By Oh Young-jin
Assistant managing editor

Professor Kim Min-jun of Kyunghee University raised an interesting point during a late-night television panel discussion, Saturday, on the upset for the ruling Grand National Party (GNP) in the June 2 local elections.

At one point, Professor Kim wondered why the government, either liberal or conservative, becomes so disconnected from the people and presses on with the very policy that irks their constituents, even when it receives a blatant public vote of no confidence. Kim hosted a television newsmagazine program before being forced to quit following a confrontation with President Lee Myung-bak.

Kim referred to the election results that showed victory for the opposition's, running counter to pre-election polls that had predicted landslide wins for the GNP.

Obviously dissatisfied the political scientist resorted to rhetorical questions, and projected herself back into the debate concluding that the latest voters' rebellion was an act of the "silent majority."

She referred to the famous phrase used by U.S. President Richard Nixon during his Nov. 3, 1969 speech that laid the groundwork for the Nixon Doctrine, the policy of "Vietnamization." Now we know that the Nixon policy of "ending the war in the way we could win peace" enabled the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Vietnam in a more orderly manner than otherwise.

The irony is that Nixon shrewdly used the phrase to rouse the support of a politically-muzzled people to eventually win a landslide re-election victory in 1972 but the GNP misgauged the political pulse of a great number of "silent voters" and lost the election.

Kim made another point to support her logic.

"People had felt either too scared or neglected to express their political views when the news coverage was uniformly supportive of the incumbent government," Kim said. "They jumped on the first chance to show that feeling of political deprivation." (Her remarks were edited and complemented to help readers better understand her point.)

Interestingly enough, the media environment facing Nixon back in the 1960s and the incumbent government, led by President Lee, are quite opposite.

Feeling alienated from the establishment, Nixon had inborn suspicions and inner animosity toward the media that he believed had an agenda against him. Likewise did the media.

When he talked about the silent majority, he was up against an elitist media that promoted the vocal minority's anti-Vietnam war views and helped turn it into a national narrative.

Eventually, it was the Washington Post, the elitist media outlet, which deposed Nixon by debunking his involvement in political espionage that became what we now know to be the Watergate scandal. Maybe, the late Nixon felt vindicated about his belief about the media's hidden agenda, when he resigned mid-term.

President Lee enjoys favorable coverage from three conservative newspapers, which combine to account for three quarters of the print readership, setting the tenor of the national agenda. A couple of progressive media outlets are critical of the Lee administration but they prove to be too small to make much difference.

It goes without saying that the contrast is striking, when their coverage of the liberal heads of state ― late Presidents Kim Dae-jung and Roh Moo-hyun ― and about Lee is compared. For instance, I remember one of the three carrying on its front page a big photo of Lee embracing a hard-working grandmother at a market during a post-inauguration visit. It was captioned "The nation cries and so does the president." I take it as a classic example of journalism sucking up to power.

National television stations are quite sympathetic toward the incumbent government with their heads being government appointees. To be fair, the previous administrations enjoyed the same benefits when they were in power.

Whether the friendly, uncritical media outlets are good or not can be the subject of lengthy discussions in some other columns but a more immediate, worthwhile question is what the incumbent government can learn from the optical illusion created by their supportive media that manifested itself through the reversal in election results.

No doubt, the election proved a gap in perception between the government and electorate, leaving the government with two choices. One of them is to shove aside the sweet talk by the friendly media and take a reality check, while the second is to continue to ignore electoral dissatisfaction and stick to their business-as-usual attitude.

In terms of state management, I don't want to be opinionated and declare that one is necessarily better than the other.

Obviously, the government may place a higher priority on political convenience for the purpose of pushing through with its agenda on the basis of which it was elected.

President Lee is highly regarded for his handling of the economy and deft damage control of North Korea's sinking of the ROK Navy patrol ship Cheonan.

Thus, he may dismiss the local election results as a temporary distraction. Since Lee is the type with a steadfast can-do spirit and pure determination, the chance is that he will follow this path, believing that history will ultimately be the judge of his legacy. Perhaps, the nation may look back at Lee's five years in office and appreciate it as the starting point of another great national leap forward.

But what about the costs? The job of being a president should be conducted in the present tense as much as in the future tense. In other words, a president receives a mandate to govern from their contemporaries and thus should feel obligated to put the promotion of their interests as the main agenda. It is a matter of course that he should engineer his present actions to pave the way for a better future.

For this purpose, a president should not be afraid to engage in a constant conversation with the nation as a whole. But it is easier said than done because a president always has a full docket and, seen from the high perch of power, dissent can be a challenge to authority. I call this presidential mentality "trench mentality," by which there are only two types of people ― friend or foe. The friendly, uncritical press runs the risk of casting a more shadowy distortion to the presidential tunnel vision.

This could be one answer to Professor Kim's question of why all presidents can end up becoming disconnected from the people.