One Giant TV Studio

By WILLIAM A. HENRY III

Print triumphs in adversity

At the moment they walked into Moscone Center last week and surveyed their back-seat accommodations, print reporters at the Democratic Convention realized that they were, more than ever, mere onlookers at a network TV spectacular. From the layout of the hall to the schedule of proceedings, everything was designed to assist or beguile ABC, NBC, CBS and a new but virtually coequal presence, Cable News Network. The long, low, wire-laden convention hall looked like, and became, an enormous TV studio. The delegates, the nominal center of activity, served mainly as a massive studio audience, providing emotional (and often selective and misleading) reaction shots during speeches. The four network booths loomed above the floor and podium, affording their glassed-in anchors the best seats in the house.

Reporters for wire services and major newspapers, by contrast, were tucked away on platforms placed diagonally behind the podium: even when standing, many of them could not see the speakers, the delegates or much of anything else except the glowing network insignia and the distant figures of CBS's Dan Rather, NBC's Tom Brokaw and ABC's Peter Jennings and David Brinkley. Said Editor Robert Maynard of the Oakland Tribune: "This is just another dramatic example that TV has completely taken over center stage in American politics."

Yet for all the prominence accorded the networks, at the moment when the Democrats made history by nominating Geraldine Ferraro for Vice President, all three networks were airing sitcoms. Contending that the convention lacked news value because it offered little suspense or surprise, the networks dropped all pretense of covering "gavel to gavel." Instead, they aired highlights for little more than two hours a night. CBS did not even carry addresses by the nation's highest-ranking Democrat, House Speaker Tip O'Neill, or by Congressman Morris Udall, who controversially urged the party to reconcile itself with former President Jimmy Carter. ABC, misled about what time Jesse Jackson would speak, cut away from Tuesday evening's session to broadcast 24 minutes of a rerun of the thriller series Hart to Hart; it returned to the convention without finishing the story (not to worry, the Harts trapped the would-be assassin, as rival NBC mockingly informed viewers two nights later). The truncated schedule left scarcely any time for the pretaped background on personalities and issues, profiles of delegates or enterprising features that had distinguished past coverage. NBC Commentator John Chancellor, covering his 15th convention, admitted in an interview, "In two to three hours of pageantry, we have not had a lot of time for reporting."

Although the convention was orderly compared with past Democratic gatherings, the multitude of roving TV cameras by their very presence tended to magnify conflict. Rumors about defecting delegates or brewing rules fights, even as they were sagely debunked from the anchor booths, tended to reverberate into mini-dramas as they were tossed back and forth among floor correspondents. The wandering reporters also sought to generate confrontations: CBS's Ed Bradley tried to force an on-air meeting between Chicago Mayor Harold Washington and Cook County Democratic Chairman Edward Vrdolyak, who are not on speaking terms. Exasperated by the prodding, Washington called Bradley, on-camera, "one of the lowest possible individuals I've seen."

Network executives admitted privately that for reasons of public relations, they did not want to approach the convention with normal journalistic skepticism but wanted to treat it as comparable to a royal wedding. Conceded ABC'S Brinkley, who was covering his 17th convention: "We have not significantly challenged the claims made in speeches, and some of them were dubious, if not appalling." While stinting discussion of the historic implications of Jesse Jackson's quest, and of the sweeping ideological nature of the challenges in his speech, the networks dwelled on it for its roof-raising theatrics, with Rather breathlessly urging viewers "to get Grandma in" to watch.

The conventions and election night in November are traditionally the Super Bowl for TV news departments, with the ratings winner gaining an advantage in prestige for years to come. But political coverage customarily costs the networks a sizable portion of its viewers, and last week was no exception. "Night after night, the cumulative share of viewers drawn by ABC, NBC and CBS was less--often much less--than half the total TV audience.

The most successful anchor, in preliminary ratings and on-camera command, was CBS's Rather. He seemed unflappable, and muted the politics-junkie hyperbole that had marred some past performances. NBC's Brokaw made quick yet persuasive judgments, but some notable boners: he claimed that O'Neill's congressional district is in South Boston (it is in Cambridge); during a platform dispute he allowed Georgia's Hosea Williams to defend Atlanta Mayor Andrew Young at length without pointing out that Young had recently endorsed Williams' congressional challenge to a white Democratic incumbent. ABC's Jennings, who has spent most of his career as a foreign correspondent, blandly deferred to the veteran Brinkley like a bright but attentive son. Brinkley, although sagacious and saltily perceptive, later acknowledged at least one major goof: he misidentified Birmingham Mayor Richard Arrington, whose support had been crucial for Mondale among blacks and in Alabama, as a Jackson supporter.

Because the schedule was so confined, the networks' supporting players had little to do. Among the most under utilized assets were former CBS Anchor Walter Cronkite, whose commentaries often came long after events, and NBC'S Roger Mudd, who was wedged in at the podium and unable to make full use of his formidable contacts. Perhaps the shrewdest analysis came from Chancellor, in pointing out the nostalgic, New Deal strain in several major speeches.

Neither the lack of breaking news nor the domination of the events by television deterred print reporters. Papers for which politics is a strong suit --notably, the Washington Post, Boston Globe and Baltimore Sun--provided copious coverage. The Los Angeles Times ably used a detailed demographic and issue survey of almost every delegate.

Among the New York Times 's succession of good stories was a much copied Page One feature on the problems of body language and etiquette facing male and female running mates. Local papers basked in sudden national attention: the San Jose Mercury News pursued every angle, including whether prostitutes considered Democrats good customers (the answer: no, too cheap); the Oakland Tribune expressed the wistful envy of print journalists toward TV in asserting that the networks had even brought along shoeshine boys.

Frustrated as all the journalists may have been, they came in record numbers: the quadrennial party gatherings now serve as conventions for newsmen and -women, whose 14,000-strong legions this year outnumbered the delegates by more than 3 to 1. Said ABC Correspondent Jeff Greenfield: "It is like the best possible reunion--everybody in my life is here."

The ranks of workaday reporters were even expanded by celebrity writers. One seemingly unlikely duo: Hunter Thompson, the Rolling Stone guru of "gonzo" journalism, and his admiring companion Ron Reagan, the President's son, who was writing a color piece for Playboy that he termed "bonzo" journalism. Joked young Reagan: "Every four years the journalists of this country hold conventions, and the political parties pander to them by providing the entertainment." At times, that almost seemed true.

--By William A. Henry III