When Should the Watchdogs Bark?: Media Coverage of the Clinton Scandals

What were the differences between the three scandals that shook the Clinton administration in the winter of 1993-94? What issues of character and competence were at stake in the allegations brought against the President in the course of the Whitewater hearings, by the troopers who served as his personal bodyguards when he was governor, and in the sexual harassment suit pursued by Paula Corbin Jones? What accounts for the reaction of the mainstream news media and the differences in the coverage of these three scandals? Dr. Robert Lichter of the Center for Media and Public Affairs and Larry Sabato, of the University of Virginia, answer these questions in this thorough and well-researched book. The result of numerous interviews and extensive analysis of mainstream news coverage, in both print and on television, When Should the Watchdogs Bark? offers compelling explanations for the behavior of the news media during these three scandals. Lichter and Sabato argue that the mainstream media was more willing to pursue the Whitewater story because of its resemblance to more traditionally reported upon forms of political corruption.