Media's role questioned amid flap over Guard duty

Written by Caroline Bermudez with contributions from Christopher R. Williams for The Journal-Gazette,     Fort Wayne IN

It was Huntington's day in the national spotlight.  Their boy, Sen. Dan Quayle, is the Republican vice-presidential nominee, and several thousand people attended the George Bush-Dan Quayle rally Friday to beam proudly and cheer him on.

But when the speeches ended, the hoopla subsided and the crowd filtered, the newsmaking had just begun.

During a news conference immediately after the rally, Quayle answered questions about how and why he joined the National Guard in 1969, when other young men were being drafted and sent to Vietnam.

"The implication is: People were dying in Vietnam and you were writing press releases," shouted one reporter.  The comment elicited boos and hisses from the crowd, which had regrouped in front of a stack of speakers turned on so all could hear Quayle's replies.  And what they heard made them angry.  Reporters seemed to be tearing their boy apart.

Quayle was not left alone to stand judgment.  Reporters, too, are being judged for the way they handled and are handling Quayle.

"I feel the coverage is right on target," said Ben Johnson, managing editor of the Columbia Missourian, a morning daily at the University of Missouri, Columbia, which has given ample coverage to the National Guard issue.  "I think it's a legitimate issue to explore, given the senator's staunch pro-defense stance," said Johnson, who served as a Marine in 1968.

But Melissa Long, co-anchor of WKJG-TV, Channel 33, Fort Wayne, said: "I feel some members of the media have lost their perspective of their role in society.  I feel they've taken on the posture of judge and jury."

Reporters have been hounding Quayle since Wednesday, when the questions arose as to whether he was helped by influential friends and family to join the state militia to avoid being drafted and sent to Vietnam.

"Basically what has happened is there are 17,000 reporters in this town (New Orleans) without a whole lot of news," Roger Ailes, Bush's media adviser said.

And when Bush took the country by surprise las week and gave the vice-presidential nod to Quayle, who was seen as a long-shot among Bush's options, the media were caught off-guard.

To the national media, Quayle is an unknown.  As a result, reporters have been scrambling to find out anything they can about him.  Since the story of Quayle's being tapped as Bush's running mate broke, local reporters and Huntington residents have been receiving calls non-stop from reporters intent on digging up information on Quayle.

"There's been a lot of speculation (in the national coverage)," said Bob Campbell, news director of Indianapolis' WTHR-TV, Channel 13.

"We're not going to hold any stories, but we'll be more polite.  I don't think we're hitting it any less, we're approaching it in a more dignified fashion."

Some local media have attempted to make that distinction clear to their audiences.

Long's station did so with a comment made during Friday evening's newscast.

After running a news clip of Quayle being questioned in Huntington, Long pointed out that it was the national media who were doing the grilling.

"While the spot was running, we received about 50 to 75 telephone calls about the questioning of the senator," Long said.

"They felt the reporters were being less than fair or badgering.  My news director wanted me to clarify that it wasn't our reporters asking the question, and that it was members of the national media."

Long said her station will continue to cover Quayle and the National Guard issue objectively.

"We are here to present the facts and let the public decide," she said.

But the facts haven't been clear, and that's what has set off the feeding frenzy.

Bush and Quayle have been letting out the story piecemeal, and, because of that, reporters have had to ask the same questions over and over.

Campbell said he was surprised at the insistence and redundance of the questioning in Huntington.

"They weren't real polite, but they've been trying to get at this for four days now," he said.

"They gang up for unusual reasons, they get carried away," said Richard D. Yoakam, professor of journalism at Indiana University, Bloomington.

"But it's a story, no question about it.  This is the first national party candidate who is of the Vietnam generation, and that war is still a very, very troublesome thing.

"That was an unseemly affair in Huntington," Yoakam said.

"I think the press got set up, and they were displayed at their very worst," he said.

But the Huntington reaction was natural.

"People don't like the media very well," Yoakam said.  "They don't like nosey people, and we're nosey.

"Plus, the entire audience wasn't a Republican, conservative, happy-about-their-guy-getting-on-the-national-ticket audience."

But when the dust settles, who will be the losers?  The jury's still out, the reporters say.

"At this moment, I think it's the media," Campbell said.  "In their persistence, they look like they're being the bad guys.

"I'm not wholly satisfied, I think there's more to it.  But, at this point, I'm wondering how much it makes a difference."