A Failure to Communicate
I have watched many politicians from both sides of the aisle handle media interviews these days, and they’ve turned not answering media questions into an art form. It’s almost as it they are trained to respond to reporter’s question with the answer they want to give.” That sounds good, but the problem is, if you don’t answer the question you look evasive.
During the 2024 presidential campaign Kamala Harris was ask to outline “one or two specific things” she would do to fulfill her pledge of “bringing down prices and making life more affordable for people.” She went on a two-minute tangent about how she was “a middle-class kid” who grew up in a community of construction workers, nurses and teachers who were “very proud of their lawn.” She recounted her mother’s saving to buy her family’s first house. She paid tribute to a neighbor who became a surrogate parent. She praised the “beautiful character” of the American people.
After two minutes, she finally got around to answering the question but had probably lost the audience she was speaking to.
Two weeks ago at the Republican get together at Trump’s hotel in Florida, President Trump was bloviating about how much money he had raised for the republican party. He asked Mike Johnson, the current Speaker of the House and a group of the gathered republican cult if he could use this money to run for President again. Now, the answer to this question is simple, no, you can’t Mister President. Yet, not one republican in the room would answer, they all laughed. The all know what the US Constitution says but they didn’t want to offend their cult leader.
Last week, when President Trump floated the idea of America taking over Gaza and turning it into a resort, I started watching the news and reporters were asking the republican senators in the hallways what they thought of this idea. Now, again, the answer is pretty simple and once again these senators tapped danced around the issue and refused to answer the questions directly. Spineless to the end!
Just because!
Of course, the question remains, “Why do politicians answer in this fashion”? The answer is because they can.
Media conferences are tightly controlled. Most reporters only get to ask one question. The politician knows that and quickly finds out there’s no downside to giving a word salad answer. In other words, there are no consequences for dodging a tough question.
There also appears to be a shortage of good & experienced reporters in the press today. It seems to me that journalist of the past were a lot tougher than they are today. They were not afraid to challenge these folks with tough questions.
People today know more about their local sports personalities than they do their local representatives. Fewer people watch the news or read a newspaper. Another reason politicians can get away with their canned responses.
Another factor is today’s political landscape is, politicians can give whatever BS they want and their supporters will look the other way and blame the media for asking questions that shouldn’t be asked.
Today’s modern political strategy is that candidates should answer the questions they want to, not the ones that are asked. It would seem to me that not answering a question from a journalist means you have something to hide. I would like to say you can make them pay at the ballot box, but since everyone does it, refusing to answer questions from reporters is no longer a difference maker.