media as the actual Bill O'Reilly shows that there has begun to be a successful counter-attack against the right-wing noise machine.
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