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Who's Afraid of Jake Tapper?
Courtesy of ABC
ABC's tenacious reporter is already proving to be the new star of the White House press pack.
Last night’s prime-time presidential address may have been like prom to the White House press corps, but every high-schooler knows that reputations are made in the schoolyard. And for the freshman class of 44, the first skirmish happened last Thursday in the White House briefing room between presidential Press Secretary Robert Gibbs and ABC’s Jake Tapper.
Tapper, the network’s ambitious, telegenic Senior White House Correspondent, has made a name for himself as a tough questioner, but last Thursday, Tapper’s tenacity didn’t just get the story—it became the story, in a sudden, testy exchange with Gibbs that was instantly snapped up by blogs, posted on YouTube and rebroadcast for good measure on Fox News’ Hannity.
It was the first tense—dare I say hostile?—media moment of the Obama administration
Tapper had asked Gibbs about getting copies of ethics disclosure forms for Cabinet nominees—a reasonable question, asked with a bit of a jab: “Based on listening to the president’s rhetoric, I’m sure this is something he would want to do.” Retorted Gibbs: “Well, knowing of your crystal clarity on his opinion, I’ll certainly check.” Oh, snap! And it was on:
Tapper: He doesn't believe in transparency?
Gibbs: Did you have another more-pertinent question?
Tapper: I think that's fairly pertinent to your Cabinet nominees and whether not they pay their taxes and whether not they have speaking fees with all sorts of industries you are supposed to regulate, I think that’s fairly pertinent, you don’t?
Ouch.
Tapper won that point—we’ve seen just how pertinent it is to Cabinet nominees that they pay their taxes—but with it came something else: the title of Briefing Room Badass.
On Twitter, the audience was divided: “Tapper humiliates White House spokesman over transparency”… “ABC's Jake Tapper looked like a jerk today”… “I love Jake Tapper: He's easily the least in-the-tank reporter I've seen in a long time”… “Is Jake Tapper hoping to move to Fox News? He has good questions, but the sneering contempt is over the top. Why not save the editorial tone?” Veteran D.C. smartass Ana Marie Cox even enshrined the moment on her Twitter as a faux-pickup line: "I wanna be on you like Tapper on Gibbs."
Whatever side you’re on, it was clear that moment had meant something: It was the first tense—dare I say hostile?—media moment of the Obama administration. This is different than Politico’s Jonathan Martin lobbing a hopeful question at Obama during a surprise press-room walkthrough and being shot down. It was a formal, organized press event and it was on live, national TV. However spontaneous it may have been, it was clear that both sides meant to send a message: Don’t even think about it, tough guy. In an administration all about conciliation, it was a moment that highlighted that, ultimately, the relationship between the president and the press is adversarial.
So was that moment about transparency—or Tapper? Press-room conventional wisdom says it was a little bit of both. “The feeling in the briefing room after that dustup with Gibbs was that Tapper was right but took it too far,” said one fellow correspondent. “That's not what we are there for, to needle them and get into pissy little spats.” The 39-year-old Tapper, who first gained renown as a Salon columnist (and Monica Lewinsky dinner date), is known for having ambition impressive even by Washington standards. At President George W. Bush’s final press conference, Bush called on Tapper and asked him jokingly what he’d been doing since 2000. Tapper’s reply, from his new spot in the front row of the briefing room: “Working my way to this chair.”
There’s another chair that Tapper may be trying to fill: David Gregory’s. No less than three separate Washington political reporters spontaneously compared him to Gregory, who made his name being a thorn in the side of various White House press secretaries. “I think it’s safe to say that he's calculated, meaning that if he's being tough, it's likely because he sat down one day to say, ‘I want to be this administration's David Gregory,’" said one colleague on the D.C. political circuit. (Note where Gregory ended up.) Others have also compared him to Sam Donaldson, whose scrappy briefing-room questioning is still legendary. “[Tapper] works really hard, he's really smart, and he does have good questions that you just can't dismiss as showboating,” said another D.C.-based political reporter who has known Tapper for years. And while more than one other person also used the word “showboating,” a briefing-room colleague was a little more Zen: “It's too early to judge anyone... And I wouldn't get too worked up over the press briefings. Judge all of us on the reporting, analysis, and packages.”
It should be noted here that Gibbs is not exactly a shrinking violet: He may look unassuming, but he knows his way around a body check (let’s not forget that he was once the guy who ran a commercial comparing Howard Dean to Osama bin Laden). “Gibbs' style is to be a little sarcastic and push back—he's aggressive and combative,” said a frequent member of Obama’s traveling press corps. “He uses the same strategies the Bush press secretaries used—make a joke, or find a way to be dismissive of the questioner. But Jake’s not easily dismissed.”
What does Tapper say? Though he declined to comment specifically on the Gibbs exchange, he did reply via email that he took his job very seriously, in part as a reaction to the rather permissive press corps of the last administration: “There's a big lesson for all of us—not just reporters, but the nation—in the need for a vigilant press that questions the decisions our leaders make, whether going to war or spending $800 billion on a stimulus package. I don't always live up to that lesson, but I try.” He also said that the job “still feels daunting and intimidating”—even if he doesn’t show it.
Tapper’s not the only toughie in the briefing room—there are cameras there, you know—but so far, he’s the one pushing the hardest. And if that makes Gibbs’ job tougher, oh well. Says Tapper: “I certainly don't think that it's the job of any journalist to make the presidency work.”
Rachel Sklar is the former media editor of the Huffington Post and author of A Stroke of Luck: Life, Crisis and Rebirth of a Stroke Survivor. She is working on Jew-ish, a humorous book about cultural identity and recently launched an online micro-giving site, Charitini. Follow her here.
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Rachel Sklar is the Editor-at-Large for Mediaite.com and a contributor to the Daily Beast. She was formerly a senior writer and editor at the Huffington Post and is currently working on Jew-ish, a humorous book about cultural identity. She recently launched online micro-giving site Charitini, and Twitters up a storm here.
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Don't let Bob Somerby of the Daily Howler hear that you actually think David Gregory was tough on Bush. Check out his archived remarks on this topic and you will see that Gregory did not push back until long after Bush had taken this country off the rails. It was a case of too little, too late and Gregory should not be praised for belatedly doing his job just because the other sheep didn't ever step up.
As for Tapper, I was impressed by his relatively balanced coverage of the election. I just hope that he does not decide to be oppositional just as a gimmick to advance his reputation the way Republicans do. A truly good reporters ask tough, substantive questions not to promote themselves but because the public needs the information to have informed opinions. Too often reporters gain popularity with thier peers by acting like the bad boy who entertains high schoolers by disruption physics class.
The "schoolyard" analogy is instructive; that's how petty and dumbed down our political discourse has become. Sklar seems impressed by aggression, even though she's swooning over someone who's been relentlessly advancing false and misleading Republican talking points for quite a long time.
And the idea that David Gregory was some sort of brave truth-teller is a ludicrous fairy tale. Gregory went along swimmingly with the Bush admin, and because he grumbled once at an obvious falsehood, he has some heroic reputation? If anything, that incident underlines how rarely the press DIDN't question the obvious falsehoods they obediently reported.
Here's Tough Guy Tapper this week:
"ABC's Jake Tapper has posted on his blog the video of his Good Morning America segment this morning, asking readers what they think. The segment runs less than two minutes, but Tapper managed to squeeze in two rather glaring flaws.
First, Tapper presents Republican Senator Jim DeMint as the voice of the "American people." Even worse, DeMint is shown criticizing Obama for ten seconds before he is identified; even then, the only indication that he is a Republican is a small "R" that appears next to his name for less than two seconds.
Next, Tapper snarks: "When you're pushing your big project, in this case the stimulus plan, Bipartisan means more than a cocktail party and a Super Bowl kegger. Republicans ... say Democrat leaders in Congress have not really tried to make the stimulus bill bipartisan." Then he showed Republican Senator Chuck Grassley claiming Republicans had been excluded from stimulus negotiations. Tapper omitted any other viewpoint, and he somehow forgot to mention the concessions Democrats have made to Republicans during the stimulus debate. Like, say, the AMT amendment agreed to by the Senate Finance Committee. Guess who introduced that amendment? Yep: Republican Senator Chuck Grassley."
http://mediamatters.org/countyfair/200902040010
Descada, you are dead on. Tapper's snearing contempt and personal feelings are coming through loud and clear. He's not truly objective, and should not be allowed to "report" but rather, be a commentator. Snarky, aggressive and ambitious..wow, what a combo.
Now that the real schoolyard bully is gone, Bush43, everyone wants to show off that they're as smart & can ask probing questions of Obama. HA! We, the American public, see through all these guys. They're fooling no one that *they all* hid and cowered in the corners of the Press Rooms around the White House. Shame on all those who think they can push Obama around.
Remember, Bush set the bar on how to push & rotate the corners of every news person in this country.
Where was all this 'false bravado' when Bush & Cheney were gutting the Constitution and the rights of Americans? Oh yeah, Tapper et all were hiding in the corners . . .
"The feeling in the briefing room after that dustup with Gibbs was that Tapper was right but took it too far," said one fellow correspondent.
************************************
Ahhh. So it's okay to question Obama's pledge of transparency, but not okay to press it too far.
Glad we got that straightened out.
I don't care if you're an Obama supporter or not (I am) our country needs the press asking hard questions and doing deep, meaningful investigation.
It's an important protection citizens have against a government doing something it's not supposed to. Like going to war under false pretenses...
The focus of any reporter shouldn't be on aggression, but rather explaining with clarity and even-handedness both sides of an issue. That certainly didn't happen during 43's administration, possibly because 43 was SO dumb, it was impossible to begin to figure out what the dolt was saying.
A little critical thinking and questioning sans all the theatrics and ego would be welcome--but don't hold your breath.
Isn't it nice to know that you can ask questions without the fear of repercussion as in the previous administration.
But to compare going to war with lies of WMDs with spending 800 billion dollars is a bit of a stretch don't you think.
4000 dead people. Think about it.
I'm sure the initial shot from Gibbs occurred because of the previous days slanted reporting from Tapper regarding Obama's press conferences on the major networks. Obama talked stimulus but Tapper completely ignored it and focused only on Obama's admission of fault in the vetting process.
At least that is how I saw this exchange starting in the first place. Two days in a row of snarkyness is a bit much.
Leave the slanted reporting to Fox news. Does ABC really want to be known as the new Fox?
Descada is SPOT ON. Furthermore, I witnessed personally as Tapper deleted comments on his ABCNews blog that dared to question his blatant lies. I got so pissed I did something I've never done, which is to call ABC headquarters to complain. Lotta good THAT did.
"Playground" is right. The D.C./New York media is more interested in writing short stories about politicians than fact-checking or asking truly important questions.
So Republicans throw hissy fits and Democrats bend backwards to touch their ankles yet again. Not much talk about what's in the stimulus (unless you're online). Not much informed analysis of how much good it could do.
I wish I could be on-camera for 45 seconds every night, describing inane things with while I stand in front of the White House. Now THERE'S a type of job that should be cut.
Is Rachel getting little starbursts through the screen?
Tapper is so obviously not an objective reporter. He's also too full of himself. He needs to dial back the sarcasm.
And I wouldn't aspire to be David Gregory. Gregory is the Peter Principle personified. He keeps rising to his level of incompetence.
Oh Yes Rachel, Let's never forget that Jake Tapper is the Story. Don't get too bagged down in your own hype sister. It's gonna be a long 4 years
It takes no talent to be a jerk. Only a lack of class and upbringing Jake.
Greengirl has it right. Lack of class, and wayyyyyyyyy.......too much ambition. JERK! He will be a NON-memory soon.
What is was is the press suddenly discovering they had balls after 8 years of nothing. Then waking up and realizing while the administration won't hide things from you, they aren't going to hand it to you on a platter. Go do some research tapper. Dig up some dirt. He is a reporter right? Like in the classic sense, not the Gay Sex Site Plant sense.
"...it was a moment that highlighted that, ultimately, the relationship between the president and the press is adversarial."
OMG ROFLMAO, please please stop, you're killing me!
It's amazing how someone (who worked for HuffPost, no less) can, even now, STILL be so oblivious to how those of us outside the Traditional Media bubble see all of this. Are you completely ignorant of the numerous predictions that the media would suddenly find it's long-lost balls as soon as a Democrat returned to the White House?
[Gotta check again, did she REALLY say that? Yep, it's there all right.]
"..ultimately, the relationship between the president and the press is adversarial."
You're being serious? Have you been paying any attention whatsoever to what happened the last eight years? Are you under the illusion that David Gregory somehow demonstrated that the press corps had a spine?
These questions go to Ana Marie Cox as well, with her breathless scoop about how Obama blowing off Jonathan Martin's question in the press room was some kind of badge of courage or demonstration of backbone.
Stop. It. You. Are. KILLING. Me.
Here, read these before embarrassing yourself further. I don't have much hope it'll make you any smarter, but supposedly optimism is in vogue these days:
http://mediamatters.org/columns/200901270006
http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2009/02/11/journalists/index.htm l
This is a good article. I've been an admirer of Jake Tapper for years, and I think he is the real deal. I think Obama will be better having to answer some tough questions. I've actually been repulsed by the worshipful attitude most of the MSM has towards this president, from the primaries to the present day. Jake provides some balance.
Thank you so much for asking the questions and raising issues that should have been done by so many more "so called" reporters. I hope you have opend the eyes of the blind! This administration has nothing but control on their minds. I am not a political scientist or economics major, but I can read through all manure. Please keep up the good work and maybe some of the other men and women who call themselves reporters will follow suite.
Luann Brown
Jacksonville, Florida
I used to believe in political media bias, but the more I look the more it seems like reporters are just honestly afraid to confront people in power. Afraid of losing "access" to public figures who really should be "the enemy" simply by virtue of being in power.
The lap dog press isn't just a left or right issue anymore. It's a fundamental crack in the institution of journalism -- one that blogs (however biased and amateurish) were supposed to correct.
Here we have an example of a reporter simply doing his job, and it's front page news all by itself.
I'm glad there's at least one guy left who's willing to swim outside the tank.
Thank you.
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