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Theodore H. White Lecture on Press and Politics with David Brooks 2012 Table of Contents History of the Theodore H. White Lecture and Biography of David Brooks ...........................................................................5 Biographies of Cynthia Tucker and David Nyhan ............................................7 Welcoming Remarks by Alex S. Jones .................................................................9 Awarding of the David Nyhan Prize for Political Journalism to Cynthia Tucker ............................................................................................9 The 2012 Theodore H. White Lecture on Press and Politics “Election 2012: The Big Questions” by David Brooks ............................................................................................14 The 2012 Theodore H. White Seminar on Press and Politics .........................33 Alex S. Jones, Director of the Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy (moderator) David Brooks, T.H. White Lecturer; columnist, The New York Times John Dickerson, chief political correspondent, Slate magazine; political director, CBS News Jennifer Hochschild, Henry LaBarre Jayne Professor of Government and Professor of African and African American Studies, Harvard University Cynthia Tucker, 2012 Nyhan Prize recipient; columnist, Universal Press Syndicate Amy Walter, political director, ABC News Twenty-third Annual Theodore H. White Lecture 3 The Theodore H. White Lecture com- memorates the life of the reporter and historian who created the style and set the standard for contemporary political journalism and campaign coverage. White, who began his journal- ism career delivering the Boston Post, entered Harvard College in 1932 on a newsboy’s scholarship. He studied Chinese history and oriental languages. In 1939 he witnessed the bombing of Chungking while freelance report- ing on a Sheldon Fellowship. In 1959 White sought support for a 20-year research project, a retrospective of presidential campaigns. After being advised by fellow reporters to drop this academic exercise, White took to the campaign trail, and, relegated to the “zoo plane,” changed the course of American political journalism with the publication of The Making of a Presi- dent, in 1960. The 1964, 1968, and 1972 editions of The Making of a President, along with America in Search of Itself, remain vital documents to the study of campaigns and the press. Before his death in 1986, White also served on the Visiting Committee at the Kennedy School of Government; he was one of the architects of what has become the Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy. David Brooks became a New York Times Op-Ed columnist in September 2003. He has been a senior editor at The Weekly Stan- dard, a contributing editor at Newsweek and the Atlantic Monthly, and he is currently a commentator on PBS’s NewsHour. He is the author of Bobos In Paradise: The New Upper Class and How They Got There and On Paradise Drive: How We Live Now (And Always Have) in the Future Tense, both published by Simon & Schuster. His most recent book is The Social Animal: The Hidden Sources of Love, Character, and Achievement, published by Random House in March 2011. Mr. Brooks joined The Weekly Standard at its inception in September 1995, having worked at The Wall Street Journal for the previous nine years. He is a frequent analyst on NPR, and his articles have appeared in the The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine, Forbes, The Washington Post and other magazines. Twenty-third Annual Theodore H. White Lecture 5 Cynthia Tucker is a columnist for Universal Press Syndicate. She is also a commentator on TV and radio news shows. Tucker was editorial page editor of The Atlanta Journal- Constitution newspaper for 17 years, where she led the development of opinion policy. More recently, she was that newspaper’s Washington-based political columnist. In 2007, Tucker won the Pulitzer Prize for commentary. She has received numerous other awards, including Journalist of the Year from the National Association of Black Journalists. In addition, she is a Visiting Professor of Journalism and Charlayne Hunter-Gault Distinguished Writer-in-Residence at the University of Georgia. David Nyhan was a columnist and reporter at The Boston Globe for 30 years. A gradu- ate of Harvard College and a Shorenstein Fellow in the spring of 2001, Nyhan was a regular participant in Shorenstein Center activities before, during and after his Fellow- ship. Nyhan died unexpectedly in 2005. In his eulogy Senator Edward Kennedy said of Nyhan, “Dave was a man of amazing talent, but most of all he was a man of the people who never forgot his roots….In so many ways, but especially in the daily example of his own extraordinary life, Dave was the conscience of his community.” The hallmark of David Nyhan’s brand of journalism was the courage to champion unpopular causes and challenge the powerful with relentless reporting and brave eloquence. In his memory, the Shorenstein Center established the David Nyhan Prize for Political Journalism. Twenty-third Annual Theodore H. White Lecture 7 The Theodore H. White Lecture November 15, 2012 Mr. Jones: Good evening and welcome to all of you. I’m Alex Jones, Director of the Joan Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy, and I’m very happy to welcome you here tonight. This is a big night for the Shorenstein Center. It’s a highlight of our year, without question. We are now marking our 26th anniversary. As some of you already know, the Shorenstein Center was founded in 1986 as a memorial to Joan Shoren- stein Barone, a truly remarkable television journalist who died of breast cancer after a distinguished career. Her father, Walter Shorenstein, endowed the Center as a place for a focused and searching examination of the intersection of press, politics and public policy. Walter Shorenstein not only made the Center possible, but remained vitally interested in what we do and was our unstinting sup- porter and friend. Two years ago, after a long and extraordinary life, he died at 95 and we miss him, mourn him. He was above all else a great citi- zen. And the Theodore H. White Lecture and the David Nyhan Prize are to recognize that same kind of engaged activist citizenship from a journalistic perspective. With us tonight are Walter’s son, Doug Shorenstein, and daughter, Carole Shorenstein Hays. Please join me in expressing appreciation and respect to the Shorenstein family. (Applause) A bit later you will hear from our Theodore White lecturer, David Brooks. But first I have another task to perform, which is also an honor. In 2005 we at the Shorenstein Center lost another great and much admired friend, David Nyhan. Many of you did not know David and I want to speak of him briefly as we this year bestow the eighth annual David Nyhan Prize for Political Journalism. David Nyhan was a man of many parts, a devoted family man, a loyal pal, the best company in the world. I can still feel the glow he imparted as a Fellow at the Shorenstein Center. Tonight we honor David Nyhan, the consummate reporter and political journalist, which is the role that occupied much of his life and at which he could not be bested. David was a reporter and then a columnist at The Boston Globe, and his work had both a theme and a character. The theme was almost always power, political power. And also especially the abuse of political power by the big shots at the expense of the little guys. He also loved politicians. Were he with us today he would have just been coming off the 15-round brutal slug fest for the White House, which he would have engaged tooth Twenty-third Annual Theodore H. White Lecture 9 and claw. But he would not have been predictable. He was always surpris- ing his readers with his take on things because most of all, David Nyhan was his own man and he called them as he saw them. In his memory and honor, the Nyhan family and many friends and admirers of David Nyhan have endowed the David Nyhan Prize for Politi- cal Journalism to recognize the kind of gutsy, stylish, relentless journalism that David embodied. Dave’s wife, Olivia, is with us tonight, as are his children, Veronica, Kate and Nick and other members of the Nyhan family. Please join me in expressing our regard and affection. (Applause) This year’s David Nyhan Prize for Political Journalism is awarded to Cynthia Tucker. I doubt there is a single person in this room who has not read To Kill a Mockingbird. It’s set in a small town in Alabama. It is remark- ably like the town that its author, Harper Lee, grew up in, Monroeville. You will recall that Harper Lee’s next door neighbor in the summer was a little boy named Truman Capote. I don’t know what they put in the aterw in Monroeville, but it must be a powerful writing elixir because that is also the hometown of Cynthia Tucker who was born there in the days when the town was still right out of To Kill a Mockingbird. Cynthia went to segregated schools until she was 17. And I would bet that living the civil rights movement, literally living it, had a lot to do with making her one of the South’s and the nation’s most vibrant liberal voices. She graduated from Auburn University and then went to work for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution back in the days when it was literally true that the paper said on its masthead, “Covers Dixie Like the Dew.” That’s no longer true. In 1980 she left the Journal-Constitution to go to The Philadelphia Inquirer, which at that time, under editor Gene Roberts, also a southerner, was regarded as one of the nation’s small handful of truly outstanding newspapers.