Sarah Palin, read this! Gavin Newsom's media advice

Bipartisan note to Alaska's Republican Sarah Palin from a direct-action California Democrat:

Stop whining about negative coverage from newspapers that don't like you and never will except if you help promote their publisher's favorite local charity and even then the affection will be short-lived.

Instead, simply help those nattering nabobs of negativity go out of business, one angry subscriber at a time.

Gangsters knew intuitively not to sue/argue with newspapers because of the resulting drumbeat of new negative stories. But it took longer for politicians across the ideological spectrum to learn the conventional wisdom: Don't argue with people who buy newspaper ink by the barrel.

Grumbling and worse over the media is sometimes warranted and always chronic among those in the public eye, who depend on the publicity but don't like it all.

Lyndon Johnson blamed negative media coverage for much of the Vietnam War opposition and the self-imposed end of his political career. Richard Nixon was not a huge fan of the Washington Post, which through Watergate helped him move along to memoir-writing a couple of years earlier than planned.

Of course, the media can create a handy target to help unify political followers against a perceived common enemy. Think Ron Paul's well-covered claims of being ignored last year and Republican convention delegates turning en masse to boo the overhanging media booths in St. Paul's Xcel Energy Center. 

And Palin is likely to re-mention media bias toward her and her family in her eagerly-awaited book, now set for publication Nov. 17. (Countdown now at 49 days.) She's particularly aggrieved over some mainstream media that took local blogs/gossip at face value. It's all sure to provide juicy new reasons to love and hate her, which Harper's corporate parent, News Corp., is unlikely to mind at all.

Who knows, you might even see Palin on another News Corp. property, Fox News. The way you just happen to see CBS stars show up on CBS talk shows and actors from Universal movies appear on NBC.

But now liberal San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, who would like to be California's next governor, has added a novel twist to media-bashing. He got a Tweet from a follower feeling aggrieved about coverage of Newsom.

Not surprisingly, the mayor was sympathetic to the sympathy. He did not mess around or waste one of his 140 characters.

Newsom Twittered out to all 1.1 million-plus followers, specific advice on how to terminate their newspaper subscription, to at least one San Francisco publication.

-- Andrew Malcolm

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Comments

[Jeff]

That's probably the only way ex-Gov. Palin will ever appear on Fox News Channel...from what I've read lately, they're not interested in her being a host of a show. (They have enough personnel, for want of a better word, with the likes of Bill "My-weapon-is-a-pen" O'Reilly, Glenn "Left-leaning-NBC-Rockefeller-Center" Beck, and Mike "Let's-just-jackhammer-the-U.N.-off-Manhattan-Island-and-let-it-float-into-the-East-River" Huckabee.)

[Felonious.Punk]

So cool! It just makes sense to me that when I consistently find fault with a news source, I should scout out other news sources and let go of the offending source. Sometimes habit gets in the way of our knowledge and even our emotional health.
I am consistently pleased with the moves Newsom makes, the way he carries himself and his city. I am looking forward to the day when it's the whole of California he leads.

[d. zent]

I can't wait 'til this cat is the new governor of California. I know of no one as able or consistently innovative, and it's likely California would experience a new "golden age". We can thank the current crop of jerks, both Dem or Repub, for its current leaden condition.