Call Waiting
RSSBy Lillian N. Gerhardt, Editor-in-Chief -- School Library Journal, 04/01/1998
For months, I have been going to bed with my shoes on and my notes within easy reach. I want to be ready when a pollster for some big-time news agency calls to ask my opinion on how print or broadcast journalists should cover -- or uncover -- the behavior of U.S. presidents. I plan to gab about the same length of time it takes to read aloud, with feeling, this page in School Library Journal. (That's about five minutes; six, if you use a flannel board.) I'll say:
"I want you members of the so-called Fourth Estate to quit spilling ink and blowing air time on First Spouses, other First Relatives, First Favorites in the White House Typing Pool, and, most especially, First Household Pets. These unelected critters are the wallpaper that come with presidents and deserve no more attention than you give to the paint on the ceiling of the White House Press Room.
I take this stern line because what you do with this copy padding harms children, their books, and their libraries.
Your coverage of presidential background characters gets rolled over into children's books. Right now, there are a half dozen titles listed in print on Hillary Rodham Clinton alone -- fan magazine fluff on an unfinished story. Reviewers have been too kind to such political puffery. Librarians and classroom teachers, battered by armchair experts' claims that they're over-concerned with the historic dead, persuade themselves to purchase these books on the batty grounds that young readers need live heroes -- even before heroic stature has been achieved.
Children read these books on presidential families and their animal companions. While the research is not in yet, the results may be grim. If even one child with chronically embarrassing relatives trashes the dream of becoming president because you've started a publicity chain that makes First Family members seem essential political career accessories, that's a tragedy.
As for First Pets, no young reader with allergies to animal dander should be led to set aside a worthy ambition to one day run the Oval Office because your excessive coverage of presidential dumb companions -- and the resulting picture books this spawns -- implies that such fur or feather props are necessary to successful presidential campaigns.
Of course, if Socks Clinton or any of her successors is ever subpoenaed to testify about any personal dirt scratched up on the White House lawn that bears on presidential high crimes or misdemeanors, you'd be justified in taking a brief departure from a firm rule against presidential pets as news. The same goes for Buddy Clinton or any other First Dog that may someday take a sound bite out of a news reporter.
As to presidential partners or dependents, be sure what you report is really newsworthy. For instance, if the current or any future First Lady or Daughter were to run off with the Librarian of Congress, even School Library Journal would mention it. But, we wouldn't dwell on it. Good judgment can be a guide in the rare relaxation of the observance of any wise rule.
Meanwhile, I thud to my knees in prayer that teachers employ the children's books about living presidents that result from your hype about their households as hilarious exercises in critical thinking. And, that librarians recatalog any such titles in their collections under a new, honest subject heading, i.e. U.S. Presidents -- Peripherals Inflated by the Press.Thank you for calling."
Every charge-card vendor in the country comes begging by telephone just as I sit down to supper. All the brokers for suspect stocks call me in the middle of an episode of Law & Order when I'm relaxing with TV. Surely, one of the canvassers on reactions to scandalous news can find me and invite my advice on how to handle journalistic peeks at, or leaks on, our presidents.I can hardly wait.
Renée Olson
Editor-in-Chief
rolson@slj.cahners.com
