WH Press Corps sliding on Knee Pads for Tonight

No question. The White House will tolerate one question on the important subjects answered with a well-prepared answer and then get 15 softballs from the servile press corps.


As usual.

For those who doubt the control, read this article from USA Today in 3/03:

http://www.usatoday.com/life/television/news/2003-03-09-media-mix_x.htm

Bush has media walking a fine line

As the potential for war against Iraq grows stronger, the White House press corps faces a delicate challenge: how to balance its obligation to hold President Bush accountable while respecting the challenges he faces at a critical time in history.

(cut)

Nowhere was that more apparent than last week, when Bush called a rare prime-time news conference, which networks and cable outlets covered.

There, Bush made two unprecedented moves that could signal the way he and his administration plan to handle — some say intimidate — the media during wartime.

(cut)

they will let George give non-answers, lies, and answers that make no sense, and we'll be left to analyze it afterwards. The whore analysts will somehow not notice these, they will declare Bush's performance a home run.

Why is he doing this? Yeah, there's a lot of pressure for the pResident to address the recent crises, but he could have simply done a public address, a speech from the Oval Office or something. I also can't figure out why they think that whatever self-damage he is inflicting by not speaking is bigger than the damage he'll inflict by holding a press-conference. Even with the softballs and the servile press-corps, press conferences are always busts for him.

I have a feeling that something's up.

disguse them in the press. It's theater of the same sort as before Scalia handed him the job. He's tryin' to look presidential. It's a another one of those "misleadership" moments and he needs to be trashed thoroughly for every second of it.

:shrug:

If you've seen any of the official WH press conferences, you know the ENTIRE WH Press corp is pathetic.

...that they'll get down on in front of the president.


wtf

and Ari, oh and Rove too).

God, are we a cynical bunch or what?

I just wish we could get all the WH press corps to defer their questions to Helen Thomas. One on One Bush vs Helen.

OK, i'm dreaming

Hasn't been the same since Sam Donaldson took himself off that beat. That guy was a bull dog.

U.S. Press Justifies Slaughter in Iraq
By Bill Van Auken
13 April 2004
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2004/apr2004/prss-a13.shtml
Excerpt:
No such critical approach is to be found today. For the most part, the media act as cheerleaders for US military atrocities. To the extent that the press even questions the Bush administration’s policy, it is entirely from the standpoint of its tactical expediency in suppressing the resistance of the Iraqis to foreign occupation. Not a single prominent voice in the media has been raised in protest against the barbaric siege against a city of over 300,000 inhabitants, an act of collective punishment that violates the most basic laws of war.

The press is marching in lockstep because the criminal war in Iraq represents a policy embraced by the entire US ruling elite. To the extent that the Times raises doubts and criticisms, it is from the standpoint of advising the Bush administration that it must repackage its message to stem the growing popular demand for the withdrawal of US troops.

The Washington Post, the other authoritative voice of the US establishment, is even more blunt. It’s Sunday editorial also criticizes the Bush administration’s tactics—specifically, its failure to get UN assistance and its over-reliance on the US-led Iraqi security forces that have melted away in the face of the mass insurrection.

But on the essential question of the occupation of Iraq, the Post advises the American people to get used to the killing and dying. Suppressing Iraqi resistance, the paper warns, “will require military power and probably more of the woeful casualty reports and gruesome television footage that have been shocking the country. More troops will be needed.”

(or 12)and they must have worked something out with the media to get their message out and raise his poll numbers. I'm looking for some one-liners that go over well - patriotism, "support" for troops, evil-doers, "critics should know that its a for us or against us situation".

bwahhhahh!!! who does he think he is, the principal or something? only way they can control the news.

sick, sick, sick administration, get rid of them!!