Bush and Gore on Oprah Winfrey, or the “Oprah-fication”1 of American Presidential Candidates by John Kares Smith, Ph.D. Professor of Communication Studies State University of New York Oswego, New York 13126 [email protected]
“Let’s begin here,” Joshua Gamson begins his book, “talk shows are bad for you, so bad you could catch a cold. Turn them off, a women’s magazine suggested in 1995, and turn on Mother Teresa, since watching her ‘caring feelings’ radiate from the screen, according to psychologist Dr. David McClelland of Harvard, has been shown to raise the level of an antibody that fights colds. ‘It stands to reason,’ reasons a First magazine writer, ‘that viewing threatening, confrontational images could create an opposite reaction.’ In fact, given that talks shows ‘create feelings of frustration’ and fear, ‘shattering our trust and faith’ in our expectations of people’s behavior, and ‘give us a false perception of reality,’ it is perhaps best to watch game shows or soaps while nursing that cold. Watching daytime talk shows could conceivably send you into a decline into pathologies of all sorts: scared, angry, disgusted, convinced you are abnormal for not fitting in with the ‘cast of misfits and perverts,’ susceptible to both perversion and more colds [Gamson, p. 3]. There are many negative critics of talk shows. Gamson trots out the usual suspects: George Gerbner [“These shows are virtually destroying the goodness of America”], Harvard’s Alvin Pouissant [“It does not bode well for the future generations of young people growing up on a steady diet of this drivel”] TV Critic Tom Shales [“These shows are portraying Americans as shallow monsters”] [Gamson, 3].Gamson defends talkshows. For example, he suggests that talk shows make hidden but significant societal problems media-visible. ______Presented at the Eastern Communication Association’s 2003 Convention, April 24 -27, 2003, Wyndham Washington, Washington, DC.
2 But talk shows are problematic. As a television genre, they can be classified only provisionally and problematically, according to Kevin Glynn, because media texts are always multi-textual and nondiscursive. That is, talk on television involves the use of films, cinematic re-enactments, or other “spots,” questions and responses from audience guests, audience members and the moderator, and in general, are participative and involve sharing. Glynn further argues that television talk reflects working class and lower middle class tastes. Whereas elite culture focuses on the detached and contemplative and “distanced aesthetic appreciation [Glynn, 5]” lower classes--those with the least cultural capital -- have a “’deep-rooted demand for participation,’” a “’desire to enter into the game, identifying with the characters’ joys and sufferings, worrying about their fate’”[ Glynn, 5; Glynn is quoting Pierre Bourdieu]. And while there are many critics disparage television talks shows, calling them “freak shows,” Glynn suggests that such a view is demeaning and dismissive of millions of Americans who live on the margins of society, “whose persecuting, deprivation, and social marginalization consign them to virtual invisibility in most commercial media programming besides talk shows [Glynn, 188].” However, in any case, the focus of this study is not to criticize the talk show as a rhetorical vehicle; rather, my purpose is to recognize and analyze the talk show as a contemporary forum for political discourse, particularly in a Presidential election year. Specifically, I want do discuss the appearances -- performances really --of Governor Bush and Vice-President Gore on the Oprah Winfrey show in the fall of 2000. The reasons for doing this kind of research are obvious. For example, in a seminar on the 2000 Election, conducted by Kathleen Hall Jamieson of the Annenberg School of Communication, Alex Castellanos, media consultant with National Media Incorporated and consultant to the Bush campaign, asked the question, “What do you associate with the president? ...your president is in a lot of ways Johnny Carson. He’s the head of the national political household. He comes into your home and tells you how things are doing. To a great degree, whoever can do that job is the guy America wants to elect. [Jamieson and Paul Waldman, 186].” And candidates show that they can do that job on Oprah. Oprah Winfrey is one of the top rated shows in America, with an estimated viewership of 14 million daily; three-quarters of that audience is women between the ages of 18 and 54. The importance of the program, Peck argues, make it one that cannot be ignored by politicians 2 [Peck, 89-126.] Where else can a presidential candidate, for example, get to address 14 million potential voters? Oprah Winfrey herself is a woman about whom there is much to admire. Probably the richest woman in America, she is founder and head of Harpo Productions [Harpo is Oprah spelled backwards], the first African-American woman to host a syndicated talk show and, in Peck’s view “one of the nation’s most visible black public figures” [Peck, 90].
3 According to Wayne Munson, talk shows are becoming one of the most prominent media of political communication[ Munson, 2 ] For example, the October 15, 1992 Presidential Debate as a “talkshow” in Richmond, Virginia had an audience of 50% of the American people [Munson, 3]. “Talkshows,” Munson continues, are really two communication paradigms, like the name itself. “The ‘talkshow’ fuses and seems to reconcile two different, even contradictory, rhetorics. It links conversation, the interpersonal-- the premodern oral tradition -- with the mass-mediated spectacle born of modernity” [Munson, 6] . The talkshow combines what he calls the “mythic American past of the participatory town meeting and the interpersonal ‘handshake’ politics of speech and presence meet the imagined ‘present’ of technological simulations, reproductions and commodification” [Munson, 7]. The talkshow, Munson continues, “draws upon the broad historical rupture in Western discourse. It relies on modernist postures -- the host’s ego, subjectivity, expressionism, and apparent autonomy and authenticity-- while the host’s and program’s coherence is secondary to affect or attitude: that is, to the emotional investment in multiple meanings and lifestyles--a postmodern tendency”[Munson, 9]. Talk shows make societal problems media-visible. Talk shows reflect problems, often on the margins; they often set the social agenda. Oprah helps us talk about our problems and has made “personal intimacy her central selling point, making her own personal life public. She took the personal, emotional elements that [Phil] Donohue’s let’s-debate-the-issues style suppressed, brought them out, and turned up the volume on them” [Gamson, 53-54]. Oprah routinely talks about herself as abuse victim, as “substance abuser, black person, single working woman and girlfriend of Stedman” [Gamson, 54]. Thus, all areas of politics is personal, and “no space where the personal is exempt from politics” [Gamson, 54]. Thus, talkshows often provide what Gamson calls the “talking cure,” combining confession and therapy [Gamson, 54]. There are important characteristics of talkshows: [Munson, 17-18]. First of all, talk shows [1] emphasize intertextuality--guests, experts, audience members, bits of film, video, music, etc., all interweave on a talk show; [2] talk shows exist cyberspatially --via new electronic” commonplaces”unbounded, a “new neighborhood; [3] talk shows are transnational that is, what is talked about on a talk show in Chicago is discussed in Egypt that evening; [4] often, in a talk show, that which is normally considered private becomes public, repression becomes “expression” gender, race, sexual orientation, disability, lifestyles, personal problems; [5] finally, talk shows are intensely interpersonal [Munson, 49]. All of these characteristics conflated in the fall of 2000 when Vice President Vice- President Al Gore and Governor George W. Bush appeared on Oprah Winfrey. The Winfrey show title appears “signaturelike over the floating images, as if written by an invisible hand. Along with oral and interpersonal communication, a signature confers a sense of nonmediation –
4 a handwritten signature at the bottom of a note from a friend” [Munson, 75]. Harpo, her production company, is her name spelled backward. Winfrey herself assumes a number of roles and voices on her show. Her “paratextual position as modernist success story also becomes mixed with her New Age philosophies”; She is “someone who rose from humble, troubled beginnings to stunning material success --[she is one of the wealthiest woman in America]”[Munson, 83]. She often depicts herself through therapeutic themes of self-improvement, as one who has taken control of her own life, of being responsible for her success, of success through self-help. [Munson, 83].... [As an aside, it seems not accidental that Elizabeth Dole, at the 1996 Republican Convention which nominated her husband for the Presidency, introduced herself and her narrative Oprah--like on prime time.] Peck further argues that Oprah Winfrey’s appeal transcends racial lines; to white viewers, her blackness is irrelevant; to black viewers, her blackness is central to her success. Thus, Winfrey must be exceedingly perceptive to continue to appeal to black audience while not at the same time alienating white viewers. In fact, Winfrey has been described, in Peck’s terms, as “a comforting, nonthreatening bridge between black and white cultures....” [Peck, 91] Part of her comforting quality, Peck continues, “may stem from her public rejection of black political activism and the Civic Rights Movement. [Further,] her gender may also figure into her broad acceptance because black women are seen by many whites as less threatening than are black men.” [Peck, 91]. Thus, her program is an appropriate vehicle for any vote-seeking politician. According to Peck, the dominant discursive framework on the Oprah Winfrey can be classified into three areas: [1] the emphasis on individualism, [2] the production of therapeutic discourse, and [3] a Protestant religious orientation. Individual discourse reflects the belief in the essentiality, autonomy and primacy of individual rights and individual expression. The capitalist system, as reflected, subtly and not so subtly, on the Winfrey show is viewed as the natural if not inevitable result and extension of not only our separateness but our collective pursuit of our own happiness. Winfrey’s affinity for therapeutic discourse is nearly always obvious. She even said once that all the problems of the world are the result of “lack of self-esteem.” [quoted in Peck, 101] Often, Oprah Winfrey discusses current social problems with emphasis on feelings over other modes of experiences and reflects what Peck calls “a therapeutic propensity to locate problems within a disease metaphor.”[Peck, 102]. Religious discourse on the Winfrey show relies on what Peck calls “the notions of ‘understanding’ and the equality of persons before God”[Peck, 104]. Gore and Bush on Oprah Winfrey Both programs began in the rather traditional way viewers come to expect from Oprah Winfrey: an announcer tells the name of the guest. Then we hear questions from selected audience members: [To Gore:] “What’s the most difficult thing you have done as a father?” “What puts a smile on your face?” [To Bush]: “What would you say is our common purpose ?”
5 “What is the public’s largest misconception of you? Then a station break, a series of one-on one questions with Winfrey, then the audience members who had asked their questions get to ask them directly. The program ends with a video section titled “Remembering your Spirit,” which includes the presidential candidate with the candidate’s spouse. Vice President Gore: September 11, 2000 Vice President Gore was the Oprah Winfrey’s guest on September 11, 2000. Winfrey began the program by extolling its uniqueness. “We’ve never done this before,” she said [American Broadcasting Company. 2000. The Oprah Winfrey Show, “Vice-President Al Gore,” September 11, 2000. All citations to this episode are from this source.] She suggested that the real purpose of her show was to “tear down the walls” between the candidates and, presumably, the voters/viewers of her audience. “We have a real, real honest conversation with ...them.” Her program, she argues, provides her audience answers to questions like “who [sic] do you trust? You get a sense of a person in an hour. Who feels right for you to be President of the United States?...Who do you like?” Thus, rather than ask questions about specific policies and beliefs, Oprah Winfrey wants us to assess the candidate’s likability and trustworthiness. Immediately on entrance, Oprah asks for a kiss...a resonance to the “long kiss” the vice- president bestowed on his wife at the Democratic National Convention. Then, Winfrey asks Gore what he thinks about the present style of presidential campaigning: “I like to do ....open meetings, where I invite undecided voters who are partisan, not, you know, scripted, they don’t have some canned pitch to make, but really to ask what’s on their hearts. And --I generally stay until the last person leaves.” When Winfrey asks him how he holds up to the demands of the campaign, Gore says that the secret is to believe in what you are doing: “then you get more energy.” Gore further states that a President has three obligations: “...first and foremost, [a president] has to communicate to the country a clear vision of what we’re all about and where we’re going; secondly [a president] has to communicate clear goals and put priorities on them...and convince people to buy into them; and third, communicate and maintain a set of values upon which decisions ought to be based in our country and try to persuade people..to buy into that.” Winfrey , thus, had had the opportunity of exploring how and in what manner Gore would pursue these three obligations he set for himself. Unfortunately , she changed the subject by asking Gore to respond to something he had said on the campaign trail: “...we must challenge a culture with too much meanness and not enough meaning.” After that, Gore discussed into his usual litany of “I’m for people, not the powerful” and discussed such issues as education, pre-school, parenting education, self-restraint in the media, and taking care of the elderly. He also discussed the defining moments in his life as the birth of his first child when he had just returned from Vietnam and the accident that nearly took the life of his youngest child and the importance of having time with his family. The important things in his life, he said are “my faith and my family....” 6 Even when confronted with negative things about his family, Gore was able to turn them into positive statements. For example, when asked about his wife’s bout with depression, Gore said that he “was fortunate because she has a graduate degree in psychology, and even as she was going through that experience, she was able to teach me and the kids.” When the next segment began, Winfrey began a long elaborate discussion of “the kiss.” Her theory is that people in a relationship fortunate enough to be kissed have a loving relationship presumably, because no one could fake a kiss like that. “What did you feel?” Winfrey asked him “...an overwhelming surge of emotion....this was a great moment in our lives. This has been a partnership and she is my soul mate....” Echoing conservative Protestant religious traditions, Winfrey responded: “You were full, as the people say.” “I was full,” Gore concluded. An audience member who wanted to know what puts a smile on his face observed that Gore is “a little stiff sometimes.” After an exchange on Gore’s “stiffness, Gore explained that he is a more formal, private person than most politicians. Winfrey asked him to loosen up a bit and “high five” the President [significantly, this was the only mention of President Clinton]. Gore responded by saying in all his years as vice-president he was not accused of being stiff. He concluded by observing that as vice president, one of his responsibilities was “strengthening somebody’s else’s hand.” Presumably, he was referring to strengthening President Clinton’s hand for the past 7 and a half years. Later, Winfrey asked him “If there came a time in your presidency where the presidency -- if you were elected and it was obviously toxic to your family, would you choose between your job and family?” Gore responded “I would change the nature of the job.” Near the end of the program, Winfrey goes through a litany of “favorite things: favorite movie [Local Hero], favorite cereal [Wheaties], favorite book [The Red Badge of Courage “...In addition to the Bible...”], favorite subject in school [science], favorite teacher [“Dean Stanbaugh, who was my art teacher”], favorite quotation [Dylan’s Those who are not busy being born are busy dying.], favorite time of year [Spring] favorite musical group [the Beatles], and so forth. Winfrey did try her hand at subtle humor when she asked Gore what was his favorite thing to sleep in. Gore had let it be known for quite some time he liked to sleep in the nude. Gore’s answer “A bed...You get the picture?” Then Winfrey runs a video of Gore and his family. The program ends with Gore lauding his family, especially Tipper. We’ve made this journey together, Gore said. “And that’s a source of great joy.” Winfrey responds: “And the source of that great kiss.” Governor Bush: September 19, 2000 Governor Bush was the guest on Oprah Winfrey on September 19, 2000 [American Broadcasting Company. 2000. The Oprah Winfrey Show, “Governor George W. Bush,” September 19, 2000. All citations to this episode are from this source.] Like the Winfrey show when Gore was the guest, the program began with an announcement that the guest will be
7 “Republican presidential candidate, George W. one-on-one.” It’s his turn, Winfrey proclaimed. Then we get a taste of the questions that will be asked of him by the studio audience: “What would you say is our common purpose?” and “What is the public’s largest misperception of you?” Again the purpose of her show is “for you the voters to get to know the person behind what I call ‘the political wall.’...[M]y hope today is to ask questions that will help reveal the real man so you can decide who feels like the right candidate for you.” Bush enters and promptly kisses Winfrey. “Oh, a kiss?” she says. “I’m trying to win,” says Bush. As with Gore the week before, Winfrey asks the candidate how he is holding up to the heat of a presidential campaign. Bush confesses that he loves campaigning: “I love it. I love the people of the country. I love what America stands for. I get to see the -- the best of the country as I travel around.” It isn't a test of endurance, Bush says: “I think it’s a test of message and vision and compassion...a test of leadership.” Soon after that, Winfrey lets an audience member ask a question. A twenty-five year old African-American woman says she has no children and no money: “I qualify for broke, but I’m not poor.” She asks how does she fit into Bush’s platform? Bush answers her that, like all Americans, she has access to the American Dream and “if you work hard, you can realize the greatness of the country.” Bush and Winfrey banter around the topic of school reform, head-start, school assessment. Several minutes later, Winfrey realizes that Bush hasn't answered the African-American woman’s question. The woman repeats her question: “How does your program affect me?” “Social Security is going to affect you, no matter what.” “In the next four years?” the woman responds. Bush then tells the woman that “if you’re working and are paying taxes, because of the surplus, I think you ought to be able to put more money in your pocket.” “Sounds good to me,” said the questioner, seeming not to notice Bush still hadn’t answered her question. Winfrey then gets into a discussion of whether Bush really told the queen of England that he was the black sheep of his family. She further asks him when there was a time he needed forgiveness. Bush evades. Winfrey counters with “I’m looking for specifics.” Bush says, “I know you are, but I’m running for president.” Bush then discusses in a quasi-religious style, of talking about his shortcomings, “I’m a sinner who has sought redemption and found it.” Every day I need forgiveness, Bush explains . And that’s the great thing about religion; religion, to Bush, “provides a--a solace for forgiveness and for hope and for comfort.” When Winfrey asks him if he has felt “the calling to be president,” Bush evades her question but then says “...there’s a big call and I’m deeply concerned about the future of the country. I’m concerned that some folks are going to be left behind....I’m concerned about the state of education.I want to make sure we keep the peace. I want people to fulfill their --their dreams in America. This is a fabulous country. It is the greatest country on Earth. The values of this country and the history of the country and the tradition of the country are just magnificent. And I feel a deep calling. I do.” Winfrey pursues 8 this topic almost religiously: did the calling come like a bolt of lightening? Bush responds...in a very secular way...that he didn't start thinking about running until 1998, after his re-election as Governor of Texas. Bush and Winfrey then discuss the litany of Republican issues: Head Start, Faith-based initiatives, education reform. Winfrey then asked him why American should vote for him. “I’m a proven leader,” he says. He then proceeds to compare his responsibilities as Governor of Texas with the responsibilities of the presidency: he brought people together, reformed the educational system and got higher test scores for public school children. Further, he says that he has an agenda that is “going to elevate the individual in America, not empower government.” He has a program to cut taxes, strengthen the military and prescription drugs. Winfrey remarks that Al Gore has said much of the same thing. That’s fine, says Bush, “..except he can’t get it done. I mean he --they--have been there eight years trying to get something done and it hasn't happened.” Winfrey then changes the subject and lets a viewer ask Bush what he thinks the public’s largest conception of him is. Bush says that many people think he is “running on my daddy’s name.” While explaining that his parents gave him the most precious gift parents can give --the gift of unconditional love-- when he ran for Governor of Texas, he ran on his own because, he explains, a lot of people didn't think he could win “...including my mother.” But, Bush concludes, he ran because he had a vision for Texas and when he won, he won on that vision, not on his family name. Are you running to carry on the family name, as part of a restoration. Absolutely not, says Bush. To do so would be running on revenge. “Revenge is such a negative thought. I’m running for positive reasons.” The best way to honor one’s family is to be a decent loving citizen willing to “contribute to our community.” Being a responsible citizen honors your mother and father, Bush concluded. Winfrey then cites...probably inaccurately2...her favorite quote from Martin Luther King: “Not everybody can be famous, but everyone can be great because greatness is determined by service.” Winfrey observes that Bush has a sense of humor; Bush tells a joke and relates interesting banter with the Queen of England when Bush tells her that he is the black sheep of his family. Then, quite unexpectedly, an unidentified man interrupts the conversation and asks Bush “Would you continue the Democratic policy of bombings and sanctions that killed 5,000 children...”. Winfrey immediately goes to a station break and says that the man will be removed from the audience. When the show resumes, Winfrey jokes that in fifteen years, she has never had a “heckler.” “You come on, I get a heckler,” she says. Winfrey then explains that the policy of her show is that one raises one’s hand and waits to be called on and the camera comes to the person before a question is asked. More than likely the man asking the question...he didn't seem like a heckler...wanted to know if Bush would continue the bombing of Iraq that had been going on since his father’s presidency. That might have been the most interesting question to ask Bush because it was the only question that had anything to do with national political policy.
9 Soon enough, Winfrey asks her litany of questions: What do you know for sure [that there is a God, and that I love my wife, says Bush]. Do you think you’re lucky? [Yes, says Bush, I had been “dealt a pretty darn good hand in my life.”] Winfrey then pursued the issue of Bush’s problems with alcohol. He explained that he stopped drinking “because it was beginning to compete for my affections” and “crowd out” his energies. Bush said that he quit alcohol all by himself. Giving up drinking, according to Bush, “requires the person involved to make up his or her mind that this is what needs to happen.” Bush then goes on to rhapsodize about his wife and the difficulties and challenges she had birthing and raising their twins. When asked what were the defining moments of his life, Bush said marrying Laura and the birth of their twin daughters. Winfrey than has a viewer ask a question about the death penalty in Texas, Bush says that he is convinced that all 143 were guilty and deserved their fate. In what seemed a strategy -- perhaps unconsciously --to absolve himself from any guilt should an innocent person be put to death, Bush admits that the Governor of Texas doesn't have the power of clemency anyway. But, for Bush, the evidence for the death penalty -- especially DNA evidence -- consistently has proved the guilt of the executed prisoner. After the next station break, Winfrey asks Bush about his children. Bush admits that their teenaged years was “an unusual experience. I was not well-prepared for it.” In one of his more quixotic moments, Bush argues that his daughters are sensitive “and I can understand why. I -- I’ve been the son of a president and a presidential candidate, and it’s not a pleasant experience. It’s much easier being the candidate that it is the son.” Winfrey then asks him if he has ever had any self-doubt. Bush, obviously not expecting this question, pauses and says “...I think you should give me a little advanced warning to come up with a moment of self-doubt. Let’s see here. I’m sure there was self-doubt when I got shipped off [sic] to school from Texas up East.” At Phillips Academy, Bush confessed, he was intimidated by his smarter classmates: “I can remember thinking how ...brilliant all of the other kids were and how hard I had to work to catch up.” Not satisfied with that answer, Winfrey asks him if there were any other moments of self doubt. No, said Bush. More or less admitting that he is not intellectually gifted, Bush launches into a defense of his kind of intelligence. Smart, for Bush, is instinct and judgment and common sense. “...I’m well educated,” he said. “But I’m certainly not the kind of person that [sic] talks down to people because of my education. Near the end of the program, Winfrey goes through a litany of “favorite things” like she had done the week before with Gore: favorite sandwich [peanut butter and jelly] favorite gift to give [Bush named the promenade to the library at the SMU after his wife]; favorite gift you’ve ever gotten? [at first, Bush said a tie; then, with a little prompting from Winfrey, he said cufflinks from his other...the same ones his grandfather gave to his father when his father went off to war] favorite fast-food [taco] favorite thing he can’t live without [running] favorite song [“Wake up, Little Susie”] favorite historical figure [Churchill] favorite prized possession [his 10 ranch in Texas] favorite childhood memory [playing Little League Baseball in Midland]. After the next commercial break, Winfrey introduced the segment, “Remembering Your Spirit,” an 11 minute video of Bush and his wife, reminiscing about their marriage Winfrey closes the program with a reminder about registering to vote. She thanked Governor Bush and told him, “Say hello to your mom for me.” Conclusions Munson’s conclusions were readily affirmed: each interview emphasized intertextuality by interweaving video, audience questioning and conversation; second, both talk shows created a kind of ‘cyberneighborhood” where, at least on the surface, we learn personal things about the personal habits of both presidential candidates; third, the programs are broadcast transnationally, so that Winfrey’s ‘cyberneighborhood” reaches telemarkets all over the world; further, personal subjects such as dreams, regrets, need for forgiveness and formal [“stiff”] speaking style, Mrs. Gore’s bouts of depression, normally private matters, were discussed at some length; finally, and most importantly, both programs were intensely interpersonal, emphasizing likability, amiability and trustworthiness over policy or public issues. There are other observations of the Gore and Bush performances worth noticing. First of all, both interviews had missed opportunities. Gore, for example, never mentioned President Clinton and never mentioned any policy initiatives or issues he had been concerned with for his entire political life as Congressman, Senator and as Vice President. Further, when Gore did discuss what he considered to be the three obligations of the presidency, Winfrey changed the subject. Governor Bush had lost opportunities too. He had an opportunity of addressing the African-American community by responding more appropriately to the twenty-five year old woman who was essentially asking him why should a young African-American woman of modest means and no children vote for him? Bush seemed to go on auto-pilot and gave a short litany of his campaign issues, in hopes that one or two of them might answer her question. Winfrey herself was very much in total control; that became most evident in dealing with what she called a “heckler.” In so doing, she let her audience know that the questions and the questioners are carefully selected, with little room for controversy. Peck’s observations of the rhetoric of the talk show is also reaffirmed. Both Gore and Bush put a great deal of emphasis on the individual. Gore discussed the responsibilities of individual parents for their children and, with the birth of his children, the necessity for Gore to take individual responsibility; Bush went on in some detail about how he cured himself of alcohol abuse only through his own individual effort. More importantly perhaps both shows were designed, in Winfrey’s phrase, to “break down the walls” and reveal the candidates as individuals as well as candidates. Although there seemed on the surface to be very little of what Peck calls “therapeutic discourse,” possibly because these were the first programs with presidential candidates as guests 11 and thus, they were ground breaking for Oprah Winfrey. However, there was a good deal of attention paid to feelings...how the voters are to feel about a candidate, how candidates feel about very personal issues in their lives. Finally, both episodes of Oprah Winfrey were permeated with a Protestant religious orientation. The Bible was referred to, faith was affirmed by both candidates, Bush going so far as to suggest that he was “called” to run for president. In this time of political alienation, we may ask what are the expected presidential performative skills necessary for a successful, political life ? For example, because of the dominance of television as the primary vehicle for political discourse, are we now left with the expectation that our president will be amiable, telegenic, a master of the sound bite, able to express a thought or a position in only a very few minutes, and able to interact on television with skill and ease? In short, are we confronting the idea of President-as-Talk-Show-Guest? Are we witnessing the“Oprah-fication” of American politics? What else do we learn from this analysis? That television can be a powerful means of communicating lots of mostly interpersonal or peripheral information about the character and background of political candidates. In that regard, Winfrey was successful in “breaking down the walls” between the candidates and the voters. However, little of political substance was discussed. Perhaps political issues have to be subsumed by personal issues because political issues on talk shows can only be presented in terms of their perceived amiability if for no other reason than commercial television is an “advertiser-friendly” environment. Stirring up passions, emotions or ideas -- the real stuff of politics --are inimical if not hostile to the commercial interests of television. Most likely, politicians on talk shows do reach potential voters...and remember, Oprah Winfrey is watched by fourteen million people. However, more than likely, political candidates on talk shows energize their core believers and reinforce already held beliefs of those who already support them. In all probability, talk shows like Oprah Winfrey are largely unsuccessful at teaching or developing political commitments from viewers. We come away as we came.3 [5,328 words] Notes 1 Charles Krauthammer in “The Pornography of Self-Revelation,” Time, August 10, 1992, p. 72, refers to talk shows which stress soul-baring, tell-all narratives, as “Oprahization,” not just to what goes on on the Winfrey show. In 1994, California Attorney General Dan Lungren used the term “Oprahization” to refer to juror’s tendencies to distrust prosecutors and to inappropriately sympathize with defendants’ personal histories and experiences, making it difficult to obtain convictions. See Sophronia Scott Gregory, “Oprah! Oprah in the Court!” Time, 6 June 1994, 30-31. Further, Jane M Shattuc published “The Oprahification of America: Talk Shows and the Public Sphere” in l999; however, I prefer the neologism “Oprah-fication” to “Oprahization” and Oprahification” because “Oprah-fication” contains the Latin “facere” which
12 means “to make.” Thus, “Oprah-fication” means “to make like the Oprah Winfrey Show.” Besides, “Oprah-fication” is easier to pronounce. For a further discussion of talk shows and persuasion, see Jones, J. P. “Forums for Citizenship in Popular Culture,” in R. P. Hart and B. H. Sparrow (Eds.), Politics, Discourse and American society: New Agendas. Boulder: Rowman and Littlefield, 2001, (pp. 193-210), J. P. Jones,Talking Politics in Post-Network Television: The Case of Politically Incorrect (Doctoral dissertation, University of Texas at Austin, 1999), and J. Street, Politics and Popular Culture. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1997.
2 Martin Luther King said “Anybody can be great because anybody can serve. All you need to serve is a heart filled with grace and a soul filled with love.” I cannot find the source of Winfrey’s version of this quotation.
3Since the fall of 2002, Oprah Winfrey has devoted quite a bit of air-time to foreign affairs, especially the war in Iraq; some of her guests, while not openly hostile to the Bush administration, have often raised a few questions about policies. Currently, while her framing of political issues has reflected war issues and other foreign policy issues, she often has celebrities instead of experts discussing or criticizing Bush policies. In the lead-up to the war E Network and others interviewed celebrities from Tom [“Bomb Baghdad to bits”]Sellek to Barbara [“Let’s talk! Can’t we all get along!”] Streisand types. No one bothered to ask if any of them had anything worthwhile to say about a subject about which both of them proved their ignorance at every opportunity. Likewise, no one bothers on Oprah to ask her celebrities if they have any knowledge informing their rather predictable opinions of current events. The latest development with Oprah Winfrey is Oprah After the Show which provides glimpses of what goes on after each regular Oprah show; often, Oprah Winfrey appears less guarded and more forthright after the show than during the show. However, even with these changes, her programs most often are still intensely interpersonal, emphasizing likability, amiability and trustworthiness over policy or public issues.
References American Broadcasting Company. (2000). The Oprah Winfrey Show, “Governor George W. Bush,” September 19, 2000. Written transcript provided by Burrelle’s Information Services.
American Broadcasting Company. (2000). The Oprah Winfrey Show, “Vice-President Al Gore,” September 11, 2000. Written transcript provided by Burrelle’s Information Services.
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