One of my local newspapers "gets it"

[kcass1954]

http://www.palmbeachpost.com/opinion/content/opinion/epaper/2005/02/26/a12a_gannonedit_0226.html


White House flack corps
By Palm Beach Post Editorial

Saturday, February 26, 2005

A man who posted his image on gay pornographic Web sites uses an alias and gets within a few feet of the president. Problem? Yes, but not as big as the problem it reveals.

James D. Guckert was "Jeff Gannon" when he spent nearly two years with the White House press corps. He wasn't a journalist. He was a plant, installed to ask Democrat-bashing softball questions of Mr. Bush and employed by two online organizations — Talon News and GOPUSA — that are financed by a Bush backer and pass off right-wing rantings as news. Just as right-wing bloggers exposed CBS' faulty story about President Bush's National Guard service, left-wing bloggers outed Guckert/Gannon's identity and postings on such sites as hotmilitarystud.com.

So Guckert/Gannon quit, but the more substantial story is the White House's unprecedented efforts to phony up the news, with the public paying part of the tab, and restrict Mr. Bush to scripted answers. The administration has paid so-called journalists and commentators to push the White House line. No president has held fewer news conferences. The president holds "town meetings" only when his staff can know the questions in advance.

While the White House press corps always has had its share of flaky reporters, they at least were honest flakes. Press secretary Scott McClellan tried to dismiss Guckert/Gannon's deception, saying, "People use aliases all the time." Yes, if they're criminals. Since the administration has detained several hundred terrorism "suspects" who have aliases, there's more than a bit of irony in Mr. McClellan's dismissal of such deceptions.

Since he never worked as a reporter — though he did run his mother's campaigns for Texas comptroller — Mr. McClellan might not understand why getting it right matters to legitimate journalists. Must be a family thing. His father, lawyer Barr McClellan, wrote How LBJ Killed JFK, which might have been amusing fiction if the author hadn't called it history.

To some degree, all presidents have tried to control the news. No president has tried as hard as George W. Bush.

[KT2000]

1. This IS good

everyone seems to think it is just about the sex stuff. Old habits I guess.