Tom Brokaw was in town last month, promoting his latest book, "The Time of Our Lives." He spoke at Westminster Presbyterian Church in downtown Minneapolis (11/8), as part of their Town Hall Forum series. It was standing room only, which he said would please his mother turning 94 soon. She envisioned him standing in a pulpit before a full congregation he said. It was a good if folksy kind of revue, including his personal memories of riding the train from Yankton, South Dakota into the Milwaukee Road depot. Brokaw has some of the late Paul Harvey's ability to spin American tales.
Walking up Nicollet Mall afterward, an older woman remarked to me that she wasn't very impressed. "Don't tell me there's another Republican here at Westminster," I (a member of Westminster) quipped. "He's the Republican," she harumphed as she hopped a bus. This little exchange beautifully illustrated Jonah Goldberg's point in his latest piece in The Los Angeles Times: Blame it on Brokaw.
In looking for culprits for today's terrible tone in American politics, you can start with 'voice of God' news anchors such as Tom Brokaw.
For as Brokaw clings to his old media formulas, that reassuring tone cannot hide the contrast with new media, left or right. We - on both sides - now hear the points not raised, the questions not asked, the stories not released. We see the factual errors, unfounded assumptions and the faulty reasoning. We learned too late that, regarding Vietnam for example, fellow evening news deity Walter Cronkite didn't exactly tell it like it was.
[Blaming] the new media environment for what ails us is an awfully convenient alibi. It suggests that the old media, of which Brokaw was a master of the universe, played no part in losing the trust of so many Americans.
Brokaw would have us go placidly amid the noise and haste as he has. That won't play in Peoria any more.
