Fraters Libertas

George Stephanopolous's Politics Machine

This morning I caught the last 45 minutes of the revamped version of "This Week with George Stephanopolous." Big changes were apparent since the last time I checked in with the program some weeks ago. They've got a different set, different format, different pacing. It all looks OK. But they do have the same host, which largely negates any other improvements made.

I think Stephanopolous is a smart guy, genial, and effective as a political strategist and communicator (as the movie "The War Room" attests). But for whatever reason, he's a lousy TV presenter. I find it hard to describe exactly what his problem is, but he comes off in a childish manner. His tone is that of the smartest 13-year-old in his class, showing off in front of the teacher. His delivery is flawless, but he relies too heavily on scripted comments and you never get the sense he's engaged with his interview subjects, beyond what was written in advance.

He doesn't project any command or control of the show, which is a problem since it's designed to be driven by his personality. But it lumbers along on of its own, often times sluggish, momentum. If Stephanopolous were to be removed from the program and replaced with any of the many generic face men on the ABC News roster, the show would not appreciably change (with the possible exception of getting better).

It's clear that ABC realized these problems, since many of the format changes seem to be designed to give Stephanopolous a greater appearance of command. No longer is he allowed to sit with multiple strong personalities in a free form conversational environment. During these times, Stephanopolous as host was relegated to mostly silence and traffic directing, butting in to change topics according to the script and throwing it to commercials on time. They've now gone to almost exclusively one-on-one interviews and even these are supplemented with video features, never allowing for too much interaction where Stephanopolous can be overshadowed. This is unfortunate since the hallmark of the old "This Week" (when the hosts were Brinkley, Donaldson, and Roberts) was the lively panel discussion.

I also noticed Stephanopolous is now given the appearance of controlling when the video features are run. He's got a high tech touch pad in front of him and after he reads the introduction for one of these video presentations, he makes a deliberate turn to the keypad and a demonstrative button pushing gesture. But it's all a facade, since the timing is out of synch. Sometimes the video starts to run in the background before he pushes the button. Other times the video runs without him pushing anything. Strange that they'd go through all the trouble of setting up this routine, then blow the choreography and continuity. Especially strange since everything else is so tightly scripted.

The whole thing reminds of a program called "George Michael's Sports Machine." It was a nationally syndicated sports highlight program that ran on Sunday nights (and apparently still does in many markets, but I haven't seen it in probably ten years). George Michael was a local sports anchor from an LA station, not the Wham! singer (although that might have made a more compelling program, since this other George Michael had all the stage presence of Andrew Ridgely).

Part of their schtick was something called the "Sports Machine" that George Michael would rev up to play the video clips of the great plays of the week. In concept the Sports Machine was nothing more than a VCR, but they made it out to be some huge UNIVAC looking computer with colored blinking lights and reel to reel tapes whirring frantically. And yes, it was all supposedly controlled by George Michael who, when it was time to run the video, would make a deliberate turn to the keypad and a demonstrative button pushing gesture.

Hard to believe ABC News is deliberately copying some hack sports show from years past. But then again, it's hard to believe they've turned over what was once the premiere political analysis show on television to some overmatched and chronically flailing TV neophyte like George Stephanopolous, so anything's possible.

There was one moment of the broadcast that worked. Near the end of the show, they presented the best of the late night comics political humor for the week and there was this from Conan O'Brien:

Democratic presidential candidate Wesley Clark had a campaign event the other day at the end of which as a promotional gesture he handed out Clark Bars to all in attendance. That's right Clark Bars. This prompted fellow Democratic candidate for president Dick Gephardt to change his name to Dick Butterfingers.

I'm paraphrasing that since I can't find a direct citation on the net. But I did find the NBC sight that runs Conan O'Brien's quotables from weeks past. They're about a month behind on their posting schedule, so it may be a while until the recent stuff is up. In the mean time, here's a few other O'Brien jokes that bear repeating:

"This week, at an auction, a pair of boxer shorts once worn by President John F. Kennedy sold for $5,000. Also going for $5,000 was a bra once worn by Ted Kennedy."

"Earlier today in Africa, a man was arrested after he snuck onto President Bush's press plane by posing as a journalist. It turns out it was Geraldo."

"In her book coming out next week, Hillary Clinton says that when President Clinton confessed about his affair with Monica, she wanted to, quote, "wring his neck.' Hillary decided against it, when she realized choking Bill would only enhance his orgasm."

"The Justice Department has barred a group of gay employees from holding their annual gay pride event at the department's headquarters. The move was part of Attorney General John Ashcroft's new 'Don't Ask, Don't Be Gay' policy."