Media Matters: "Spoiling for a fight"

Jamison Foser has a great "Media Matters" post entitled Spoiling for a fight with a great take on Hillary's "troubles" as of late as reflecting back to the idea that she is the inevitable Democratic candidate and who wants that? Moneyquote:

So what was all that talk about "inevitability" really about?

Maybe it reflected the impression the Clinton campaign itself was trying to create; political reporters and pundits have long ascribed that strategy to the campaign even as candidate and staff insisted they weren't taking anything for granted.

But maybe it was something else. Take a look at how some of the nation's most influential journalists have described their profession in the past:

Gloria Borger: "We take people to the top of the mountain and then once we get them to the top of the mountain, it's our job to knock them down." [9/10/06]

Brian Williams: "[I]t does seem true over the years that the news media almost reserve the right to build up and tear down and change their minds and like an underdog." [9/21/00]

Howard Fineman: "We want a race, I suppose. If we have a bias of any kind, it's that we like to see a contest, and we like to see it down the end if we can. And I think that's partly the psychology at play here." [9/21/00]

Many in the media certainly seemed to be building Clinton up prior to the Philadelphia debate -- though it should be noted that they were doing so strictly in a horse-race context. Clinton wasn't getting the kind of fawning media coverage that George W. Bush, John McCain, Rudy Giuliani, and Mike Huckabee have enjoyed at various points in recent years. The storyline wasn't that Clinton is a "straight-talker" or someone you'd "want to have a beer with" or an apolitical "maverick" with "folksy charm."

Instead, media built her up as "inevitable."

Were they doing so simply so they could knock her down? Here's The Washington Post's Anne Kornblut, only moments after Tucker Carlson called Clinton "inevitable" on the October 26 edition of MSNBC's Tucker:

KORNBLUT: I have to say we in the media are spoiling for a fight. Usually we are biased in favor of a good tussle at about this point. ... I wouldn't be surprised if somewhere between now and January 3, now that we know that's when the Iowa caucuses are going to be, to see some kind of reverse, some kind of Obama surge or an Edwards surge. Something that is going to knock Hillary down a few pegs. Whether it's a media creation, or something that actually happens on the ground. I would be shocked if there were nothing like that.

Interestingly, I was having a conversation about this with a friend right before receiving the email with the article from Media Matters in it.

She was asking me what I thought about everything that was going on with what the media is saying about Hillary and her troubles. I more or less echoed what is in the article. [remember - this was before I got the email.] One of the things that I said to her was that Bill and Hillary are consummate politicians and that I wouldn't be surprised if this wasn't all planned, especially from Hillary's comment a few weeks ago that she wasn't going to take anything for granted. Meaning, I assume, that inevitable wasn't necessarily a thing that they wanted on the horizon. It makes one more vulnerable.

Check out the entire article over at Media Matters. It's a great insight.