This sounds like an olive branch to the press, a gesture to try to win back their good will. If that's what Anthony Scaramucci thinks is going to result from the return of televised briefings, he is going to learn quickly that there's no point trying to make nice with the media if you work for a Republican president. I don't mind that Trump hired a communication director who is not conservative. It's not Scaramucci's job to make policy. But if his view of the press is influenced by the fact that he is not a conservative, then he is going to learn very quickly how they treat you when you become one - which, for the purposes of his new job, he essentially does:
The White House briefings for weeks have been held off-camera, aggravating reporters used to sparring with the press secretary or deputy press secretary in a live, televised setting.
An exception to this trend was last Friday, when the White House held its first on-camera briefing in nearly a month on Friday -- to announce Press Secretary Sean #'s resignation, Sarah Huckabee Sanders' promotion to the post and Scaramucci's hiring.
The last on-camera press briefing before last week was June 29.
During the briefing on Friday, Scaramucci did not specifically commit to "regular" on-camera press briefings.
"The answer is we may," Scaramucci said. "I have to talk to the president about that. I like consulting with the president before I make decisions like that."
This is a terrible idea. Not even a little bit good. All bad. Disaster with a capital D.
Disaster with a capital D
And what makes it so bad is the fact that there is no legitimate reason to televise the briefings in the first place. If I'm reporting a story and I need information, I go to the source and I ask for the information. Then I write it down and I use it in my reporting. There's no reason anyone needs to see video or hear audio of my asking the question or receiving the answer. The news value is in what I do with the information once I've got it, not in some live drama that's involved in my getting it while you hang on every second.
Ah, but the press objects, there is news value to the facial expressions, the hesitations, the hemming and the hawing of the White House spokesman. There is news value in watching them squirm at an uncomfortable question, they insist, or in giving an answer that they have to come back later and correct.
No. There's not.
The only news value is in accurate information. If you call a source on the phone and ask a question, and the source doesn't know the answer but vows to get it and call you back with it later, it's not important to your reader that all this went on. You don't put it in your story. The reader doesn't care and shouldn't care. The reader only cares about what the information is, and why they should be confident it's accurate.
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There's nothing you can do to mollify the press
And the problem with making a big deal out of facial expression, awkward pauses and the like is that they don't always mean what they appear to mean when you watch it in the cold light of day. A person might just be thinking carefully about the answer he or she wants to formulate, but you see this pause of whatever length and you jump to the conclusion that the person was nervous or trapped or whatever. There is no news value to that.
But this brings us to the real reason the media want these briefings televised. In reality, they see them as hand-to-hand combat. Each one is hoping to ask the question that a) stumps the press secretary; or b) leads to an embarrassing answer; or c) sparks the nasty back-and-forth that becomes that days trending Twitter video. It is not about getting and reporting information at all. It's about drama, pure and simple. And if Scaramucci brings the televised briefings back, he's going to find that all the press does with it is heighten the drama for its own purposes and then use what they create to aid them in their case that the Trump presidency is a trainwreck.
I hope he reconsiders. There's nothing you can do to mollify the press when they're out for your scalp, but this is an especially bad idea because it gives them back the weapon they want the most and need the least. Don't do it.
