Acosta not a journalist
A few years ago if I stopped ten people and asked them who Jim Acosta was I doubt more than two of them would have known. He was a handsome, capable, yet easily forgettable reporter on a lowrated cable channel. Then came Donald Trump. Now Acosta is a star who is probably in line for a six figure book deal. An author he may well become but please don’t call him a journalist.
Listen, I know the president is rude and out of line and I hate it when he paints the media with a broad brush and calls us the enemy of the people. We are not. As a whole, there are lots of journalists doing a solid job reporting the news, especially at the local level where we don’t get caught up in national politics. I understand that the president can be a first-class bully and jerk when he wants to; he’s guilty as charged. All that said, Jim Acosta is not a journalist. Not anymore.
Being a news geek I enjoy watching White House press briefings on C-Span. Watch enough of them and you can’t miss the pattern that some reporters in the press room have. What Acosta has been doing isn’t close to the definition of journalism and the reason he is doing what he is doing is both brilliant and self-serving.
I started this column telling you before Donald Trump came along no one knew who Acosta was. That’s no longer the case. Of the hundred or so White House reporters how many get to go on Stephen Colbert of Jimmy Kimmel’s show? Just one, Acosta. Why? Because he behaves like the “opposition party”, not a journalist.
Before you send me angry emails just let me do a brief autopsy on the recent dust up that got Acosta kicked out of the White House. The President makes a statement and opens the floor to questions. Let me say that word again- questions. You ask, he answers. That’s how it works. A couple of the reporters did just that and then it was Acosta’s turn. The very first words from his mouth to the president were, “I want to challenge you.” So right out of the gate we are not getting a question from a reporter, we are getting a political position and lecture from the all-knowing Jim Acosta.
He continued his non-question by telling the president that the caravan coming toward America was not an invasion and asked why Trump was demonizing people? He got an answer (without any bloodshed) even though he interrupted the president more than once. There were two follow up statements disguised as questions from Acosta which were answered rudely by the president and at that point everyone in the room wanted to move on. After all you had 100 reporters with their hands in the air patiently waiting their turn.
You know what happened next. Acosta refused to give up the microphone, which doesn’t belong to him by the way, as another reporter stood waiting. Then we had the young intern trying to do her job and take the mic away which didn’t go well. Once he did give up the microphone and sit down and the NBC reporter was finally in the middle of his question Acosta stood back up and shouted over his colleague at the president. From the time Acosta was called on to ask a question until the moment he finally stopped shouting at the president, 2 minutes and 37 seconds went by. Yes, I timed it. It was, make no mistake, the Jim Acosta show.
To understand why I say Acosta is not a journalist let me give you a fictional example using me. When the governor passed the “safe act” gun control measure many people upstate were upset. If I went to his first news conference after that bill became law and said to Andrew Cuomo, “Governor, John Gray from News10. I’m going to challenge you. The safe act does not make us safe. All it does is punish law abiding citizens and limiting bullets in gun clips is stupid.” I would fully expect Governor Cuomo to rip me apart because I was not acting as a journalist, I’d be nothing more than a shill for the NRA.
Reporters are not robots, we have opinions and feelings and we get angry over issues just like everyone else. But it’s your job to keep your personal opinions out of the briefing room. And that rule applies no matter how much you may dislike or do not respect the person taking the questions.
All that said, I do believe the White House was wrong to pull Acosta’s credentials. I simply would have told the entire press corps that reporters who make statements and grandstand instead of asking questions will not be called on. Period. Acosta’s whole existence is to place himself in the spotlight. Take that attention away and I suspect the days of reporters playing the role of “the resistance” would soon end.