All glory is fleeting, but the glory reserved for youthful p.r. operatives in American politics may be the most fleeting of all. Consider:

In its December 7, 1992, edition, U.S. News & World Report declared George Stephanopoulos to be "Clinton's boy wonder" and reported: "Just like the president he will serve . . . Stephanopoulos has mastered the new rules of American politics." But in its June 7, 1993 edition, the newsmagazine reported that "At the tender age of 32, George Stephanopoulos already is a former boy wonder." He had abruptly been shunted aside, to make way for a new p.r. chieftain, U.S. News's own David Gergen.

In a glowing November 30, 1992, piece by Margaret Carlson, Time magazine said Stephanopoulos "is one of the savviest communicators in the business." But on the day the White House shakeup was announced, Carlson observed on the Inside Washington program that "Anything's better than George." The pattern was much the same in other media.

Early this year, White House spokeswoman Dee Dee Myers enjoyed a run of exceptionally friendly press coverage. The San Francisco Chronicle deemed her a "political wunderkind . . . tough, swift, smart, sassy and thoroughly professional." Vogue (April 1993) ran a profile titled "Admiring Myers." And on April 1, The Washington Post ran an upbeat, largely laudatory 60-paragraph, 530-line, 3,140-word portrait of Myers. It depicted her as a young woman of true grit who "isn't going to take any stuff" from those nasty reporters peppering her with questions, whom she called "the beasts." The profile was a kind of Beast's ode to Beauty.

But within a few short weeks, reporters were raising questions about her competency, too -- after the "Hair Force One" $ 200 haircut fiasco and the much bigger p.r. disaster involving Clinton cronies seeking a piece of the White House press charter business.

During last year's campaign, reporters marveled at the achievements of such media consultants as Clinton's Mandy Grunwald, Paul Begala, and James Carville (THE DOUBLE FIDGET CAMPAIGN WHIZ, The Washington Post, January 23, 1992). But by the time of the White House staff shuffle, journalists' bad feelings were extending to consultants as well. Newsweek (June 7) reported that "Clinton's vaunted cadre of political consultants is also losing some of its luster. . . . Some staffers are bitter that they have managed to evade accountability." That same week Time magazine jabbed Carville, reporting that he had boasted after the election that the incoming administration "didn't need the press anymore."

Didn't need the press? Carville seems to have lost sight of just what a good thing that he, Stephanopoulos, and some of the other aides and consultants had going: news organizations had actually been competing to play up to, and at times kiss the rings of, the very people who were being paid to manipulate them.

The resulting profiles were exceptionally self-abasing. They were also rather reckless, hailing the brilliance and super-competency of folks whose achievements tend to be mercurial, given the precarious nature of success in American politics.

Close textual study finds even basic elements or unities in this school of reportage.

1. The profile should be presented from the point of view of the subject. For instance, the Post's Myers profile begins with a view of the press from her side of the podium: "Tired, grumpy, cynical faces. New York subway rider faces. A collection of maws that won't stay filled. . . . By contrast, she's looking pretty smoothed-down and blown-dry these days." A September 20 profile of GOP soundbite queen Mary Matalin in The Boston Globe opens with the subject "riding herd in her 12th floor office" and quickly paints the world in her terms ("Matalin . . . has said proudly that she has been politically incorrect ever since she can remember." Etc.)

2. The article should quote friends, relatives, political allies, and admirers of the subject as extensively as possible. Myers profiles tend to quote her father ("She was always the peace finder") or sisters, as well as subordinates, who of course provide their own disinterested perspective (""She's very cool,' says David Leavy, her assistant of one year," Vogue, April 1993). Stephanopoulos profiles rely heavily on his parents ("who say that George is not just a son, but a trusted friend," People, October 26). His mother, Nikki, has revealed to several reporters that, as children, George and his sister never played with toys but instead read newspapers and magazines. Bosses and co-workers can provide an almost infinite supply of this sort of comment as well.

Co-ethnics can also be tapped. For instance, George Savidis, p.r. chief of the American Hellenic Educational Progressive Association, the oldest Greek-American fraternal organization, had this to say about young Stephanopoulos: "George is every Greek mother-in-law's dream. He's also the modern embodiment of the Periclean ideal" (The New York Times, December 6, 1992).

3. The article should make the subject look good even as he or she is shown doing things that make reporters look bad. For instance, last September 28 The Associated Press ran a profile of Grunwald that included an insider account of how, in a tense staff meeting, she devised a one-liner to deflect the latest round of attacks on Clinton. She is quoted as saying in the meeting: "You know, Governor, it seems to me that the only two times you've been invited on Nightline was to talk about a woman you never slept with and a draft you never dodged." The AP goes on to report that Clinton used a variant of this barb on Nightline and "it became the sound bite of the night" -- i.e, widely repeated in other media. The article makes no effort to assess the accuracy of the line.

Another example: on July 15, 1992, the Los Angeles Times reported, in a glowing profile of Stephanopoulos: "This spring, [he] played a key role in keeping several negative stories about Clinton out of major newspapers and off television, quietly calling editors and network executives to convince them the stories in question were unfair or otherwise flawed." The piece begged the question of whether the stories were in fact unfair or flawed.

4. The writer must choose words carefully to play up the significance or political potency of the pension under discussion. He or she can describe the subject, for instance, in terms of heat ("If George's IQ could be converted to Fahrenheit, the boy could boil water" -- Carville on Stephanopoulos, People, October 26, 1992O). Or, better yet, in terms of heat and light ("He has, at 31, leaped ahead of his elders to be at the red hot center of the Clinton universe. . . . This brooding, dark presence has a quiet authority. His power whisper makes people lean into him, like plants reaching toward the sun," Time, Stephanopoulos profile, November 30, 1992). Or perhaps in terms of other forces of nature ("Mary Matalin . . . is engaged in a whirlwind of power phoning," The Boston Globe, September 20m 1992).

Another approach, which works only for some subjects, is to describe them in terms of supernatural forces. Profiles of Carville, for instance, have emphasized his ability to "spook" the opposition and described him as a "Svengali," as "breathing fire." They have told how, as election day nears, he resorts to wearing black woolen gloves, not changing his underwear, and practicing other forms of political voodoo; how his dark basement office/dwelling is known as "The Bat Cave"; how his opponents refer to him "in terms normally reserved for Satan" and how one compared him to Rasputin.

In reality, of course, nearly all operatives, including Stephanopoulos and Carville, have been involved in failed campaigns. They are not superhuman. But by the end of these profiles, we are convinced they could melt the polar ice cap or conjure votes from a cauldron. That's writing!

5. The profile should play up, and even exaggerate, the subject's admirable traits. For instance, the Houston Chronicle (May 24, 1992) made a point of Matalin's singular humor. For Matalin, the paper reported, "things get done in a 'nanosecond' . . . her assistant Dave Carney is 'stud-muffin.'" (Are you in stitches?) Time (November 30) was among several news outlets to remark on Stephanopoulos' breathtaking humility: "It is hard to figure out how someone so self-effacing ended up where he is . . . an intellect unencumbered by a comparable ego. . . ." (Many of the White House reporters who were exposed to him regularly after the election soon took a revisionist view.)

6. The article should acknowledge, but must play down, criticisms of the subject. The Post's piece on Myers, for instance, acknowledges that some reporters have questioned whether she has enough access to Clinton. But it then rehabilitates her image, citing Carville's partner, Paul Begala. He argues that Clinton appreciates her humor, which "gives Myers her own distinctive bond with the president."

7. The profile must help foster an intriguing personal legend about the subject that can be passed on in future articles as a kind of gift to posterity. For instance, profiles of Stephanopoulos mention that he grew up as a preacher's son; frequently they work in how his experiences as a high school wrestler taught him about life. Myers profiles mention her "Brady Bunch" childhood in California and how she is called Dee Dee because a sister could not pronounce her name (or, in some versions of the yarn, could not pronounce the word "baby.")

Part of the enthralling lore passed on in such profiles should be about the subject's defying of conventions or bucking of tradition. In fact, judging by the literature, this seems to be an absolute requirement of the genre: the piece must emphasize that the subject is, say, a woman in a man's world (Grunwald, Myers, Matalin, Bush campaign spokeswoman Torie Clarke), or a young person in an older person's world (all of the above plus Stephanopoulos), or an eccentric in a world of gray suits and bland personalities (Carville, Mataline, and Clarke, who, "Torrential" to aides -- doesn't fit in the gray-haired Bush brigade," USA Today, August 19, 1992).

There must also be a kind of fable of sensitivity: however brazenly manipulative the political operative may appear on the surface, he or she must never come across as some cynical, callous image peddler but instead must be portrayed as having a genuine feeling for ordinary people. Thus, Carville is depicted keeping in touch with common folk by hanging out in Wal-Mart or (in some versions) Kmart stores; Myers consults her sister, Jo Jo, who is a hairdresser; Grunwald touches the public pulse by reading People and watching trash television; and Matalin never loses sight of her working-class steel-town beginnings.

Thoser are the seven principles for writing a fawning profile of a flack.

Now for the hard part: explaining why such acts of journalistic fellatio come to be performed in the first place. Several theories come to mind, some more satisfactory than others.

There is The Ideological Theory. Conservatives correctly point out that the ickiest, most sycophantic news treatment of this type during the 1992 campaign was mostly bestowed upon Democratic operatives. Conservatives see an ideological motive on the part of the liberal media. Their case, however, is easily overstated. It cannot adequately account for gushy profiles of Republicans Matalin, Clarke, and, in earlier election cycles, operatives like Margaret Tutwiler.

There is also The Access Theory, the idea that news organizations, as a matter of policy, order up pieces that flatter the flacks in order to get better treatment, juicer morsels of news from the president's table. That sounds plausible until you consider the less than adoring tone when White House reporters, who need access the most, confront the flacks in daily White House briefings. Consider this exchange during the May 5, 1993, briefing, as Myers introduced Don Steinberg, a new spokesman on foreign policy issues:

MYERS: He has a Masters in journalism from Columbia and, most importantly, he's a Dodgers fan. (Laughter.)

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: Our deepest sympathy. (Laughter.)

Columbia Journalism Review, July, 1993

MYERS: That was the most important criteria in his coming here.

HELEN THOMAS: I think journalism was the most important, for a change.

MYERS: That's right. He has credibility, Helen, at least for the first fifteen minutes.

THOMAS: For a change.

MYERS: For a change. . . . (Laughter.)

More promising is The Insider Theory, the idea that these gushy profiles came to be because so many journalists are inclined to puff up the group that provides them with the insider's perspective they crave. Showing their editors and readers they can get "inside" is evidently such an intoxicating accomplishment for some reporters that they seem to suffer from diminished critical capacities once the door opens.

There may also be a special Insider incentive for hyping the younger flacks: the reporter can project himself or herself as being with it enough to operate inside a hip, stylish, sexy political subculture. This could help explain why reporters made so much of Stephanopoulos' resemblance to the rock star Sting (Los Angeles Times, July 15, 1992), and his "boyish features and GQ look [that] Clinton once described as 'angelic funk'" (Baltimore Sun, February 4, 1993). It may explain why USA Today (August 19, 1992) says of Torie Clarke: "her frosted short hair looks spikey in a punk rock kind of way. Hemlines of her chic skirts end inches above her knees"; and why Time (March 8, 1993) writes of Clinton's p.r. aides: "The median age had dropped from forty-five to about twenty-five. [They] have brought with them boom boxes, R.E.M. tapes, takeout food, cappuccino makers, and a dorm room energy."

(On the other hand, youth culture's downside was emphasized after Stephanopoulos took the fall. In a June 1 piece headlined THE WHITE HOUSE KIDDIE CORPS, The Washington Post posited the theory that Stephanopoulos had become "a symbol of everything that's wrong with Bill Clinton's presidency -- which is regularly portrayed . . . as callow, arrogant, obsessed with image over substance.")

The Insider explanation has much to commend it, but is incomplete.

To it must be added The Great Person Theory, according to which journalists write at worshipful length about such people as Stephanopoulos because they think these operatives are shaping historry; because they are convinced that, were it not for a Carville or a Grunwald, Governor Clinton might have lost the 1992 election. There are compelling reasons not to subscribe to such a view -- underlying political currents generally are so strong that any competent team of operatives can exploit an advantageous tide. Even so, many journalists seem to take the Great Person approach. ("With the exception of the White House chief of staff, James A. Baker III, and the campaign chairman, Robert Teeter, Matalin may have more responsibility than any one for whether Bush wins or loses," Boston Globe, September 20, 1992). I suspect that a twisted sense of self-importance may drive some of this reporting -- a belief that this is a terribly important person I am writing about, a person so terribly important that I am going to lavish thousands of words upon him, and one of his terribly important duties is pitching messages to reporters like me; that means I must be terribly important, too.

A similar narcissism may account for some of the more enthusiastic press commentary on Gergen's ascension, which, in my view, tended to inflate the potential good that one commenatator/editor/image-monger could do for Clinton. Gregan, after all, tried and failed to restore the public standing of Richard Nixon and could not sell the voters on Gerald Ford.

But this last observation is probably too historical to be relevant: in the news business, after all, "reality" is a highly perishable thing -- so much so that an entirely new crop must be grown every few months. That's a chore for journalists, to be sure. On the other hand, we don't have to worry much about linking the present with the past, and that is one of the real blessings of our profession. It gives us an enormous sense of "empowerment," to use a word much in vogue with the Clintonites, and a perpetual sense of discovery. Tomorrow is always a fresh new day.

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