Salon Media Circus | Tabloid mud wrestling!


T A B L E_.T A L K Is the newspaper of record falling short of its own high standards? Weigh in on the New York Times in the Media area of Table Talk - - - - - - - - - - R E C E N T L Y The best little ass-kicking columnist in Texas By Carol Lloyd When Molly Ivins slaps leather, corporate fat cats, welfare slashers and arrogant media stars bite the dust (04/21/98) The squirrel and the computer By Robert Winkler When a small life and a computer screen both went blank at the same moment, something else lit up: conscience (04/20/98) Bestseller Hell By Jon Carroll James Van Praagh's friendly ghosts (04/17/98) The curse of the Pulitzer? By Dwight Garner Will the New York Times put book critic Michiko Kakutani out to pasture now that she's won the big prize? (04/16/98) Greener pastures By Jenn Shreve Out of the growing glut of finance mags, one zine is poised to capture the expanding market of young investors (04/15/98) - - - - - - - - - - BROWSE THE MEDIA CIRCUS ARCHIVE		Tabloid mud wrestling! NATIONAL ENQUIRER REPORTER ASKS CLINTON-BASHERS: WHAT'S SLEAZIER -- MY ELVIS DIET STORIES OR YOUR VINCE FOSTER RAVINGS? BY CHRISTOPHER RODELL It was the kind of recognition that sets the pulses of ambitious young writers racing. Out of the blue, a Washington think-tank opinion-monger recognized my name and heaped praise upon my freelance work. "Do you write for the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review?" Why, yes, I do. "Man, you're doing a great job. Keep up the good work. The whole country is going to find out about you. Just keep it up. Don't be intimidated. Keep after the truth." Appeal to someone's vanity and you fog their sense. My mind was sipping at the heady praise while straining out the odd facts. Truth seeker? Don't be intimidated? What gives? One after another, more than a dozen of them from all over the country, they'd all said essentially the same things: Pittsburgh-based writer connected to a specific paper (true); America is hungering for my work (unlikely); and they hinted I was a courageous (false), hard-working (false) journalist (call me that again and I'll smack you). It wasn't until months later that it hit me like a bolt of lightning. "They think I'm the No. 1 Media Enemy of the White House!" They were confusing me with the man White House Press Secretary Mike McCurry called a "hate merchant" out to topple the Clinton presidency with his conspiratorial insinuations of murder and deceit. They think I'm the guy George Stephanopoulos described as a "deeply dishonest journalist. Crazy guy, I think." They think I'm Christopher Ruddy, architect of both the Vince Foster and Ron Brown murder theories and author of "The Very Strange Death of Vince Foster," No. 1 with a bullet on Clinton haters' bestseller list. To whom the mistaken identity is more insulting, I cannot say. Because during the time I was being praised for doing Ruddy's work, more than 20 million tabloid readers were devouring my National Enquirer story under the shrieking headline: "The Elvis Diet: I ate like The King and gained 20 lbs. in one week!!!" While Ruddy was digging up bones, I was digging through Brenda Butler's Elvis cookbook, "Are You Hungry Tonight?" as part of the wacky work that is my bread and butter, or, more appropriately my fried peanut butter and banana sandwich. I've spent the better part of the last five years as a top non-celebrity features writer for America's most notorious and entertaining newspaper. We live in strange times when a supermarket tabloid reporter can take legitimate offense at being mistaken for a top reporter at a so-called mainstream newspaper, a media star who's a regular guest on nationwide radio and TV babblefests. Stranger still when it's easier for me to defend working for that same supermarket tabloid than it is for any of the Washington rabble to justify playing rugby outside Monica Lewinsky's apartment. How did we get here? First a little background. I've been a reporter and then a twice-monthly columnist at the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, ground zero for Hillary Clinton's "vast right-wing conspiracy." The paper is owned by Richard Mellon Scaife, the ultra-conservative reclusive fat cat who spends his millions promulgating White House misdeeds, real and imagined, while spending his time, perhaps, poking sharp needles into the "distinguishing characteristics" of his Bill Clinton doll. Scaife's front-page headlines are devoted to conspiratorial tales of strange deaths, drug deals and randy antics of the first guy and his diabolical wife, most of which appear above the byline of Chris Ruddy. Ruddy's lurid stories are widely disseminated through the Internet and numerous Scaife-funded media outlets. Every other Sunday from 1994-97, tucked way back behind the sports, food, style, travel and entertainment, appeared my innocuous column. Sure, it wasn't featured very prominently, but if anyone wanted to get to Ziggy they had to get past me first. It was considered a humor column only because the rest of the paper is so relentlessly humorless. Reading the T-R since Clinton became president has been like eating a greasy breakfast. Any nourishment you might get from the ordeal will be overwhelmed by the body's reflex to pass the whole mess. Although my column had no pretensions to greatness, it gave me the opportunity to write silly observations about knife-wielding monkeys, moon vacations and the foul balls I snagged at two Pirates games. But the happy little column was little more than a pastime. My days were spent finding and writing about the greatest true stories in America. I spent eight years as a serious journalist and never once in all that time did I use the work "wacky." Now, if I don't use it three times by Thursday, it's probably a slow week. Headlines that have graced some of my recent stories include: "Town Saved By Giant Ball of Twine!!!"; "World's Coolest Hotel Made Entirely of Ice!!!"; and the memorable "Hotdog Lawyer Quits to Open Mustard Museum!!!" All true. How do those stack up against "Brown's Wound Appeared to be From Gunshot" and "Starr's Report on Foster Death Questionable"? Ruddy bolstered this latter position when he told Rush Limbaugh on Feb. 3, 1994, "Let's face it, this is not the first time somebody's stuck a gun in someone's hand and said it was a suicide when in fact the person had been murdered." Perhaps it's a sign of the very strange death of good journalism, but Ruddy's stories of deep, vast conspiracies are much more likely to seep into the mainstream media than my features. Many editors and producers consider him an investigative reporter worthy of equal billing with reporters from the Washington Post or NBC News. Some of these same editors have slammed professional doors in my face simply because of my association with the Enquirer. My feature stories involve extraordinary things happening to ordinary people. Tell the same story under the banner of the Wall Street Journal -- a story source gold mine for me -- and journalism professionals will nod approvingly, "That's amazing. Crazy world, isn't it?" But if the same story and the same facts appears in the Enquirer, those same editors will angrily denounce it as the source for "Elvis Is Alive!" stories (never), two-headed toddlers (that was Life magazine) and alien babies (show me one and I'll give you a fortune). Andy Rooney said people should try to live in a town with two newspapers, preferably with one you can hate. He said that back when towns had two newspapers and when some people sort of liked their newspaper. Now public believability polls place the media on the same murky level as used car salesmen, Mafia turncoats and, gulp, Congress. So, please don't confuse me with Chris Ruddy. And until daily newspapers straighten out their focus and locate the mainstream again, don't even call me a journalist. I'll stay a storyteller for the National Enquirer, enjoying a weekly lovefest between me and our happy horde of loyal readers. And if you're ever introduced to Chris Ruddy, do me one small favor. Tell him he did a great job on the story about the giant ball of twine. SALON \| April 22, 1998 Christopher Rodell's assignments as a top non-celebrity feature writer for the National Enquirer have included wearing a kilt in front of jeering construction workers and lying on a bed of nails while being pounded with a sledgehammer. This is his first story for Salon.