The Condit Saga: To Cover or Not to Cover?

In the now-daily tumult that is the story of missing federal intern Chandra Levy, Jim Murphy watches and waits. Murphy, executive producer of “The CBS Evening News,” has made waves himself this week, as a sober arbiter of news begging off a story that most media outlets--from major daily newspapers to nightly network news shows--can’t resist.

On Wednesday, “CBS Evening News,” so far alone among the cable and broadcast news networks in not covering the story, was set to join the pack, reporting on the Washington, D.C., police search of Rep. Gary Condit’s apartment. But by the end of the day, Murphy saw little new in the wall-to-wall TV coverage of an event that was almost a day old and pulled the story from his newscast, leading the news with President Bush’s proposals for prescription drug discounts as part of Medicare reform.

Thursday brought a new potential bombshell--a Washington Post story saying FBI officials had interviewed a Modesto Pentecostal minister who said that his then-18-year-old daughter had had an affair with the congressman seven years ago. Murphy professed skepticism; he’d seen another report on CNN’s Web site that the woman had posted a note on her front door denying any past involvement with Condit. “There’s a lot of strange people involved in this,” Murphy said. As of noon, he said he didn’t intend to broadcast the story.

There are layers everywhere in the unspooling story around Levy and Condit. Both the family of the missing woman and the increasingly disgraced congressman have spin-meisters of their own, massaging and reacting to what the media dig up. Daily, news organizations make decisions that, through happenstance or not, define their attitude toward the story. Coverage has reached the kind of critical mass that prompts a spasm of punditry and self-assessment.

Much of it has been targeted at Murphy, who finds his “CBS Evening News” being defined as curiously absent on the story or misguidedly highhanded. As his competitors chase the juiciest story of the summer, bearing down on apparently false statements Condit has released through his staff, Murphy says he doesn’t consider himself a martyr to responsible journalism. Nor, he says, is he seeking to gain publicity by holding his program up as a source of more substantive issues. Yes, he feels pressure, and yes, the Levy case is a hot-button topic in news meetings. But Murphy, who hardly sounds cranky on the subject, says he returned from vacation Monday and was “disturbed” by the frenzy of coverage on morning news shows. He made a decision not to cover the story on his newscast barring a major development in the investigation. And anchorman Dan Rather is in full agreement, he says.

“I do not believe that this is not a story,” said Murphy. “But a lot of what I had seen really disturbed me. . . . I’ve seen lots of stories like this, and I will cover this story at some point, and I came close last night. But to me, it’s, let’s take a deep breath and say, ‘What are we doing here?’ ”

Still, inside the shops churning out the day’s stories, the question is, Why is CBS standing alone in not covering the story?

“I do not understand CBS’ position,” said a rival network news producer. “There’s a U.S. congressman involved to some degree.”

“I think they did it for strategic reasons,” said Jerry Nachman, a frequent pundit on cable news shows and, most recently, executive producer of ABC’s “Politically Incorrect With Bill Maher.” Nachman, who has also held executive positions in television and print news, added: “They did it to differentiate themselves. . . . This is the line they’re drawing in the sand as to how they’re different and above the fray.”

Although 24-hour cable networks are built to inhale the story, the nightly national newscasts have differed in their approaches. ABC’s “World News Tonight” covered the Condit apartment search Wednesday, while “Nightline,” long respected in the news business, broadcast a timeline of the story later that night. NBC’s “Nightly News,” which led its newscast Wednesday with two stories, one on the Condit apartment search and another on the missing-persons investigation, has been the most aggressive, having devoted nearly a dozen stories to either Levy or Condit since mid-May.

“I’m completely comfortable with our coverage,” said Steve Capus, executive producer of “Nightly News.” “There’s a tremendous amount of interest in this story, and there is an unsolved mystery. And that says to us, there’s a real story here.”

Developments in the investigation surrounding Levy’s disappearance 10 weeks ago have been few. Failing hard facts, the story’s momentum has largely been fueled by revelations involving Condit’s alleged extramarital affairs, including one with Levy, which the congressman reportedly revealed to police during a third interview with investigators. Since then, two more alleged Condit affairs have come to light, one with flight attendant Anne Marie Smith, who gave cable’s Fox News Channel two interviews.

“I think if Chandra showed up tomorrow, happy and smiling, the story would fade pretty quickly,” said John Moody, senior vice president of Fox News. In the interim, Fox News is only too happy to pursue a story filled with information gaps and room for sexy speculation. On Wednesday’s edition of “The O’Reilly Factor,” for instance, host Bill O’Reilly openly called for Condit’s resignation. On Thursday morning, Fox News’ Web site posted that police said they may have found blood in Condit’s apartment, with no apparent substantiation.

“If Congressman Condit’s personal life is peripheral to the main story, it’s peripheral in a way that seems to interest not just the press but the police, and the missing girl’s parents,” Moody said. “And that’s why you’re seeing it so much on the screen.”

“We have throughout this story, and every time we speak of it, emphasized that the unfolding revelations about the congressman’s personal life may have nothing to do with [Levy’s] disappearance,” said Keith McAllister, CNN’s senior vice president of national news. McAllister noted that the all-news network had spent Thursday morning focusing not on the Levy case but on an evacuation of the West Wing of the White House after a dog identified a suspicious car on White House grounds. “Just as we got off that story, the Levys made a statement,” McAllister said. “As CNN does, we are trying to bring the best, most important stories to viewers as they happen.”

But to critics including CBS’ Murphy, news outlets, by lavishing coverage on Condit, are too brazenly linking the congressman’s dishonesty to Levy’s disappearance, even encouraging audiences in a presumption of Condit’s guilt.

Others, meanwhile, are skeptical about the backstage massaging of the story by the respective legal and public relations teams behind both the Levy family and Condit. Condit has hired high-powered attorney Abbe Lowell, who is speaking on his behalf. Representing the Levys are attorney Billy Martin, one of Monica Lewinsky’s closest advisors during her time in the tabloid glare, and the Washington, D.C., public relations firm Porter Novelli, whose team includes Mike Frisby, who covered the Clinton White House for the Wall Street Journal.

A report this week on the Web site https://www.salon.com described how the Levy team stoked the story last Friday by having Linda Zamsky, Chandra’s aunt, give a detailed account of her niece’s affair with Condit to the Washington Post, bypassing the networks because they were uncertain how Zamsky would come off on TV. Frisby did not return calls for comment.

“It is totally in the family’s interest to keep the story alive, so it doesn’t go into what the police call cold storage,” said Robin Sproul, Washington bureau chief for ABC News, noting the efficacy of the Levys’ attempts to pressure Condit. “They’re getting some pretty high-powered advice on this.”

Whoever is orchestrating the news, Nachman is among those who feels strongly that Condit’s lack of candor has made him an available target for scrutiny--not unlike the pressure that similar denials brought to former Sen. Gary Hart or President Clinton.

“Let’s just for fun take out sex,” Nachman said. “You have a constituent, which is the family of a missing woman, accusing their congressman of lying and hindering an investigation. How is that not a news story? . . . How do you not cover that?”

To Nachman, the criticism that cable networks are obsessed with the story misses the mandate under which 24-hour news operations work. “Their wheel is an all-news radio wheel. Part of what they’ve got to do is deal with an audience that’s very circadian in its rhythm.”

Murphy’s rhythm is circadian, too, but he has to dollop out news in nightly 22-minute increments. And so far neither Levy nor Condit has made the cut. “Every day that story is on the list along with everyone else,” he said. But so far, he sees a story better suited for CBS’ other news programs, “The Early Show” or weekend news shows, which have devoted time to Levy’s disappearance. Noting a House vote on campaign finance reform was coming to a head Thursday, Murphy said: “I don’t think anyone is going to decide their vote on campaign finance based on what’s happening to Gary Condit.”