Posted on 02/17/2005 10:00:57 AM PST by bigsoxfan
It's been buzzing all over the Internet, on the pages of the Washington Post and, according to White House press secretary Scott McClellan, it even merited a brief discussion with President Bush.
It involves an alleged homosexual prostitute who managed, with no previous journalism background, to wiggle his way into the White House as a correspondent for the conservative Internet-based Talon News and ask Bush loaded questions at presidential news conferences, before being ripped to pieces by Left Wing bloggers and liberals in the media and Congress.
I can't help wondering why the Left got so upset over Jeff Gannon (a.k.a. James Guckert) and Talon News. Was the Left more enraged by Gannon's lack of journalistic credentials and purported political bias, or because of what it considered an unpardonable sin?
No, not that he might be a homosexual hooker, but that as a homosexual hooker, he would have betrayed the liberal cause with conservative-slanted writing.
There are other reasons about which one can argue Gannon that had no business working at the White House, but they fall flat when one considers the past and present practices of what we today loosely refer to as "journalists."
1) Gannon's lack of journalistic experience: How many times have we seen entertainers with no past journalism experience plopped in the television or radio anchor chair to pontificate on the issues of the day and ask questions of guests? Is someone like John McEnroe a journalist? No more than a Janeane Garafalo or an Al Franken.
Then there are the bloggers, many of whom also lack journalism backgrounds and traditional accountability, but who sometimes pull in larger audiences than some of the nation's daily newspapers. Their influence can't be denied; they helped take down Dan Rather and CNN's Jordan Eason. Are these bloggers journalists?
2) Gannon's use of a pseudonym: As a former television news reporter and producer in the nation's number seven market, I can tell you with first-hand experience that many of the "journalists" you see on television or hear on the radio use different names while conducting their work. 'Taylor' is easier to pronounce than 'Tetreault' for instance. While there were legitimate reasons for the Secret Service to learn Gannon's true identity for security purposes, there was no other valid excuse for the Left to split a gut over Gannon's use of a pseudonym.
3) Gannon's use of loaded or softball questions at presidential news conferences: This is the most laughable excuse for the Left going loony over Gannon. How many times did Bill Clinton get softball questions from the adoring White House press corps, 90 percent of whom admitted to voting for him? Are we to believe that the David Brock-led Media Matters for America and his allies on the Left flipped out because one person asked President Bush conservative slanted questions in a forum that usually produces many more of the insulting and accusatory variety? I don't think so.
Make no mistake, Jeff Gannon, or James Guckert, or whatever his name is, is no conservative. Anybody who publishes sexually explicit photos of himself on a website in hopes of making money as a hooker is no conservative. Not in this lifetime. Not on this planet. The person in those photos is a pig and a pervert.
But Gannon did rile up the Left, and it's because they felt betrayed, certain that the only reliable, no-questions-asked, no-strings-attached home for such individuals is in the liberal wing of the establishment media or Democratic Party.
The Left wants this controversy to be about a Republican White House letting in a ringer to ask questions and get access to sensitive information so he could write up favorable stories on the Talon News website. But if Jeff Gannon was a heterosexual, I suspect his questions for the president would have drawn scant attention. He wouldn't have made many friends in the White House press room, but almost nobody would have cared.
Homosexuality, at its core, is about narcissism and self-loathing. But the Left is demonstrating another of its common characteristics in the Gannon flap - denial. They want the world to believe that exposing Gannon's journalistic bona fides, or lack thereof, is their ethical responsibility.
But don't be fooled. The Jeff Gannon controversy is about sex and turning the political tables on Left Wing ideologues he should have known would seek revenge and personal destruction. It's nothing more than that.
(David Thibault is the managing editor of CNSNews.com)
Actually, most of Gannon's questions weren't meant as softballs for Bush, but as bombs dropped on hypocritical Democrats, for instance, asking McClellan to comment on the latest Kerry flip-flop. His questions seemed to do their damage to the left without any answer required from McClellan.
They just love all this sex talk, just like with the prison orgy in Iraq, they can't let it go.
I quess thats what happens when you define yourself by who you like to have sex with!
I haven't had the time to follow this story this week. Has it been confirmed, then, that he was a gay "escort?" The last I'd heard, he had simply registered some gay websites as part of his web development job.
Well, since most of the MSM are undeniably whores, many are homosexual, and a degree from J-school hardly seems necessary (or even encouraging) to a common sense take on issues, what's the big deal? He's just like all the rest of them! ;-)
I don't approve of the homosexual lifestyle, but they have a right to be reporters like everybody else. I think this piece is over the top and, pardon the word, judgmental.
Conservatives were happy to read Sullivan's work, until he went around the bend. There is room in the conservative movement for homosexuals.
The issue really isn't Gannon's website, which he evidently repented. The issue is credentials. And the White House can give credentials to whomever they want, within reason. "Within reason" to me means that they can't crowd out ALL the MSM idiots because there isn't enough room. But other than that, they can do what they like. In fact they could even do that, but then they couldn't complain when the media bitched about it.
"the issue is credentials"
Peter Jennings dropped out of school at 16. It didn't prevent him from being a "journalist".
What they fail to realize is the media whores don't report on media whores, at least not in pubic
Has it been confirmed, then, that he was a gay "escort?"
Is that what you call him? I thought "sycophant" was a more apt term
WOW. There are journalists who are also gay?!?! Who'd a THUNK!
The moronic lackeys at DU'ers think this so called Bush scandal is going to be the tipping point in bringing down "Bushco"
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Uh, a journalist has personal behavior akin to Barney Frank and that's a scandal for the Bush white house ... how?
oh, I see, the journalist dared to ask softball questions ... like Dan Rather asked of the Clintons.
The real scandal to the DUers is that a person with a deviant 'lifestyle' has the temerity to not be a full-bore deviant Liberal. oh the schock and outrage.
But if I was a journie, I'd be hounding this Gannon guy with provoking questions like "Did you ever have Barney Frank as a customer? How about David Souter? ..."
ping
Analyzing the DU thought process should be left to better men who have the patience of Job, the deep thinking ability of Hawkins and the stomach of a Butcher
This is one of the better articles about the Gannon flap.
Exactly! I can never understand why gay people insist on "putting their bedroom out on their front porch"
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