Mr. Media Training

The Mr. Media Training Blog is pleased to announce the ten worst on-camera media gaffes of 2011!

This year’s winners include a politician who lost his place, a country singer who lost his job, and a celebrity who lost his show.

The media spokespersons were selected based on the impact of their gaffes. All ten people reinforced an existing narrative about their lack of preparedness for office, their lack of discipline, or their lack of compassion.

Here, without further ado, are the ten worst video media disasters of 2011!

#10: Hank Williams, Jr. Compares President Obama to Adolf Hitler

In October, country singer Hank Williams, Jr. was fired up during an appearance on Fox and Friends. While reflecting on a golf match between President Obama and House Speaker John Boehner, Mr. Williams quipped, “It would be like Hitler playing golf with Netanyahu.” The Fox hosts looked shocked and distanced themselves from his statement; ESPN promptly dropped his theme song as its Monday Night Football opener.

#9: Sarah Palin’s “Blood Libel”

Months before Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ) was almost killed in Tucson, Former Gov. Sarah Palin (R-AK) released an infamous “crosshairs map,” which placed a target over Ms. Giffords’  congressional district. In the days after the shooting, Ms. Palin was blamed, in part, for the shooting.

Ms. Palin was upset by media stories connecting her to the crime; she was right that there was no evidence that the shooter had even seen her map. But she over-reacted, taking to the airwaves to blame the media for committing "blood libel." That term is most commonly used as an anti-Semitic slur referring to Jews murdering Christians.

Her poll numbers immediately plummeted with Independents and Republicans (Fox News head Roger Ailes was also said to be infuriated by her response). Instead of using the moment to expand her base by issuing a gracious statement, Ms. Palin narrowed it, leading many political prognosticators to declare her 2012 hopes dead.

#8: NPR Fundraiser Ron Schiller Blasts The Tea Party

National Public Radio’s chief fundraiser, Ron Schiller, went to lunch with a couple of men claiming to be Muslim donors in March. It turned out they were Republican activists with a hidden camera. During the lunch, Mr. Schiller called members of the Tea Party, “seriously racist, racist people,” among other things.

That he made those comments was bad enough; that he made them while NPR was already in the midst of a heated debate about its public funding was flabbergasting. His comments not only led to his immediate resignation, but the resignation of NPR’s CEO, as well. The House of Representatives voted to strip NPR of its federal funding. Fortunately for NPR, the Senate prevented that from happening – for now. 

#7: Rupert Murdoch Channels Tony Hayward

While testifying before the British Parliament in July, News Corp CEO Rupert Murdoch was asked whether he accepted the ultimate responsibility for his company’s phone hacking scandal. Not only did he say “no,” but he delivered his answer without even a hint of humility. So much for Harry Truman’s axiom, “The buck stops here.”

By delivering such an indifferent answer, he gave former BP Executive Tony “I’d like my life back” Hayward competition as the world’s most clueless corporate executive.

#6: Rick Perry’s “Oops” Moment

During a Republican presidential debate in November, Gov. Rick Perry (R-TX) confidently declared he would eliminate three government agencies – and promptly forgot what they were. For 47 painful seconds, Mr. Perry tried to recall the third agency he would eliminate. He finally gave up, shrugged his shoulders, and lamely said, “oops.” That one moment likely sank any remaining chances Mr. Perry had of winning the nomination.

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#5: President Obama Jokes About Joblessness

With the nation’s unemployment rate above nine percent and millions of Americans desperate to find work, President Obama cracked a joke in June that few people found funny.

When a questioner asked a serious question about the nation’s inefficient permitting process, Mr. Obama cracked wise about his two-year-old pledge to create shovel-ready jobs, joking, “Shovel-ready was not as shovel-ready as we expected.” Many people blasted the President for his political tin ear, which has gotten him in trouble before (see earlier gaffes related to a San Francisco fundraiser, Hillary Clinton, and the Special Olympics).

#4: Charlie Sheen’s Downward Spiral

There’s little funny about addiction, and Charlie Sheen’s dangerous spiral was sad to watch (see “Why #Winning Isn’t Funny”). Sheen stayed in the news for months, but it was his out-of-touch interview with sycophantic radio host Alex Jones in February that led to his dismissal from his top-rated sitcom, Two and a Half Men.

In that interview, Sheen made vaguely anti-Semitic comments about “Men”” creator Chuck Lorre, called Alcoholics Anonymous a “bootleg cult,” and labeled Thomas Jefferson a “pussy.” He topped off his tirade by threatening to “murder” those who attack his family.

#3: The Herman Cain Affair

Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain was caught flat-footed in October when numerous women accused him of sexual harassment (another woman later asserted she had had a long-term sexual affair with him). Mr. Cain changed his story on an almost-hourly basis, even arguing that he didn’t understand an earlier question that had used the word “settlement” instead of “agreement.” 

Mr. Cain dropped out of the race in December, maintaining his innocence to a public that no longer believed him.

Politico compiled a partial chronology of Mr. Cain’s rolling disclosures in the early days of the crisis.

#2: (Alleged) Penn State Child Rapist Jerry Sandusky Speaks

When former Penn State football coach Jerry Sandusky spoke to NBC’s Bob Costas in November about horrific allegations that he raped numerous boys, no one was prepared for his jaw-dropping answer to this direct question: “Are you sexually attracted to young boys?” It took 16 seconds for Sandusky to say “no.” Instead, he began by saying how much he “enjoyed” young people and loves to be around them. Sandusky’s alleged actions, combined with Penn State’s ineffectual response, led to the firings of the University president and legendary football coach Joe Paterno.

(Fast forward to 7:15)

#1: Anthony Weiner’s Twitter Scandal

Self-immolations rarely come in more spectacular fashion than when Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-NY) was caught tweeting naughty photos to strangers in June. His approach to crisis management was to: 

1. 1. Deny the charges and claim his Twitter account had been hacked.
2. 2. Call a reporter a “jackass.”
3. 3. Say that although he hadn’t sent the photos, he couldn’t rule out “with certitude” that the erect undies shot was of him.
4. 4. Hold a tearful press conference to admit he had tweeted the photos himself but refusing to resign.
5. 5. Watch helplessly as a nude photo of his…ahem…member…was released.
6. 6. See his private news about his wife’s early-term pregnancy announced to the world.
7. 7. See yet another batch of sexy gym photos released.
8. 8. Resign in shame.

One of Mr. Weiner’s worst moments (there were many) was captured during a CNN interview, in which he sanctimoniously blasted reporters. After Mr. Weiner resigned, a Republican won his seat, costing Democrats a critical seat in the House of Representatives.

FLASHBACK: THE TEN WORST MEDIA DISASTERS OF 2010

Click here to listen to Brad Phillips discussing this top ten list on Washington D.C.’s top-rated radio station, WTOP-FM.

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Remember the old game show Let’s Make a Deal?

During the program, host Monty Hall regularly asked contestants to make a choice: They could choose what was behind door number one, door number two, or door number three. If they chose correctly, they might walk away with a new car. If they didn’t, they might end up “winning” a live turkey.

The Let’s Make a Deal analogy holds in the context of media interviews. If a reporter asks you a multiple choice question and you answer it correctly, you’ll win by avoiding an off-message headline. But if you answer it incorrectly, you’ll deliver an off-message answer – which the media will love and replay repeatedly.

The way you “win” Let’s Make a Deal when a reporter asks you to select one of three doors is simple: Refuse to play. Select a fourth door that helps you convey your own message instead.

Earlier this week, CNN reporter Dan Lothian asked President Obama a multiple choice question. Asking about the Republican candidates’ support for waterboarding, he asked:

“I’m wondering if you think they’re uninformed, out-of-touch, or irresponsible?”

President Obama paused for four long seconds before responding:

“That’s a multiple choice question, isn’t it? Let me just say this: They’re wrong.”

President Obama handled that in exactly the right way, refusing to accept any of the reporter’s three choices and using his own word instead. (Still, I’m a bit surprised that Mr. Obama appeared flat-footed for several seconds – this can’t be the first time he’s encountered a multiple choice question.)

If you’re put on the spot by a reporter’s multiple choice question, tell the reporter you would characterize it differently, and then answer the question using your own words.

Otherwise, you may find yourself picking one of the three answers the reporter offers – and walking home with a live turkey.

Queen’s Freddie Mercury would have said that you’re my best friend. I’ll settle for just being liked.  Please like me on Facebook to keep up with our latest public speaking and media interviewing tips!

President Obama will address a joint session of Congress tonight to unveil his new jobs proposal. But his track record as a bad negotiator will undermine even the most brilliant speech.

Dismayed progressives lament the President’s tendency to offer bold proposals and negotiate them away. Emboldened conservatives know that the President’s initial proposals are merely a starting point and that they’ll be able to move him much farther to the right before agreeing to any deal.

As examples, President Obama:

• Made the “public option” a centerpiece of his healthcare proposal before negotiating it away.
• Pledged to end tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans until violating his own pledge and extending them.
• Gave away so much in the debt ceiling fight that House Speaker John Boehner bragged: “We got 98 percent of what we wanted.”

I’m not making a value judgment here on the proposals themselves, but rather on the widely-held (and growing) perception that he will inevitably fold on them. 

As a result, the President’s words will have diminished impact tonight. When speakers offer terrific proposals but don’t reinforce their words with actions, it leads to audience fatigue. Many of the President’s supporters are skeptical of another bait and switch, and opponents suspect they’ll eventually get what they want anyway.

That’s not to say the President won’t succeed in passing something close to the economic plan he unveils tonight. But after having the rug pulled from under them numerous times, even his most ardent supporters are likely to take a cautious “wait and see” approach to see whether the President fights for his plan this time around or negotiates it away yet again.

What’s your opinion? Is my critique overly-harsh, or not harsh enough? Feel free to offer an opinion, but remember the blog’s comment policy – no ad hominem attacks or pejorative name-calling will be posted.

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What’s the best way to handle hecklers?

Should you give them a forum to express their views, or is it better to embarrass them by mocking their ideas in front of the crowd?

As these videos of Mitt Romney and President Obama show, both approaches can work. Although the two men differed in tone, both employed a similar tactic: they offered the floor to their hecklers before re-claiming the floor. That’s a smart approach that helps neutralize opponents who would otherwise continue shouting during their speeches.

It’s worth noting that both men were speaking to friendly crowds – an important point that worked in their favor.

This first video, from earlier this month, shows Mitt Romney sparring with protesters concerned about Social Security and Medicare cuts:

After initially trying to shout down the protesters, Mr. Romney changes his tactic when he appears to realize that the scene could get ugly if he doesn’t offer them the floor (note the heated response of his campaign supporter in the crowd). After he allows one protester to make his statement, Mr. Romney takes back the floor by saying:

“The way this is going to work is that you get to ask your question and I get to give my answer. If you don’t like my answer, you can vote for someone else.”

By taking back the floor in that manner, Mr. Romney signals that the dialogue is closed and that he isn’t open to further interruptions. When the protester continues questioning him, Mr. Romney tells him “you’ve had your turn,” turns his body away from the heckler by 90 degrees, and says “next question,” which finally quiets the protester.

In the second video, taken during the 2008 general election, then-Senator Barack Obama is heckled for his alleged lack of support for the black community.

Mr. Obama pledges to give the protesters the floor later in the meeting, which silences the protesters for the time being. As promised, he gives one of the hecklers the floor later in the rally. When the protester finishes asking his question, the crowd starts turning against him. Mr. Obama gains control of the crowd by saying:

“Hold on a second, everybody, I want everybody to be respectful. That’s why we’re having a Town Hall Meeting. This is democracy at work. And he asked a legitimate question, so I want to give him an answer.”

Mr. Obama could have allowed his friendly crowd to turn on the heckler, but he refused to take the easy path and requested instead that they offer him their respect. In so doing, he made everybody – including himself – look magnanimous.

Actually, there’s a third approach, used by Ronald Reagan the day before he was elected President:

With a simple “awww, shut up,” Mr. Reagan silenced his critics and earned wildly supportive applause.

Unless you’re blessed with Mr. Reagan’s sense of showmanship, the Romney and Obama approaches are probably your best bet.

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President Obama and his family left late last week for a 10-day vacation in Martha’s Vineyard.

Since then, Mr. Obama’s critics have blasted him for vacationing during an economic meltdown. And his poll numbers – down to 39 percent in a recent Gallup poll – suggest that he can’t afford the bad optics of having fun in the sun while a large percentage of his constituents continue to struggle to find work.

So here’s the question: Should President Obama cut his vacation short as his critics suggest, or is he entitled to some rare precious time with his wife and young daughters while Congress is out-of-session?

President Obama with daughters Sasha and Malia on an earlier vacation to Martha's Vineyard

THE ARGUMENT: YES, HE SHOULD GO ON VACATION

1. Historically Speaking, He Hasn’t Vacationed That Much: President Obama has vacationed significantly less than President Bush did up to this point in his presidency. According to CBS News reporter Mark Knoller, Mr. Bush had vacationed for 225 days up to this point in his tenure, while Mr. Obama has been away just 70 days.

2. Style Over Substance: White House Press Secretary Jay Carney rightly pointed out that presidents are never really on vacation. Even when clearing brush in Crawford, President Bush received daily briefings and was available to conduct presidential business. Same is true for President Obama. Canceling his vacation might look good, but it would accomplish substantively little.

3. Vacations Allow For Healthier Decisions: Vacations aren’t only an excuse to blow off work. They’re also psychologically proven to help people make better decisions. According to the Baltimore Sun:

“Being on a vacation that relieves stress allows people to regain their ability to do well on tasks that require them to focus their attention. A 2009 PNAS study in rats provides clues for the mechanism behind this: Researchers found that stress causes parts of brain cells in the medial prefrontal cortex to shrink, impairing their ability to do well on an attention task. But after four weeks of stress-free living, the rats’ cells returned to normal.”

4. Even Presidents Need Family Time: The President and First Lady have two young daughters. The Obama family deserves time together, and those two beautiful children deserve an opportunity to enjoy some rare time with Mom and Dad.

Martha's Vineyard, Photo Credit: Quinn Dombrowski

THE ARGUMENT: NO, HE SHOULDN’T GO ON VACATION

1. Going on Vacation Is Politically Tone-Deaf: Going on an extended vacation in a playground for the wealthy is politically tone-deaf. The real unemployment rate is now at about 16 percent; one in six American workers is out of work. The American people rightly want the sense that their President is doing everything possible to get them back to work, and his vacation is undercutting his pledge “not to rest” until people get back to work

2. The Vacation Will Provide Bad Optics: For ten days, Americans will see stories on the evening news about plummeting stock markets and faltering foreign economies juxtaposed with stories showing the President eating ice cream on the beach in shorts. It looks bad, almost as out-of-synch as former BP CEO Tony Hayward attending a yacht race while tar balls rushed onto Florida’s shorelines.

3. The Vacation Undercuts His Main Loyalty: The President’s main loyalty during his time in office is to his country, not his family. When he decided to run for office, he knew it would come at a tremendous personal cost. Not being able to vacation for 10 days with his family during a crisis is a sacrifice presidents just have to make.

MY CONCLUSION 

I agree with every argument that the President is justified to go on vacation.

But in the end, I side with his critics. I don’t side with them for the same reasons – I believe many of his critics are motivated more by politics than sincere belief – but despite that, I find myself reaching the same conclusion.

President Obama could have chosen a different vacation. For example, he could have gone to Camp David with his family for a week, away from the reporters and photo ops that will follow his every move in Martha’s Vineyard. Or he could have visited a city with a struggling economy for a few days – an abandoned steel town, a decayed urban city like Detroit, or Nevada, the state with the nation’s highest unemployment rate.  His visit would have provided a short-term economic boost, and could have sent a surge of tourism to places that badly need it.

Canceling his longer vacation would, indeed, be style over substance. But style is a key component of effective leadership, and facts aren’t always enough to compensate for perception. For a President already widely regarded as distant and aloof, this vacation reinforces an existing narrative.

My criticism isn’t based in partisanship. I started this blog after President Bush’s tenure had ended, but my criticism would have extended to him as well, for the same reasons. Clearing brush on a Crawford farm looked bad as American troops died almost daily in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Today’s presidency, magnified in the fishbowl of a 24/7 media culture, requires leaders to be ever-mindful of optics. The optics look bad here, and President Obama will likely pay a political price.

What do you think? Should the President go on vacation regardless of polls, or is the timing distasteful? Please leave your thoughts in the comment section below.

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President Obama’s poll numbers are now languishing at the 40 percent mark – the lowest of his presidency. Given his low approval ratings and the tumultuous U.S. economy, he desperately needs a press secretary who can help advance his message as he enters what will surely be a bruising campaign.

Jay Carney, who has been on the job since February, is not that person.

Mr. Carney seems incapable of parrying successfully with the press. He regularly appears outmatched by reporters and fails to take control of the interaction when presented an easy opportunity to do so. He takes questions too literally, gets bogged down in the details, and fumbles to find his way to a higher-level response. He stammers, shifts his eyes uncomfortably, licks his lips, and loads his delivery with “uhhs,” “umms” “I thinks,” and “you knows.”

He sounds timid, looks uncomfortable, and comes across more like an eager student than an experienced spokesperson capable of advancing President Obama’s agenda.

As an example, here’s a video of his press briefing from last Wednesday:

Several times throughout the briefing, Mr. Carney actually read his answers to reporters directly from a briefing book. While reading, he didn’t make eye contact with the press, nor did he forge any connection with the viewers at home. His role was completely superfluous – if he’s just going to read documents to the press, he may as well hand them out and let the reporters read the material for themselves.

Even when delivering a solid television-friendly sound bite, he undercuts his effectiveness with his own verbal filler (at 9:29):

“This President will not rest until he is uhhh confident that every American who uhhh wants a job can find a job. And uhhh there is no greater focus of his work uhhh of this Administration’s work uhhh than the economy.”

In a February article in Politico, former George W. Bush press secretary Ari Fleischer said:

“It’s become a TV show. It’s really not the real substance of the relationship between the press corps and the spokesman. The real work is done 20 times a day when reporters walk into your office, close the door and talk one on one with you.”

That may be true on the substance, but millions of viewers watch the live briefing or catch excerpts on television, online, and on the radio. Mr. Fleischer underestimates the importance of Mr. Carney’s public role, given that he is arguably second only to the President in visibility. If Carney is truly terrific behind closed doors, the White House should keep him in the background and appoint a separate person to handle on-camera briefings.

Mr. Carney seems like a genuinely nice man who is trying hard to get this right. But he’s the wrong person for the job. If you believe as I do that presidents deserve to be served by spokespersons that represent them well, Mr. Carney has got to go.

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Did President Obama time his “birther” press conference for last Wednesday only after learning that the United States was likely to kill Osama Bin Laden?

Yes, according to rampant speculation on Twitter. One theory centers on the possibility that the Administration knew the Bin Laden news would wipe the birth certificate issue off the map, therefore freeing the White House to preemptively dismiss the issue with only a few lingering days of negative press coverage.

It’s a compelling theory, and it’s almost certainly untrue.

The public often has a major misconception about the communications function – one that ascribes Machiavellian string-pulling powers to PR folks who scheme about the political gain in every event and prevail successfully upon their principals to follow along.

As a result, the media and the public often look at two unrelated events and try to determine how they’re related. That’s an appropriate question – but it often leads to flawed conclusions that assume causation when coincidence alone is at work. 

One example of this flawed thinking was another bit of speculation on Twitter last night – that Mr. Obama purposely scheduled his televised statement during the final minutes of NBC’s Celebrity Apprentice to knock rival Donald Trump’s show off the air. But facts have a funny way of getting in the way of a good story, and it turns out that ABC and CBS cut to news at about the same moment.

I do find one argument persuasive: During President Obama’s birther speech, he said he had “better things to do.” Perhaps that was a wry allusion to the news he hoped was coming. But that’s the only likely connection I see between the two events.

In the end, these events appear more coincidental than planned – and not part of some master public relations plan cooked up by political spin doctors.

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Related: President Obama’s Birth Certificate Press Conference

In an effort to squelch growing doubts about his nation of birth, President Obama released his long-form birth certificate this morning.

Here’s my question: What took so long?

I don’t say that from the perspective of those in the “birther” movement. I’ve never questioned the President’s American citizenship, and I find questions about his citizenship distasteful, at best.

Rather, I question the White House’s media strategy that allowed this controversy to last so long and take such deep root. How deep? A recent New York Times/CBS poll found that a plurality of Republican voters do not believe President Obama was born in the United States (45 percent believe he was not; only 33 percent do).

In his press conference today, the President blamed the media for fueling this controversy, and he’s right that they did. But the signs have long been there, and the White House should have seen that the political winds most recently exploited by Donald Trump have been blowing in that direction for months.

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I suspect that the White House viewed the birther movement as a helpful ally, one that could help it paint Republicans as extreme. I also suspect that when their overly-clever media strategy got away from them, they realized they needed a new strategy.

I’m sympathetic to those who ask why President Obama should have to release his birth certificate at all, and share their frustration. But Mr. Obama lost more than he gained by waiting, and a more sound media strategy could have prevented the unfounded doubts from growing so broadly.

As President Obama said, the release of the birth certificate won’t satisfy skeptics. His main target appears to be the mainstream media, which he hopes will reduce the airtime on this issue to focus on more serious issues. It will be interesting to see whether the press lavishes attention onto a high-profile book called “Where’s The Birth Certificate” being released next month, or whether Mr. Obama’s strategy encourages them to exercise more restraint.

Given that the White House waited this long, they did the right thing by releasing the birth certificate today. But I wish the Obama campaign had authorized the release of the long-form birth certificate long ago. Instead of rising to the presidential level, his press secretary could have dealt with this issue months – or years – ago.