( CNN ) -- The press has turned on President Obama with a vengeance . Suddenly , the White House briefing room is filled with confrontational questions . Suddenly , the news pages are ablaze with scandal , and the commentators -- even some of the president 's usual defenders -- are bemoaning his shortcomings . Suddenly , Obama is n't getting the benefit of the doubt . According to Obama 's longtime detractors , the denizens of the fourth estate are finally climbing out of a tank in which they have been immersed since roughly 2007 . But the reality is a bit more nuanced than that . There are a number of unsavory allegations swirling around Washington , but do not underestimate the importance of the Justice Department seizing two months of Associated Press phone records without so much as a heads-up . This not only seems like a case of prosecutorial overreach , even in a case involving national security , it strikes at the heart of what journalists do -- and has fostered feelings of betrayal . Does the administration not understand the chilling effect on reporters and their sources , they wonder , or simply not care ? It 's easy to say that news organizations recoiled from Obama only when their own special interests were threatened , and maybe there 's some truth to that . But the media also have a deep , abiding love for scandal , and beyond the AP phone records story , the administration is lately providing that scandal in spades . The battle over Benghazi has mostly divided along partisan lines , with conservatives seeing a sustained coverup and liberals perceiving a partisan attack on what was a bungled operation and confused aftermath . But the report by ABC 's Jonathan Karl alleging the scrubbing of the Susan Rice talking points ( following a less-noticed report by Stephen Hayes of the Weekly Standard ) transformed the tone of the coverage in a single stroke . The Karl report turned out to be based on an inaccurate , misleading characterization of an email , but for the first time , many journalists came to believe the administration had something to hideâ€ ” and that they had been personally misled in press briefings . That is guaranteed to get the blood flowing . The disclosure that the IRS selectively targeted conservative groups for review brought immediate condemnation from many across the media spectrum , including Carl Bernstein , who investigated the Nixonian abuses , of which this story carries an unmistakable echo . And it is the trifecta of these scandalous sagas that will dominate coverage for months as media outlets feast on the cycle of investigations , hearings , subpoenas , resignations and denials . Any doubt that scandal trumps ideology in the media firmament can be dispelled with a glance back at Bill Clinton 's tenure , when what he called the `` knee-jerk liberal press '' investigated Monica Lewinsky , Whitewater and other allegations with a fervor that eventually put it on a virtual war footing against the White House . More troubling for the current crew is that news outlets are starting to pivot to broader questions about whether Obama is competent at the business of government or a passive bystander in his own administration . That impression , if it takes hold , can not be Etch-a-Sketched away . To be sure , some of Obama 's antagonists will overreach by framing every scandal as the next Watergate and each revelation as an impeachable offense . That may trigger a counter-reaction in which some of the president 's liberal allies shift their focus from the administration 's missteps to the opposition 's overkill . Some in the media rolled over for Barack Obama in the 2008 campaign , though the record was decidedly more mixed once he took office . But personal feelings toward this president who has never courted the press no longer matter ; nor do personal predilections on gun control and immigration reform . The scandal machinery has kicked into high gear , and its sheer noise may drown out everything else . The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Howard Kurtz .
Howard Kurtz : AP phone records search , other stories have turned press on Obama . He says attention is n't just out of press self-interest ; Obama 's stuck in number of scandals . Comment: Kurtz : GOP may overreach to damage Obama ; still , scandal could drown out governing .