...
...
...
...
Posted on 02/23/2005 4:52:17 PM PST by perfect stranger
Posted: February 23, 2005 1:00 a.m. Eastern
© 2005 Universal Press Syndicate
In response to the public disgrace and ruin of New York Times editor Howell Raines, CBS anchor Dan Rather and CNN news director Eason Jordan, liberals are directing their fury at the blogs. Once derided as people sitting around their living rooms in pajamas, now obscure writers for unknown websites are coming under more intensive background checks than CIA agents.
The heretofore-unknown Jeff Gannon of the heretofore-unknown "Talon News" service was caught red-handed asking friendly questions at a White House press briefing. Now the media is hot on the trail of a gay escort service that Gannon may have run some years ago. Are we supposed to like gay people now, or hate them? Is there a website where I can go to and find out how the Democrats want me to feel about gay people on a moment-to-moment basis?
Liberals keep rolling out a scrolling series of attacks on Gannon for their Two Minutes Hate, but all their other charges against him fall apart after three seconds of scrutiny. Gannon's only offense is that he may be gay.
First, liberals claimed Gannon was a White House plant who received a press pass so that he could ask softball questions – a perk reserved for New York Times reporters during the Clinton years. Their proof was that while "real" journalists (like Jayson Blair) were being denied press passes, Gannon had one, even though he writes for a website that no one has ever heard of – but still big enough to be a target of liberal hatred! (By the way, if writing for a news organization with no viewers is grounds for being denied a press pass, why do MSNBC reporters have them?)
On the op-ed page of the New York Times, Maureen Dowd openly lied about the press pass, saying: "I was rejected for a White House press pass at the start of the Bush administration, but someone with an alias, a tax evasion problem and Internet pictures where he posed like the 'Barberini Faun' is credentialed?"
Press passes can't be that hard to come by if the White House allows that dyspeptic, old Helen Thomas to sit within yards of the president. Still, it would be suspicious if Dowd were denied a press pass while someone from "Talon News" got one, even if he is a better reporter.
But Dowd was talking about two different passes without telling her readers (a process now known in journalism schools as "Dowdification"). Gannon didn't have a permanent pass; he had only a daily pass. Almost anyone can get a daily pass – even famed Times fantasist Maureen Dowd could have gotten one of those. A daily pass and a permanent pass are altogether different animals. The entire linchpin of Dowd's column was a lie. (And I'm sure the Times' public editor will get right on Dowd's deception.)
Finally, liberals expressed shock and dismay that Gannon's real name is "James Guckert." On MSNBC's "Hardball," Chris Matthews introduced the Gannon scandal this way: "Coming up, how did a fake news reporter from a right-wing website get inside the White House press briefings and presidential news conferences?"
Reporter David Shuster then gave a report on "the phony alias Guckert used to play journalist" – as opposed to the real name Shuster uses to play journalist. (You can tell Schuster is a crackerjack journalist because he uses phrases like "phony alias.") With all the subtlety of a gay-bashing skinhead, Matthews spent the rest of the segment seeing how many times he could smear Gannon by mentioning "HotMilitaryStuds.com" and laughing.
Any day now, Matthews will devote entire shows to exposing Larry Zeigler, Gerald Riviera and Michael Weiner – aka Larry King, Geraldo Rivera and Matthews' former MSNBC colleague Michael Savage. As a newspaper reporter, Wolf Blitzer has written under the names Ze'ev Blitzer and Ze'ev Barak. The greatest essayist of modern times was Eric Blair, aka George Orwell. The worst essayist of modern times is "TRB" of The New Republic.
Air America radio host and "Nanny" impersonator "Randi Rhodes" goes by a fake name, and she won't even tell people what her real last name is. (She says for "privacy reasons." That name must be a real doozy.) As Insideradio.com describes Rhodes, she refuses "to withhold anything from her listeners" and says conservatives "are less likely to share such things." How about sharing your name, Randi? We promise not to laugh.
Democrats in Congress actually demanded that an independent prosecutor investigate how Gannon got into White House press conferences while writing under an invented name. How did Gary Hartpence, Billy Blythe and John Kohn (Gary Hart, Bill Clinton and John Kerry) run for president under invented names? Admittedly, these men were not reporters for the prestigious "Talon News" service; they were merely Democrats running for president.
Liberals keep telling us the media isn't liberal, but in order to retaliate for the decimation of major news organizations like the New York Times, CBS News and CNN, all they can do is produce the scalp of an obscure writer for an unknown conservative Web page. And unlike Raines, Rather and Jordan, they can't even get Gannon for incompetence on the job. (Also unlike Raines, Rather and Jordan, Gannon has appeared on television and given a series of creditable interviews in his own defense, proving our gays are more macho than their straights.)
Gannon didn't write about gays. No "hypocrisy" is being exposed. Liberals' hateful, frothing-at-the-mouth campaign against Gannon consists solely of their claim that he is gay.
Ann Rox!!
Freedom of the press is not dead in America, but it has taken a mortal injury with the ouster of Talon news from the White House press corpse. The message from the Stone Age Press is that unless you are a Propaganda Arm of the DimRat Party you are not a reporter. Outside of Fox Rox News, the herd mentality of DNCBS is completely opposite of the average American. This is why Gannon’s question was so pointed and relevant for today. How in the world can the President get his message to the world if the people who deliver that message disagree with it with obvious hatred??
The Stone Age Press stretching from the Old York Times to ABDNC, lost the last election every bit as much as Yaaawn Kerry. They were openly campaigning for him with every trick from phony polls to planted stories to forged documents. Wonder where all those “investigative” reporters are on themselves?? The average reporter from the 5th estate is not only a Democrat voter but a liberal activist. These people hate GW and America as much as their number one standard bearer Michael Mooreon. How can people so out of touch with America’s values and the goodness she represents, tell the world what America stands for??
Mr Gannon actually asked one of the most important questions in the American Media. As it wallows in the quagmire of the Tarpits of histoir, how can we get the truth to the American people? The success of Fox Rox, Talk Radio and Modern Media, how can the press be so blind? In reality they are a herd mentality and they believe in the safety of the herd. Polls have shown that nearly 90% of the news spewers are extreme Commucrats, and report for each others approval who believe America still thinks the way they do. What they don’t realize is that to keep the herd healthy, there must be a thinning as well as a strengthening of the herd or you end up with Rather old, tired, sickly Dinosaurs. That is who we have now reporting in a digital world with hammers & chisels.
Fox Rox News appears to be Right leaning since it is not an extreme Left-wing mouthpiece. To report middle of the road is so far removed from ABDNCBS, that they are Right by comparison. Heck, Pravda is to the Right of the Samestream Press. For one not to attack the President or Republicans 24/7 they are so far outside of Lamestream Groupthink that they appear opposite to the rest of the news filters. This is why Fox is enjoying skyrocketing ratings and hated by the herd. We the consumers are not the uneducated bumpkins they have portrayed us for the past 20 years. Most Americans have access to the same direct news feeds that they have, which allows us to compare their service both in quality and accuracy. The News business is the only service in the Country that continually insults over 50% of it’s customers.
How the Stone Agers do not cast the vote in Iraq as one of the great achievements in the history of the World is proof enough to their false reality. The fact that a Country would invade another Country and overthrew a mad dictator, not to own that Country and it’s wealth; but to free an enslaved people. Saddamn kept his slaves not with chains but fear and torture. The only reporters that got it right were the ones who were actually at the polling places witnessing the hunger of Freedom. From the SAP in their cushy desks at the hotel or NY studios, it suddenly was not that important. Everything is filtered through their DNC activism and hatred for W and America. The continual comparisons to Vietnam is more a stretch than Lola Pelosi’s mask.
So Gannon’s question is: How can this President work with a press that is out of touch with reality and America?? This is the question of the 21st century. How can any company work without good information? Information is the bedrock of any business or organization and critical for a Free Country. Just as you would dump any accountant that gives you faulty information about your business, you should be able to fire or replace a herd that is lying about this Country. Rather, the herd shoots the messenger describing the Dinosaurs in the Tarpit.
Pray for W and Our Freedom Winning Troops
lol ... no indeed, I'm sure "security" was not a matter of concern for Mr. or Mrs. Bush. Far from it.
I still like the part where she goes so far as to "send a message" by giving the Post kudos for not covering the story.
That's the truly outrageous part, General_Re. If you wish to think about it.
Is this is real picture or is it photoshoped?
What in the world does all that mean, it bears no relation whatsoever to the "don't ask, don't tell" policy.
Whatever the case, why don't you try some serious criticism of yourself tonight? After all, it's PAINLESS!!!!!!!
I really enjoy Camille Paglia which is strange primarily for the fact that I am not a feminist by any stretch of the imagination.
We have some serious differences, naturally, but she is truly astute on many issues and instead of stooping to the Coulter level of trashing or zotting the opposition, she zeros in on the substance of the matter.
Interestingly enough (particularly from a lesbian) is her take on sex. I've posted it many times and -- especially where her deriding of the rape counseler "victim" mentality is concerned -- the issue of personal responsibility is applicable here.
Just as women who get drunk at frat houses or allow guys to take butt shots off their backs must take some responsibility for "sending the wrong message" should they be expected to deliver (and raped in the process), surely the likes of Gannon who (perhaps due to his clientele) think themselves above being exposed are exempt from any sympathy where it's strictly their own decisions and actions which have landed them in a jam.
Surely Nixon stands as testament to the fact that no Player is so valuable that they can't be used to "divide and conquer" as the PTBs see fit.
I find it curious that the GOP doesn't just drop it. Ample opportunities abound for exposing the hypocrisy of the left. A scandal centered on the hypocrisy of the right seems an odd choice for slamming the Dems on this particularly point.
But it's nice to see how many conservatives will stand by a hypocrite like Gannon. If he plays his cards right -- taking a tip from Horowitz, perhaps -- maybe he can rake it in on the "Former Homosexual" circuit.
It means that to voluntarily cooperate in suicide is contrary to moral law.
(It's one reason I show up on threads like this. I'm against assisted suicide of all sorts.)
......
...
...
Such certitude. Based on what, though? Your own secret-sauce parsing of "Not at all"?
I still like the part where she goes so far as to "send a message" by giving the Post kudos for not covering the story.
"It was a nonsense attempt to smear me and my family. Thank you, Washington Post, for not lending credence to it."
Or:
"Thank you, Washington Post, for not exposing the gay prostitution ring my husband has been operating from the Oval Office".
You appear to have chosen "B". Gotta tell you, you're pretty much going to be all alone on that. Sorry. If I'm to believe that, I want more than innuendo.
Anyway, I didn't pick out your fellow travelers - they appear to have chosen you. I would think you might ask yourself why that is, but if it doesn't concern you, so be it.
Liberals keep telling us the media isn't liberal, but in order to retaliate for the decimation of major news organizations like the New York Times, CBS News and CNN, all they can do is produce the scalp of an obscure writer for an unknown conservative Web page. And unlike Raines, Rather and Jordan, they can't even get Gannon for incompetence on the job. (Also unlike Raines, Rather and Jordan, Gannon has appeared on television and given a series of creditable interviews in his own defense, proving our gays are more macho than their straights.)
I once heard you like to park your car and take up two spaces....shameless!
Using unfounded accusations to "smear" is one thing.
(I can rustle up a gazillion posts to me, in addition to those on this thread, as example if you like.)
Reporting on the FACT that teenage tricks are touring the White House is another.
The fact Wallaby's posts and the initial reports have been "smeared" by their association with lunatic fringe sites is immaterial to me in that it has no bearing whatsoever on the integrity of the original facts as reported.
Particularly in light of those conservatives bent on digging up Clinton's past and who have embarrassed themselves more than once by readily lapping up whatever personal accusation an anonymous source might offer, this whole defense of the White House (if not Gannon) kinda reeks to high heaven of hypocrisy, IMHO.
Good thing we have Ann around to cheer.
MORE PICS PLEASE!
I'm honest, too! LOL.
=== only the hypocrisy of the left in who they attack.
And, like I said, this opportunity presents itself again and again and again.
But using the Gannon Scandal as platform to attack "hypocrisy" is just plain silly, truth be told.
Then it is clear you do not practice what you preach. There is something called "suicide by cop".
Your constructions of logic, while they possess a certain symmetrical aspect, fall apart when attempts are made to connect any conclusions you have come up with this evening to reality.
You should have a crystal lens placed in your navel, so that you may see to navigate, as it is presumed that your eyes are mounted on your head, and said appendage is thrust so far up your rectal orfice there is no other way to gain a view of the outside world.
I agree. The hypocracy of the left is simply amazing.
Its strange, though, that in DU, they call Ann, "Man" Coulter. Funny he would come in FR and call her a drag queen. Sounds very DUish to me.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.