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Journalists Route Around White House Press Office
Tailhook writes Pool reports written by White House correspondents are distributed to news organizations via the White House Press Office. Reporters have alleged that the Obama White House exploits its role as distributor to "demand changes in pool reports" and has used this power to "steer coverage in a more favorable direction." Now a group of 90 print journalists has begun privately distributing their work through Google Groups, independent of the Press Office. Their intent is to "create an independent pool-reporting system for print and online recipients."
The Internet perceives censorship as damage and routes around it. The tighter the control the more systems will slip through their fingers.
Ooh how many more memes can this article produce?
i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
What did they imagine the White House Press Office was for? It's always been the tool that the White House uses to get whatever information it wants the press to report on out to reporters. It's not a service to the press to tell them everything THEY want to know about the government. Never has been. If they're not getting out the information that THEY want to report on, whose job is that?
After reading TFA, this is much to do about nothing. One piece of "news" requested by the White House to be removed included paring down an article of the President's visit on the "Tonight Show" based on an agreement with the show not to release too much about the content of the show before broadcast - a common show biz rule. Another was a line about the First Lady working out in a hotel gym, while another was a piece about the President honoring a retiring long-time White House journalist with a cake and a humorous quip. The only thing of possible substance here is the 4th mentioned report where a reporter had sour grapes about being left out of a photo op, and wrote a piece comparing his treatment to a freedom of the press speech the President had given days earlier.
In fact, they quoted other reporters saying they've never had a problem, and have never been corrected besides "spelling and factual errors".
What a sham post. Editors should be ashamed of themselves for trying to start a boiling political argument over nothing. Smells thickly of corporate motives, which is blatantly unacceptable.
So you would run on a platform of "change" and "transparency"?
You are not fooling anyone Obama.
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
If we had a more independent, and aggressive, investigative news agencies out there, Obama and other politicians (both parties) would not get away with half the shit they do.
I think the news agencies should, in general, always view the administration at the time as somewhat adversarial, and should always be on the look for errors, law breaking and any hint of wrong doing. That should be their jobs, to constantly being on the heels of those in power, and keep them on their toes.
When you lose true news investigation and reporting, you lose democracy....the free press is needed to keep the administration honest, and just parroting news feeds from whatever administration is in office does the country absolutely NO service, and can in fact, allow very bad things to happen to the country as a whole as well as to erode and harm citizens on a more personal level.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
Well, apparently under this President it's gotten to the point where they've have to have a formal work-around. Perhaps partisans will jump in and say that under Bush a report was delayed for an hour because of an emergency, or some other lame precedent that will allow them to claim that "everybody does it," when no, everybody doesn't do it.
Sadly our current news media is ratings driven drivel. When your news outfits become purely profit driven, your quality doesn't have to be appealing, only your entertainment value. That is probably the largest marker of the decline of the United States. Often we hear about how the bread and circuses had to be maintained to keep the populace of Rome happy. As it turns out, our news media reflects a circus, and we have McDonald's and other fast food venues for our bread. While I support the legalization of marijuana, I feel that cheap thrills obtained by weed will most likely perpetuate this culture of bread and circuses.
Place something witty here
Yes, this administration has prosecuted more "leakers" than any before. This administration has ignored more FOIA requests than any before. This administration has delayed or ignored more congressional subpoenas than ever before. It's obvious that the Obama administration is more "transparent" than prior adminisrations. What is not obvious is the definition of transparency being referred to. I am seeing right through them.
I think they should stop allowing the President or other officials from "choosing" whom to get questions from in the pool...make it a random drawing who gets question 1, 2, 3....
But has gotten progressively worse...and that means the current admin is about bottom of the barrel with respect to this...until the next admin....
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
Bush did it first! Bush did it first! Bush did it first!....seriously how fucking long can you parrot this shit?
For as long as people think that it will all be fixed by a Republican president.