Politics, citizenry, and tabloid-style journalism: The case of the Clinton/Lewinsky scandal

Tabloids, often defined by the half-broadsheet size of regular newspapers, feature titillating, sensationalized stories of crime and/or scandal offered in a piquant manner. The exploratory study asks how the tabloid style was manifested in the coverage of the Clinton/Lewinsky scandal of 1998 and related news, thereby fostering a hegemony in which the citizenry was distracted from more important political issues and events. The study also assesses how a critique of such tabloidization developed among journalists and scholars during the scandal. The print media analyzed are the tabloids Star magazine, The National Enquirer, and Globe , and mainstream media The New York Times and Newsweek. This study demonstrates that even the mainstream, "objective" reporting reflected sensationalism, the use of piquant and highly cliched language, and a lust for scandal, rendering it nearly indistinguishable from stories in the reviled tabloids. The related critique, led by journalists and extending to scholars who provided greater insight, precision, and elaboration, focused on the influence of the Internet and an increasingly competitive 24-hour media environment in fueling tabloidesque coverage of the scandal. The escalation of tabloid-style reporting in mainstream publications proved to be a troubling symptom of an industry already struggling under public distrust.