It provided some entertaining news fodder last week when United States presidential candidate George W. Bush was unable to name the leaders of four countries considered to be political hot spots.
Reporter Andy Hiller asked Bush to name the leaders of Chechnya, India and Taiwan, and the person who recently seized power in Pakistan. Bush could not, summoning up only the first name of Lee Teng-hui, president of Taiwan.
Some political hay was made over Bush’s lacklustre performance in the pop quiz. Reuters News Agency reported that vice-president Al Gore, also a candidate, forestalled a similar quiz days later by taking the initiative.
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“The other day I was talking to Utkir Sultanov. You know, the prime minister of Uzbekistan. And he asked me, ‘Did you send a birthday card to Hamed?’ That’s of course Hamed Karoui, the prime minister of Tunisia….”
Once the chuckling was over, media and political types pondered the fairness of the pop quiz.
“Almost everyone knows that they could not, out of the blue and with the cameras rolling, dredge up the answers to Hiller’s questions,” said Michael Kelley, editor in chief of the National Journal, a weekly magazine based in Washington, D.C.
“Among the very many people who could not have answered Andy Hiller’s quiz is, you may be sure, Andy Hiller.”
What did the quiz reveal about Bush? An inability to recall names? A failure to remain current on international affairs?
Many people plead guilty to similar shortcomings, so what was the point of asking? Is knowledge of these particular world leaders a prerequisite to suitable presidential leadership?
Hiller’s motives were not revealed in news coverage of the matter. But on the face of it, this sort of borderline trickery does no service to the media. Bush was made into a fall guy, and no source wants to be put in the same position. It increases wariness and suspicion about media motives, when the goal is to serve the public and provide its members with fair and accurate information.
Will Western Producer reporters administer quizzes to politically sensitive sources – or any other sources, for that matter?
Not likely. But if it did happen, good journalism practices dictate that questions be asked not with the intent to embarrass, but with the goal of gathering information relevant to readers.
