[baldheadeddork]

Originally Posted by kitkat

Helen Thomas: "The point is the control-- We have never had that in the White House. And we have had some, but not-- This White House. I'm amazed. I'm amazed at you people who call for openness and transparency and—It's shocking. It's really shocking. It's a pattern of controlling the press. Your formal engagements are pre-packaged. By calling reporters the night before to tell them they're going to be called on. That is shocking."--addressed to Robert Gibbs at the July 1st WH press conference.

After the press conference, Thomas had some further comments:

“Nixon didn’t try to do that,” Thomas said. “They couldn’t control (the media). They didn’t try.

“What the hell do they think we are, puppets?” Thomas said. “They’re supposed to stay out of our business. They are our public servants. We pay them.”

Thomas said she was especially concerned about the arrangement between the Obama Administration and a writer from the liberal Huffington Post Web site. The writer was invited by the White House to President Obama’s press conference last week on the understanding that he would ask Obama a question about Iran from among questions that had been sent to him by people in Iran.

“When you call the reporter (Huffington Post) the night before you know damn well what they are going to ask to control you,” Thomas said.

“I’m not saying there has never been managed news before, but this is carried to fare-thee-well--for the town halls, for the press conferences,” she said. “It’s blatant. They don’t give a damn if you know it or not. They ought to be hanging their heads in shame.”--CNS news interview


The libs positively celebrated Helen Thomas back when Bush was her target...now? Not so much... Ana Marie Cox (who often appears in eyelid batting contests with Rachel Maddow on her MSNBC show--) had the following comment on this:

" I may get struck down for saying this, but I think that exchange should put to rest the idea that Helen is some kind of symbol of speaking truth to power. She is, in the end, just another mainstream media reporter. I think her seat in the briefing room could probably be put to better use by, say, the Huffington Post."

Kat, you really are a wingnut? Knock me over with a feather.

(If you don't want to click on the link, she cribbed most of her post from the Conservative News Service - motto: "The 'Right' News. Right Now.")

C'mon Kat, fess up. This really is you, isn't it?

About what passes for a story in this post, Helen Thomas is wrong on this. Not just on opinion of what happened, but factually wrong. The White House did know that Nico Pitney would have a questions from Iranians on the ground, and they put him in the press conference so he could ask the question. But they did not know what the question would be. If this was scripted, Obama's answer would have been a hell of a lot more polished. The questions Pitney asked were not softballs, in fact Pitney's were clearly the most difficult and uncomfortable questions for Obama to answer.

The only management of the press was giving a seat to a blog reporter who would ask a question about Iran, which should have described every reporter in the room, and that Obama was using Pitney as a conduit to have a direct conversation with the Iranian people. There was nothing stopping any reporter in the room from doing that. Had Helen Thomas or Chuck Todd used their resources to get a question from an Iranian they would have done the same thing, and they would have been called on, too. But they chose to use their opportunities for the kind of bullshit questions about inside DC politics that tend to make up 95% of the questions in the WH press room. In the oldest rule of journalism, they got beat on a story by a reporter who was showing more initiative.

Being a reporter in the White House press corps has been compared to a gilded cage. On the good side, you're guaranteed to get on the air in the first segment or make the front page every single day. The bad news is, you're nothing more than a glorified stenographer. You write down what the press secretary or president says, you put it together with what comes from your Capitol Hill, Pentagon or State Department reporter, you talk to the political opponents of whatever is in the news that day, and you file your story. There is almost no real reporting that comes out of the WH press corps and that's been true for decades. A lot of people want to talk to you, but only because you're their conduit to the front page or the first segment on the nightly news. Even if you have the desire to do original reporting, you don't have the time because you've got to put a story together about what everyone said for deadline every day.

That's the most generous view of the WH press. The other side, just as true, is this is a kingdom of fifty egos that do not like to share their access. The WH has to invite bloggers to press conferences and put them on the daily guest list for briefings because the WH Correspondents Association refuses to issue the credentials that would give them access. The same is true in Congress, where even bloggers with backgrounds as academics and historians on Congress are barred from the press gallery or from getting the press credentials that allow easier access to members of Congress. These same lions of the press corps threw a shit fit earlier this year when Obama called on bloggers during a prime-time press conference - while the reporter for the Washington Post asked the president what he thought about A-Rod taking steroids.

Think about all of the stories that the DC press corps has blown in the last ten years. When have you ever heard Helen Thomas bitch about her non-blogger colleagues totally missing those stories. But Obama asks a blogger to ask a question from an Iranian, and that's shameful.

Anna Marie Cox is right.