What the People Know: Freedom and the Press.

Richard Reeves Harvard University Press, $19.95, 147 pp.

Robert Schmuhl

Ever since Monica Lewinsky became a household name, the American news media have conducted themselves with the restraint of a fire department responding to a five-alarm blaze. Assuming the "Big Story" stance of O.J. Simpson's sorry saga and Princess Diana's untimely demise, journalists and talk-show hosts have made it difficult to think about anything other than President Bill Clinton's libido - or his energetic efforts to hide it.

Oddly, though, the accumulated facts and charges defy the popular intuition that negative information about someone will engender a general opinion of disapproval about that person. In fact, Clinton has received stronger approval ratings for his work as president since the initial Lewinsky disclosures in January.

That puzzling paradox raises larger questions about media power and influence. Are citizens separating revelations about private behavior from judgments of public performance? Are opinions of the president's deeds in elective office more influential than his unofficial conduct? Are people saying the media have gone too far in covering the story? Does their continued support of the president carry the implied hope the sordid spectacle will just end?

Using different approaches and methods, Timothy E. Cook and Richard Reeves address central issues of media impact and power in fresh, illuminating ways. More importantly, however, both authors convincingly argue that journalists themselves need to reassess their responsibilities and roles in reporting about politics and government today. "Know thyselves," Cook and Reeves implore; and given that knowledge, a more professional journalism might develop to strengthen American political life.

A professor of political science at Williams College, Cook mines a wealth of historical and organizational literature to assert that the news media are a distinct political institution in our democratic system. Unlike the constitutionally defined branches - executive, legislative, and judiciary - the news media are "intermediary institutions" similar to political parties and interest groups.

As Cook meticulously shows, everything from early Republic postal subsidies to the contemporary emphasis on governmental public relations (and even White House "spin control") reflects an intertwining of journalism with politics or government. Statecraft and stagecraft go hand-in-hand, despite protestations of journalists that the First Amendment keeps them free from any entanglements.

Noting that "newspersons are not a reflective bunch," Cook makes a case that they should think more deeply about what they do and what impact it has. In the judicious phrasing one finds throughout the book, he explains: "journalists are political actors. This does not mean that reporters have political axes to grind or are consciously pursuing particular partisan or ideological agendas. On the contrary, what is so complicated about assessing the role of newspersons is that their political influence may emerge not in spite of, but because of, their principled adherence to norms of objectivity, deference to factuality and authority, and a let-the,chips-fall-where-they-may distance from the political and social consequences of their coverage."

In the past four decades, the news media have assumed greater significance in all aspects of American life. Cook explains how public figures today factor newsmaking into much of their work, leading to an unhealthy emphasis on journalistic rather than political values.

When "standards of newsworthiness begin to become prime criteria to evaluate issues, policies, and politics," is it any wonder why we see so much partisan conflict and so little politician-to-politician consensus? The media love contests between easily identifiable opponents, the more vivid the soundbite the better. Success in gaining media coverage can result in political advancement and real clout. Appropriately, Cook calls Newt Gingrich "the poster child for media-mindedness on Capitol Hill," observing that the House Speaker rose quickly in Republican ranks with "a heavy reliance upon a media strategy."

Although there's not enough attention devoted to the informal, at times contradictory, nature of news-media power for instance, different kinds of journalism have highly variable consequences, given particular circumstances - Governing with the News demonstrates that journalists are not disengaged bystanders, chronicling political and governmental affairs as complete outsiders. Cook hopes the emergence of "public journalism" and new forms of information technology will make newspeople better understand the role they play in our democracy and help improve their work.

Reeves, a syndicated columnist and author (President Kennedy: Profile of Power), draws on almost four decades of experience and a library of reading to describe the evolving relationship between what he nostalgically calls "the press" and the political world. What the People Know is a penetrating primer from inside the contemporary news business that simultaneously reflects the writer's affection for and dissatisfaction with his craft.

While Cook worries about the consequences of journalistic values on politics and government, Reeves frets over the influence of bottom-line, audience-building business concerns on news decisions. Public-opinion polling and focus-group feedback determine what people want at the expense of what news they need to be informed. "News is being created by a journalism of artificial insemination," Reeves observes, with professional standards taking a back seat to survey statistics.

In urging the citizenry to hold the news media more accountable, Reeves offers detailed criticism of actions and attitudes undermining journalism's historic responsibilities in the United States. Since the heyday of Watergate, being adversarial has become de rigueur to the point where both public figures and the press are increasingly viewed with nose-holding contempt.

"In denigrating politicians before the fact, before we have reason, we are denigrating our own mission - and, inevitably, ourselves," Reeves states. "The mission is vigilance and understanding. Part of the mission is to understand where our power ends.... There is courage and honor in standing against the wind of calculated public opinion and checking out the emperor's wardrobe. But wisdom is knowing when to shout and when to study, and understanding the difference between what we can do and what we cannot do."

Acknowledging current problems and those looming on the multimedia horizon, Reeves advocates a back-to-the-future approach, a return to fundamental principles of probing reportage about the strengths and shortcomings of our political life. A nay-saying press ultimately loses its voice of authority - and the respect of the public.

Robert Schmuhl is professor of American studies and director of the Program in Journalism, Ethics & Democracy at the University of Notre Dame. He is the author of Statecraft and Stagecraft and Demanding Democracy.