While Poynter’s Andrew Beaujon enjoyed John Harris and Jim VandeHei take down of Nate Silver, to me, the most important paragraph in Isaac Chotiner’s Q&A with the POLITICO honchos, is where VandeHei answers a question about whether there are any politicians who are really good at “winning the morning” without going too far?
VandeHei believes Rahm Emanuel is better at navigating the media than any other politician around today because “he has the relationships and he understands old media and new media.”
Here’s the key line in his answer, “There aren’t that many on Capitol Hill who I think are savvy. Most of them, it’s old men trying on the new jeans, trying to figure out how to be hip by being on Twitter.”
That last line reminds me of so many pols, not just in D.C., but also in Tallahassee and throughout Florida. Pols trying ‘so hard to be hip’ on Facebook, on Twitter, and in the media, but failing miserably. I am reminded of the silly so-called infographics currently being pumped out by the Republican Party of Florida. I am reminded of the hit-and-run social media accounts the PR firms spend so much time setting up only to let lay dormant. I am reminded of the pointless online initiatives launched by newspapers — remember “MyLawmaker” — which stray so far from their core mission of, you know, reporting the news.
So many old men trying on new jeans who’d be much better off just sticking to their khakis.
