26
PARTISAN REVIEW
ate out of his hand.
So I'm not worried really about the media setting the agenda, be–
cause the media is heterogeneous; and even more important, the presi–
dent of the country, if he has any leadership qualities, is going to set the
agenda for the country. I might remind you of how Henry Adams de–
scribed the president of the United States. He said the president resembles
the commander of a ship at sea: "he must have a helm to grasp, a course
to steer, and a port to seek." The Constitution gives every president a
helm to grasp, but if a president has a course to steer, and a port to seek,
as Reagan did (although it seems to me it was a reckless course,
nonetheless he had one), he is going to set the agenda. With a president
like Carter or Bush, who had no course to steer or port to seek, you
have a different situation.
Eric Breindel: I
would just like to add, on an informational note, that
the media, in plural, were highly aware of and strongly resented the de–
gree to which they were controlled by Reagan and his handlers and the
experts in the White House. The media were very aware of what they
perceived as failures in the coverage of the 1988 campaign. What went
on right after the campaign was that the people who covered these
campaigns reached a collective decision not to allow campaigns to be
controlled again in the same way the GOP had controlled the campaigns
of the 1980s. Thus, the advent of the truth squads that we now see. At
the end of each of this season's national debates, one of the television
commentators has gone on the air to say, "If you watch our news show
tomorrow morning, the accuracy of the points that have been in made
in this debate will be assessed by so-and-so," implying that someone is
going to stay up all night and check up on everything that each of the
candidates said. Beyond that,
The New York Times
is running a campaign
feature on an almost four-times-a-week basis, showing the advertisements
that are available on television, giving you the texts, and then analyzing
them for truthfulness. There is an active effort on the part of the media -
in plural - and particularly the prestige media, to combat the ability of
the people who run political campaigns to be as successful as they have in
the past in controlling the agenda or if you will, setting the agenda. I
think it's well worth noting.
Fred Siegel: I
would like to make a few points. First, I think Arthur
Schlesinger's discussion was a little bit incomplete. The most important
function the parties lost was their ability to control nominations. The
difference in American and European parties (and in Europe the parties
are in trouble too; I think the French Socialists are running at twenty-
