Conservative columnist Matt Lewis is warning in his new book that while the conservative movement has benefited from a surging conservative media, aspects of that media may be leading to a “dumbing down” of the movement.
In Too Dumb to Fail: How the GOP Betrayed the Reagan Revolution to Win Elections (and How It Can Reclaim Its Conservative Roots), Lewis says the rise of conservative media in recent decades has served as an invaluable corrective to liberal bias in the mainstream press. But he also says it’s acted as a “double-edged sword.”
“I think it’s a mixed bag,” Lewis told the Washington Examiner media desk. “Although I think that conservative media outlets help — they’ve helped expose liberal hypocrisy, forced stories into the mainstream — there’s also a downside.”
Successes of the conservative media include bloggers exposing “Rathergate,” and, most memorably, revealing former president Bill Clinton’s extramarital affair with a White House intern, as the Drudge Report did. The two events bent the course of political history in favor of conservatives and Republicans.
But the “downside,” according to Lewis, has been the explosion of an industry composed partly of “charlatans.”
“The cumulative effect is that voters are misled, charlatans become rich and conscientious political commentators are left on the sidelines,” writes Lewis.
Lewis, of course, counts himself among the “conscientious political commentators.” But he cited pollster Dick Morris as an example of someone who has courted trouble on the right.
“He was assuring voters Mitt Romney was going to win the 2012 election by a landslide,” Lewis said, referring to the roundly mocked predictions by Morris that year that Romney was sure to unseat President Obama. “When voters woke up and saw that was not possible, it didn’t happen, it’s understandable that they may be aggravated, frustrated and essentially scratching their head, wondering, was the election stolen?”
Lewis argues in this book that commentators like Morris have a “perverse incentive” to make faulty predictions or otherwise mislead eager conservative audiences to false conclusions.
“They get rewarded: TV time, buzz, whatever,” he said. “That’s a good business model … but it hurts the conservative movement and the conservative cause.”
Lewis also says conservatives have a problem rushing to claim “third-rate celebrities” for their side, apparently driven by the bitter fact that Hollywood and the entertainment industry are overwhelmingly liberal.
These newfound celebrities of the right “don’t even have to say anything conservative; all they have to do is criticize Obama and we go gaga and we eat it up,” Lewis said. He cited former “Saturday Night Live” cast member Victoria Jackson as an example.
Jackson’s celebrity status gained new life after years in obscurity when in 2008 she came out as an outspoken opponent of Obama’s, when he was running for his first term in office. She called him a “communist.”
Lewis said he’s skeptical of any entertainment figures who turn conservative activist.
“A-list celebrities rarely come running to conservatives when their careers are in their primes,” Lewis writes, “but instead sometimes experience a conservative political awakening as a last-ditch effort to remain relevant.”
In Too Dumb to Fail, Lewis, a fixture on cable news shows and blogger for the DailyCaller.com and TheWeek.com, argues that it’s time for a conservative media “intervention.”
He calls on aspiring conservative writers to focus on the writing and less on the politics. “You actually have to be very talented at your craft; you have to work at actually being a good writer…” he says. “Don’t be a conservative political writer — be a writer who happens to have conservative ideas.”
And for talk radio, where fiery conservative commentary thrives, Lewis advises hosts to turn down the hyperbole and refrain from giving liberals an easy target.
“Talk show hosts who truly care about advancing the conservative movement (not just about ratings and stirring up controversy) must adapt to these changing times and train themselves not to provide fodder for their political enemies,” he said.
Too Dumb to Fail publishes Jan. 26.
