Years, you and your team have been charged with telling the story of the news media in society. Were going to talk today about news media and president s. When you think about that relationship from a macro standpoint, what has characterized the relationship between president s and the press throughout our history . Patty it is an interesting courtship, that relationship between the president s and the press. Early on during, the campaign years, the candidates want to woo the press. They want to put on the best face. They know the power of the press to get their message outside. But when they get in office and the confetti is down and the celebration is over, and the reality of governing comes in, and they realize that the role of the press is to be a watchdog, to be the peoples watchdog on government, to see how are they doing the job that they are doing. To be a check and balance on the president. Few president s enjoy being criticized. That is often the role of the press. So that relationship for people who dont understand that, it can go very badly. Susan were going to talk about changing media over time, and also changing reporting styles. So, when did the tradition begin that the news media should be an impartial judge . So much of our history, news reporting was you read the side that you were attuned to. When did that shift . Patty it was a 20th century ideal. In the George Washington days, the press was highly partisan. Remember, it was the publishers and the printers who make the case for it being time to separate from Great Britain and king george iii. It was highly partisan. Highly volatile. Printers were being tarred and feathered, their presses burned. It was highly volatile. We talk about how divided we are as a country, being an msnbc person or fox news person, but back in the early years of our country, in the first several presidencies, it was very much that way. Susan and even continued past the civil war era. Patty absolutely. Susan lincoln, you have to read both sets of newspapers to understand what was going on there. Thinking in general about successful president s, is there a correlation between president s who know how to work the newsmen and women of the time, and the ultimate success of their presidencies and how they are viewed in history . Patty absolutely. I think president s who understand the media of their day are able to deal with it smoothly, understand the press, make friends with the press. We saw that john f. Kennedy, how he had that cuddly relationship with members of the press who knew things about his private life that were perhaps not very flattering and chose to overlook it. Of course, it was a different time then. President s who understand the role of journalists, who respect them for what they do, who respect the First Amendment. Freedom of the press is part of the First Amendment. We were the first country to make that part of our governing laws, so it is very important to our very foundation, our dna as a country. So it is president s who are not thinskinned, who understand the role of the press as being the voice of the people, and those who understand the medium of their day and are able to project through that medium. Susan were going to dig into history, but not in chronological order. I want to start with the nixon presidency. The relationship between president nixon and the press seemed strained throughout much of his public life. John farrell just did a landmark nixon biography, and if you look in the index there are 16 citations under medias mutual enmity with nixon, setting the stage for it. During the cold war era, when he was a senator, he made a name for himself as a anticommunist warrior. The media in the 1940s and 1950s looked upon Richard Nixon in those days, how and when did it begin to change to become more antagonistic . Patty he makes a National Name for himself during the house on Unamerican Activities Committee hearings where hes pressing people about communists in the government and alger hiss. That is the height of the red scare, where people were terrified that there might be communists in our government. There were communists in our government. And yet the republic still stands. We are still here. Then he is on the ticket with eisenhower, general eisenhower, on his Vice President ial ticket, and a report surfaces that mr. Nixon has perhaps taken finances from someone and he should not have done so. So he goes on television, and he is in hot water with eisenhower as well as the country, he goes on television and gives his famous checkers speech. This is probably the height of nixons success with television. He goes on and talks about how the only present he has ever gotten was his dog, checkers, and both of his girls love checkers and were going to keep him. So americans thought, oh, what a good dad he is. So he becomes Vice President. In his presidency, his mistrust of the press is a landmark of his time in office. After he loses his first run for the presidency, he goes back to california and then loses another race for governor in california, and at a famous press conference he says, you are not going to have me to kick around anymore to members of the press. That is his attitude. That is pretty much prevailing. During the white house era, he creates an enemies list of reporters who are friendly, who are not friendly, has the f. B. I. Investigating reporters. So that poor relationship with the press is never resurrected. It certainly did not help him much when two young journalists from the Washington Post dig into the watergate breakin and it goes all the way to the white house and he resigns his presidency. Susan from that unsuccessful california governors race, from John Farrells biography, he writes, the California Press corps knew the state and its issues. They believed that nixon was using the Governors Office as a stepping stone, and bridled at his haughty expectation that they owed him a free pass. They met him with skepticism and sometimes hostility. He returned the favor, labeling them as prostitutes and hatchet men. Patty tough to get over that. [laughter] that kind of a conversation. How do you get past that, when thats kind of setting the stage for it . And of course, we have the famous kennedynixon debates, when nixon has just come out of hospital. Hes had an infection. He doesnt look good. The first nationally televised president ial debates. John f. Kennedy, handsome, rested, very at ease in front of the camera, a former journalist himself. People who listened to the debate on the radio thought nixon had more content, but the people who saw it on television were mesmerized by the telegenic appeal of john f. Kennedy. Susan really interesting since you cited two earlier experiences, when he seemed to understand the power of the media. The televised committee hearings, and then also the checkers speech. So was it more the circumstance, do you think, of his illness, or is it not known why he did not do so well in the kennedynixon debates . Patty i think people generally feel that it was pretty much that he i think they asked kennedy, did he want makeup . He was very tan already. He said, no, i dont. Nixon perhaps felt it was not manly to put makeup on. That was probably a bad gamble on his part because, of course, makeup helps everybody look better on television. Not you, susan. You look perfect without makeup. Doesnt matter. But that was the decision he made and the illness did not help. It was a poor performance on television. But radio, better. Susan once the watergate story broke after his landslide election, when we look at what happened between the white house and how the white house that day responded to crises versus what were seeing with the white house today responding, it was a very different era in the media. What are some of the lessons on reporting around the time of watergate, and what the media was like then versus today that people might be interested in . Patty i think coverup is always a mistake. Whenever you are putting so much energy in a coverup, that is always a bad sign. They really circled the wagons against the press and the media. The sort of saturday night massacre events that happened. We are seeing elements of that today with the trump presidency. The sudden people leaving office, people who have served their government and their country for decades and decades as civil servants, as military servants, suddenly leaving. Those are anomalies that the press is going to cover. When shocking things like that happen, the press has to give people an understanding of what is going on there. Susan we have our first piece of video to share with you and the audience. This is Richard Nixon and a postwatergate story breaking news conference, november 17, 1973. Just a little glimpse of how he reacts and interacts with the media. Lets watch. [video clip]. I want to say this to the television audience. I made my mistakes, but in all of my years of public life, i have never profited, never profited from public service. I earned every cent. And in all of my years of public life, i have never obstructed justice. And i think, too, that i can say that in my years of public life, that i have welcomed this kind of examination, because people have got to know whether or not their president is a crook. Well, im not a crook. Ive earned everything ive got. Patty those are words that would go back to haunt him. What is the headline that every newspaper editor in the country is going to say . I am not a crook, Richard Nixon. Yet he resigns his office in ignomy. That defensive tactic that you see in him on television does not play well on that medium. He comes off sounding defensive all the way through. When he says, i am not a crook, the immediate thing that you think is yeah, you might be. Susan from the media side, a whole generation of young people were drawn into the business of journalism after woodward and bernstein. How did newspaper reporting change and coverage of the president change as a result of watergate . Patty absolutely. I think that many young journalists saw it as a field that would be one where you could do good for society. You could unearth conspiracy. Correct injustice, draw attention to stories that otherwise were not otherwise being told. I think there were a whole generation of people who went into journalism because of the woodward and bernstein and the power they had and the important story they did. I think the relationship, the cozy relationship that the press and president s had, for example, in the kennedy years, was no longer. It became much more mistrustful. Of course, thats happening also with the vietnam war, and the pentagon papers that reveal that the government has been misleading the public about how well the war is doing. So many things are happening. Its the counterculture era when young people are challenging their elders. We have a president who has gone down to resignation in shame and ignomy. Many things are happening culturally that are leading people to Mistrust Authority in general. That attitude reverberates in the press. Susan just eight years earlier in the election that Richard Nixon lost, that brought john kennedy to power, a very different relationship between the president and the media. The term camelot often used to refer to the time. What are the things to know about how the press and john kennedy interacted during his presidency . Patty things to know are john kennedy and his wife, jacqueline, understood the power of image, understood the power that their telegenic young family would have on the American Public. We come from the eisenhower years of a much older president and first lady. Suddenly, we have this first lady who is like a hollywood star. She sells magazine covers just by her presence. She is mysterious and softspoken. Those Young Children in the white house really get a generation of americans excited about, these people are going through the same thing that i am going through. The baby boom generation are watching these Young Children grow up in the white house for a few years. Kennedy was very comfortable with the press. He was comfortable with the intellectual debate about ideas and criticisms of himself. You saw that days after his inauguration. He has the first live president ial press conference. You see that bantering, that sense of humor he has. He charmed the American Public and he charmed the press. They admit later that they did not holding to the same standards that they might have, were he not such a personally engaging person. He had a great friend in ben bradlee, who was with newsweek and then the famous editor at the Washington Post. Those kind of connections helped pave his way in the washington power structure. Susan one last citation from john farrell on this. He wrote, kennedy could curse the press, tap their phones, keep a private blacklist and piteously crush a foe, but with the confidence bestowed by wealth, good looks, and breeding, he did not let the censure got to him. The storms passed and the tempest eased by irony or humor. Nixon didnt have that quality. So is it somewhat about personality in the relationship with the press . Patty it is absolutely about personality. I think you see that. President trump has been elected. He is a Reality Television star. His personality is one that resonates with a large percent of the american population. I think personality is really critical, and i think president s who understand the best way to get their personality across through the prevailing media of the day are often the most successful. Susan were going to go back farther in time and history, but before we do, a little bit about you so people know who they are listening to. What is your job at the newseum . Patty i am the Vice President of content and exhibits. I have this wonderful job where we tell the stories about the five freedoms of the First Amendment and how ordinary americans can use them to effect change from the Civil Rights Era to the lgbtq era. I have a great job. Susan how long has the newseum been open . Patty the newseum has been open for almost 22 years, first in rosslyn and now we have been on pennsylvania avenue for about 12 years. Sadly, we are going to close our location on december 31 to the public and go off into a new future and figure out were going to do our mission for the future, because our mission has never been more important to explain to people, the five freedoms of the First Amendment, particularly the role of the freedom of the press. So thats what were going off to. Susan the newseum is funded by admission fees, and how else . Patty funded by admission fees. Our primary funder is the freedom forum. Thats our parent organization. We also have donors who have helped sustain us throughout the years. And ticket prices from the people who have come and seen us. Susan i am sure many people watching have made it part of their washington, d. C. Visits, when they come to the nations capital. Do you have plans now for where all the exhibits might be going . Patty we have a robust traveling exhibit schedule. Rise up stonewall and the lgbtq Rights Movement is going to travel to seattle, the museum of popculture, next june. Weve also got a Pulitzer Prize exhibit on the road, 40 chances, about the power of photography to uncover the causes of hunger from photographer howard buffett. So weve got a lot of exhibits on the road. Were going to continue doing our programs and our robust work around the journalists memorial, where we highlight journalists who have given their all, given their lives to report the truth to people around the world. Susan you came to this job as a reporter and editor. Tell me about your journalism career. Patty my first job was at a small newspaper, for the gannett chain, in huntington, west virginia, the huntington advertiser. That folded shortly after i got there, and i went to the morning paper, the heralddispatch. I worked there for three years. Then i came to usa today as one of the founding editors, which was really exciting. It was a startup. No one knew anything about us, and then it became the Largest National newspaper in the country, so that was a really exciting ride to have. Susan what took you into journalism in the first place . Patty a little bit of woodward and bernstein. A little bit of that passion of the 1970s to see how do you combine skills writing and telling stories with a desire to make the world a better place. Susan if you look at the world of journalism from when you started or even when usa today began, what are the differences today and those earlier years . Patty gosh, i wish i could be more optimistic, but there were many more journalists in the 1970s than there are right now. The losses that mainstream print publications have had to the digital news era have been decimating, particularly to local journalism. There are places where there are news deserts where there is no news organization, news outlet covering the news for large swaths of the American People. That is very troubling. We have seen the rise of Digital Media and the rise of social media. Some people see things on facebook and see it as fact, when it is not reported like journalists do Fact Checking and calling multiple sources. There really are not two sides to the story, there are multiple sides to a story. There are some troubling things that are happening. I like to be an optimist. I would like to think that the American People are going to see that members of the press are critical to our democracy, and will start supporting media, whether it is print or podcasts. Get your news from good sources, because the truth matters. Susan in september, the Pew Organization did one of its regular surveys on Public Attitudes and at that time, they reported that only 41 of the public th