ABC is crowing that it's a first -- the first time a sitting president has been on a daytime show. When No. 44 -- Barack Obama -- appears on ABC's The View later today, he'll not only set a precedent. He'll pull the show's five female co-hosts out of their pop culture comfort zone and into the annals of American political history.
Barbara Walters, Joy Behar, and Whoopi Goldberg are up to the challenge. But what about Sherri Shepherd in general and Elisabeth Hasselbeck in particular? Appearing on Survivor as a contestant isn't the usual route taken by a broadcast journalist in order to earn the kind of credentials and develop the skills that qualify her for the biggest interview on the planet -- a sit-down with the Leader of the Free World.
I've been uneasy about Obama going on The View ever since the story first broke. My concern has little to do with gender and everything to do with the growing trend of news as entertainment.
The View is not a news show and has never claimed to be one. The only journalist on the show is Barbara Walters. Granted, some of the women are politically active; Joy Behar has her own show on another network and is no cream-puff interviewer. (Remember John McCain's View appearance?)
But it's notoriously difficult to do a multiple host interview. I've co-hosted a daytime talk show and know the rhythms of conversation between two people change when you add a third, or a fourth, or more. It's tougher to be substantive and make your key points; group interviews on-air tend to be more casual, less insightful, and thinner in content. This is not what we need from the president at this time.
Obama won the election in part because his team mastered the art of creating an effective online presence that mobilized people to contribute, volunteer, and vote. He hasn't quite mastered the art of appearing on TV, and any previous successes on the campaign trail have been obliterated by several poor performances as president. In a sense, stepping into the White House has set that counter back to zero. He's already been on Leno and Letterman in recent months, but those were one-on-one interviews and different from the potential free-for-all that his appearance on The View could descend into.
The best thing that could happen would be for Barbara Walters to take the lead and guide the conversation. The others could ask a question here or there, but joking around with comments that he's a sexy president or trying to get him to confess to a superficial detail (like Michelle Obama did during her time on The View when she said she didn't wear pantyhose) would not serve the show or the president.
I want The View to rise to the occasion and prove to the nation that smart women can have substantive conversations.
I don't want President Obama to dumb down to the level of most daytime TV talk shows and make small talk about inconsequential matters. We're in the midst of an ongoing recession with no clear end in sight, a war in Afghanistan that few believe we can win, and an open-ended environmental disaster due to the Gulf oil spill and a botched response by this administration. We need answers and we need leadership. We don't need a feel-good appearance designed to reverse falling poll numbers and dispel the bad taste in our mouths following last week's public humiliation of civil servant Shirley Sherrod.
If Obama goes light, the fallout will be twofold: 1) he will cheapen the image of the presidency and give Limbaugh, Beck and Fox News an excuse to scream "media whore!" and 2) the women of The View will blow their chance to prove that daytime TV can be as issues-oriented as the Sunday morning political talk shows...and that women deserve more than a token seat at that particular table.
I hope my uneasiness is unfounded and that The View is a win-win situation for everyone concerned. I hope Obama's appearance is more newsworthy than entertaining, and that he can maintain his dignity while revealing his compassion and humanity. In short, I hope The View reacquaints us with a view of Barack Obama that has dimmed in our collective mind's eye -- Obama as the embodiment of change and hope, and a man worthy of our votes and our trust.
Comments
I am planning to watch the View today and hope that the President delivers a serious but encouraging message to the audience. I do agree with you that the View should take a more serious approach for this particular show. I also think that President Obama is making a good move appearing on the View. I say this because it will have an enormous female audience and after all, women voters outnumber men in this country.
The media-whore train? Left the station a looooooooong time ago.
http://deepmuckbigrake.com/2008/02/18/politics-all-the-worlds-a-stage/
As a non-American, please allow me to take issue with the following two points”:
a. “…any previous successes on the campaign trail have been obliterated by several poor performances as president.” This sweeping and damning comment seems grossly inaccurate and unjust. Linda, are you saying that President Obama has not had any successes in his term and has not opened doors nor signed legislation to historical firsts which no previous President has had the courage and foresight to do?
b. Your experience as a host undoubtedly provides important experience in such a show, but damning the show and the President so strongly in advance seems unwarranted and biased.
Gene, that comment was part of a larger sentence describing Obama’s flaws during his television appearances, not his efforts as President. He had a stronger presence on TV during the campaign, but has seemed stiff since the inauguration. This is not an article assessing Obama’s leadership, but his media appearances.