Media Matters boot camp readies liberal policy wonks for the camera’s close-up

Since its inception in August 2009, the Progressive Talent Initiative, or PTI, has trained nearly 100 pundits who have appeared 800 times on television and radio. Media Matters For America uses that metric to pitch donors for more contributions, but its leadership believes that the surge of camera-ready liberals has recaptured lost ground in the media wars against conservatives.

“There was a chronic imbalance,” said David Brock, the founder of Media Matters, which picks up the entire cost of the course. “We didn't just want to accept that this is the way it is.” Brock is a former conservative writer at the American Spectator who was instrumental in efforts to discredit Anita Hill and to oust Bill Clinton, and who made a sharp left turn a decade ago. The primary mission of Media Matters, he said, is to obsessively monitor Fox News and call attention to its distortions. But now it’s moving into the operational phase, transforming from observers to shock troops. The organization, he said, had to “professionalize the training and booking” of a left-leaning counterpoise.