Politico.com opened a rich vein of controversy in March when it
reported that “President Obama doesn’t go anywhere without his
teleprompter.… No other president has used one so consistently and
at so many events, large and small.” Indeed, I have learned Obama
sometimes brings a teleprompter to the Indian Treaty Room at the
Eisenhower Executive Office Building and uses it to speak to as few
as 15 people.
Obama’s reliance on the device has led some to assert it has
become a crutch he can’t throw away—much like the cigarettes it’s
been rumored the chief executive still sneaks puffs on. “After the
teleprompter malfunctioned a few times last summer and Obama
delivered some less-than-soaring speeches, reports surfaced that he
was training to wean himself off of the device while on vacation in
Hawaii. But no luck,” noted Politico.com.
Indeed, several reporters took notice of the new teleprompter
that Obama unveiled at his late March news conference. Fox News
opened its post- conference analysis by showing a picture of a
52-inch teleprompter that had been positioned in the back of the
room, replacing the usual two screens flanking the podium. The
change had clearly been made to make sure the TV cameras covering
the event didn’t pick up a view of the device. Moderate columnist
Ruben Navarrette acknowledged that “the popular narrative from
conservatives— that Obama stumbles when he is off the
teleprompter—is becoming more believable.”
But do conservatives agree on the significance of the fact that
a man known as a gifted orator often uses a teleprompter? There are
sharp divergences of opinion. Thomas Sowell of the Hoover
Institution is acidic: “As it turns out, Obama has been such a
bumbling incompetent that he probably couldn’t handle a trip
through a Wendy’s drive-in window without a teleprompter telling
him what to order.” Michael Gerson, former speechwriter for
President Bush, is kinder, even gentle: “With a teleprompter, Obama
can be ambitiously eloquent, without it, he tends to be soberly
professional. A teleprompter speech represents the elevation of
writing in politics. And good writing has an authenticity of its
own.”
Tucker Carlson, the former MSNBC host, took issue with Obama
critics such as Glenn Beck who worry that the teleprompter should
cause Americans to worry “about who’s writing every word for this
man.” “I am completely for the teleprompter,” he told a New York
audience this month. “I know it’s frustrating for conservatives
that there’s this narrative that Obama is stunningly eloquent when
he’s often not. But you can’t change a narrative once it’s set in
people’s minds. They will even reject direct evidence to the
contrary.” Deroy Murdock, a syndicated columnist for Scripps
Howard, also gives Obama a pass: “God bless him and his
teleprompter. Ronald Reagan used one to great effect to give great
speeches, so who are we to criticize its use now?”
Liberals responded to the Obama teleprompter issue by dismissing
it and using it as an excuse for more Bush bashing. CNN’s Rick
Sanchez introduced a segment on the issue by claiming “the far
right this week has been saying that President Obama is too stupid
to talk without a script.” He then played David Letterman’s skit
titled “Teleprompter vs. No Teleprompter,” which pitted an excerpt
from Obama’s first speech to Congress against a clip from an
informal town hall meeting given by former President Bush. It was
no contest, although it would have been fairer also to compare an
Obama speech with one of his own gaffe-prone speeches when he was
winging it on the campaign trail.
All that said, Obama sometimes gets a bum rap for mistakes
related to his constant traveling companion. At a March St.
Patrick’s Day event, he was standing next to Irish prime minister
Brian Cowen when the foreign leader started giving President
Obama’s remarks off the teleprompter. Mr. Obama then stepped in and
said: “First, I’d like to say thank you to President Obama.…” But
he was ad-libbing to break the tension, not reading mindlessly from
the screen. Yet even Obama’s joke served to underline an impression
that he’s become overly scripted and too dependent on the
device.
THE JOKE HAS GONE SO FAR that a satirical blog
(www.baracksteleprompter.blogspot.com) has been started in which
the president’s teleprompter dishes up presidential gossip and
snarky comments about White House message development. In
mid-March, the blog noted press reports that Obama’s aides were
trying again to wean the president off the teleprompter
crutch. “Are they insane? With this rabid press corps constantly
looking to pin Him down for every…detail about obscure legislation
like the TARP funding? Or the economic stimulus bill? All that kind
of detail can’t be fit on little note cards.”
Indeed, the teleprompter blog has confirmed reports in The
American Spectator online that the White House is now “looking
into how to hide video screens in podiums the president uses.” Such
placement of screens would allow aides to scroll speech texts,
messages, and even statistical data or quick points to be made by
Obama in answering press questions. That would create a “wow”
factor—an impression of competence and skill that would be
unwarranted—akin to when President Kennedy was leaked in advance
some of the questions that would be posed to him at White House
news conferences, which reinforced the liberal narrative that he
was a charming master of all subjects.
Using teleprompters for speeches is fine. What worries some
Americans and should worry reporters is if use of such devices goes
further and allows a president to pretend he is something he is
not. As former Bush administration speechwriter Peter Roff notes, a
presidential news conference is a test of sorts—a test of
presidential skill under pressure.
Having top aides transmit behind-the-scenes updates to be used
during a seemingly spontaneous event would be akin to a student
writing the answers to a test on a shirt cuff. After all, it wasn’t
so long ago that left-wing bloggers fell into a frenzied lather
complaining that the bulge in President Bush’s suit during a 2004
debate with John Kerry was secretly giving him electronic
assistance in answering questions.
Barack Obama isn’t the first president to use a teleprompter,
and such a device can clarify his thinking and make it easier for
the American people to understand his policies. But it’s also
appropriate for the media to note just how much more he is using it
than did his predecessors, and that there is a line beyond which a
“Great Communicator” becomes a “Wizard of Oz”—a puffed-up figure
who is much less impressive once people look behind the curtain.
