can we be more than we are?
that's the question linc asked me in an e-mail and he answered with 'yes!'
i don't know if it's the holiday or ruth's wise words or what but at the start of the week, a lot of readers were saying they were depressed or feeling down and as we roll on towards the 4th of july, it seems like we've come alive.
i called up the wonderful ruth and found out that her words were as much for her readers as they were for her grandchildren who were really excited during the conyers' hearing and had grown less so as the days moved on.
i asked where was the yiddish in her last columns and confessed that i run to a friend with each word to learn how to pronounce them. she said she'd decided to hold back on some humor in the last post and just try to get the message across plainly because she didn't feel like it was being said enough and that it needed to be said.
i spent most of the day on the phone. i'm much more likely to pick up the phone and then to boot up the computer.
with c.i. the topic was judith miller. c.i. said that with my p.r. background i should have some idea of how to fix the problems to which i replied nobody sells something like c.i. so don't be so damn modest.
the new york times has only made judith miller's situation worse. myself, i don't care whether she goes to jail or not. there are a lot more important issues in my book. but we brainstormed and came up with some things that the paper should be doing but hasn't.
as ava and c.i. pointed out, rightly, in their dvd review of jane fonda's the electric horseman, the message has been a problem. here they are discussing a scene in the movie where jane fonda's hallie is confronted with a first amendment issue:
Don't miss the scene where Hallie's pressed to reveal her source. Fonda plays it perfectly. Hallie realizes where it's going and she's not backing down. Think about Judith Miller's various public pleas, The Charlie Rose Show for one, where she tries to manage the grit and sweetness combo that Sally Field can toss off without breaking a sweat. If Miller didn't veer between that extreme and her infamous bravado ("I was proved fucking right!"), if she showed some of the spirit Fonda's Hallie does, she might make you give a damn about her plight.
Hallie's not playing it modest, but her argument is for a free press. With Miller's public announcements, it never veers from the personal, the I-Judith! (And no matter how she strives for gamine, the fact is Miller's not very likeable and she has her own reporting to blame for that.)
i-judith! truly captures the problem with the p.r. on this.
there's no persona to sell. she's not believable as 'soft judy' and they should have realized that after charlie rose. between those soft focus moments she's bellowed 'i was proved fucking right!'
and that makes the person all the more difficult to sell.
a few months ago, some 1 should have gotten a hold of her and began a remodel/make over.
the hair's a problem but there's not much she can do without it being obvious at this point. 1 thing she can do is push the bangs to side. instead of letting them frame her forehead, let them frame the side of her face. that would help a great deal in terms of new look can make some 1 look at you differently. any major change would backfire so that's about the most she can do.
she needs to dress better. the darks are a problem for her but there again it's too late to change that. so what she should do is wear professional outfits in dark shades and wear a white blouse whenever possible with those professional outfits. no more of the audrey hepburn like outfits with their soft necklines. people aren't buying it. it comes off false. she needs to wear some dark suits that are tailored.
the paper ran 2 pictures of her in 1 day this week. while that was a huge mistake for the paper and for her cause, when we were discussing her bangs, c.i. pointed out the inside photo and how she looked so much more approachable without the bangs layering that forehead. if it wouldn't come off too sally field, she could be wearing a handband or clips to pull back the bangs completely but it's too late for that so what she needs to do now is just push them to the sides so that they frame her face and not cover it.
there should be no statements of fear on her part about the possible jail time. no 1 bought her as soft to begin with. she should make statements like 'i believe in the freedom in the press and if defending that right means going to jail, i will gladly go to jail.'
why? it makes her appear strong. and note that we didn't include her saying 'i was right' in any of that. the truth of the matter is judy miller was not 'proved fucking right' on anything and when she makes any sort of statement to that effect it just stirs up the ill will she's trying to overcome.
miller needs to dress professional and to act professional. she should not take it to the personal because no 1 honestly cares. if she went on hardball and chris matthews listened to her make statements like the 1 offered above and he said, 'but judy you could go to jail?' she should reply 'this is a principle, chris, it goes beyond me.' if he followed up with 'but how do you really feel?'
she should reply with something along the lines of 'i feel honored that i've been given the chance to defend the rights of a free press. this isn't about me or what story i might write tomorrow or next month, this is about what our press will or will not stand for in the future and i'm strong enough to fight this battle and it is 1 i belive in.'
picture miller saying that cool and calm. right away the audience gets the issue. forget her trumped up wmd stories because they aren't the issue. she's just said that. she's made it all about the issues as she sees them and the responses will have to reflect the ground that she's staked out.
the new york times needs to handle it differently as well. you can't humanize judith miller. it backfires on you. make her iconic. start making the issue the freedom of the press. use that space to give a historical essay on the freedom of the press. in fact, we think the paper should do a series of articles. not on the op-ed pages, not in editorials, as stories in the main section.
this isn't where they name check past press struggles, this is where they do a history. the thrust of the article is not 'poor judy!' but the freedom of the press. within those articles, the case is made repeatedly for the importance of a free press. judith miller is mentioned in some of them but it is in relation to the case.
that's how the times gets behind this. not with yet another article about judy miller. no 1's buying it and they should have realized that a long time ago. if they're wanting to defend her, they need to do it via a news series on the press under attack in previous times.
they also need to grasp that not every 1 knows woodward & bernstein. c.i. loves to tell the tale of a woman in her thirties who had a degree in journalism and wrote a script. c.i. reads over it and the main character's a reporter. but she never comes off as a reporter. so c.i. recommends some band aids, such as 'why don't you mention woodward & bernstein' and the woman, who holds a degree in journalism, asks, 'who are they?'
generations have come of age since watergate and earlier struggles are not well known to a great many people. the times would be doing a service to the public (and probably help stem the negative poll results) by making the case for a free press via an article or articles that informed readers of past battles and how they informed the public.
in that article or series of articles, judith miller is not the opening paragraph. this should read as history and miller should be tied in near the end.
those were our basic results from brainstorming. again, i could care less. i won't lose any sleep. c.i. does care about it. and i didn't last as long as i did in public relations by only being able to sell things i believed in.
tomorrow i'm going to discuss the fiction in the third estate sunday review. but i'll leave this entry with the focus being on tips as to how the times can turn the story around.
