The Maverick and the Media

THE MAVERICK AND THE MEDIA
[Commentary] Sen John McCain is a darling of the media: Reporters routinely attach "maverick," "straight talker" and "patriot" to him like Homeric epithets. But why? The answer, which says a great deal about both the political press and Sen McCain, may be that he is something political reporters really haven't seen in quite a while, perhaps since John F. Kennedy. Seeming to view himself and the whole political process with a mix of amusement and bemusement, Sen McCain is an ironist wooing a group of individuals who regard ironic detachment more highly than sincerity or seriousness. He may be the first real postmodernist candidate for the presidency — the first to turn his press relations into the basis of his candidacy. He acknowledges the symbiosis between himself and the press and, more important, his willingness, even eagerness, to let the press in on his own machinations of them. In exposing his two-way relationship with the press this way, he reveals the absurdity of the political process as a big game. He also reveals his own gleeful cynicism about it. Yet the reporters, so quick in general to jump on hypocrisy, seem to find his insincerity a virtue.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/26/opinion/26gabler.html?ref=todayspaper
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