Posted on 01/25/2011 8:21:46 PM PST by Qbert
So much for all of the White House’s efforts to keep the details of President Barack Obama’s second State of the Union address under wraps until delivery.
At 7:14 p.m. – almost two hours before Obama was scheduled to speak in the House chamber – The National Journal posted a draft of the speech, making the secrecy, calculated leaks and embargoed background briefings seem quaint.
The White House, furious over the leak, responded by releasing an un-embargoed copy of Obama’s speech. It landed in reporters’ in-boxes shortly before 8 p.m.
National Journal editor in chief Ron Fournier told POLITICO he didn’t reach out to the White House before posting the text, and was only concerned about the draft’s accuracy. “I think that my only concern was that this was an accurate draft of the speech — were the sources credible? I talked to our reporter, and was assured that it was a credible and accurate draft, and we moved it out.”
“As a courtesy, I do wish I had given the White House a heads-up. Normally, anytime I’m part of a breaking news story, I do that,” Fournier said.
And in fact, Obama himself responded with a bit of chagrin in the chamber to the news that a copy of his speech had been leaked to National Journal.
As he greeted Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Obama joked, “I don’t need to deliver it now; everyone saw it.”
A National Journal spokesperson, Taylor West, said, “We received a draft copy of the speech from a trusted source. In addition to the reliability of the source, the draft matched up to excerpts that had been released previously in the day. Given the clear news value of the information, we moved with it. We have not spoken with the White House about the decision.”
West noted that “in comparing our copy with the remarks that the White House just sent around, it appears that what we received was, in fact, the final draft.”
The National Journal piece did not contain a byline but was credited only to “National Journal Staff.”
“Getting the speech, verifying, prepping, and publishing it all in an extremely short period of time was a full team effort on the part of the NJ newsroom, so the attribution went to the team,” West said in an email.
And why do we care if the wh is upset
The list, ping
Let me know if you would like to be on or off the ping list
It’d be curious how this occurred. I doubt that more than a dozen folks had a text copy to start with...within the White House. It might have been sent by email to video technician to load up for the President’s podium late in the afternoon....and I’d think someone from that crew is more likely to have tossed a copy to a friend who quickly moved it to the news folks.
Awesome, I’m glad they’re in a Liberal snit.
Saw it here, printed it out and now it rests strategically under my two parakeets. I hope it doesn’t give them nightmares or make them sick.
Easy solution. Have Odumbass give his speeches off of a few notes on his hand! Try and leak that text!
Saw it here, printed it out and now it rests strategically under my two parakeets. I hope it doesn’t give them nightmares or make them sick.
...............................................
Funniest comment ever.
Are they upset because it sucked?
The speeches are overrated. I wish they’d just fax to the Congress a factual recitation of the state of the union and skip all of this nonsense. First President that does that from either party will receive my gratitude.
Skipped all the speeches tonight, I just don’t care what they say anymore. Actions are all that matter.
Although I might have been tempted to watch had Republicans not decided to date the enemies across the aisle. Only reason to watch this thing would have been the optics of opposition against Obama and they took even that suspense away.
Did anyone else hear the montage on Rush today of the media calling it date night, prom etc? You have to hear it, I couldn’t belive it was real!!! I think the whole building heard me yell “Oh my GOD!”.
The speech seemed shallow to me. I did not believe his praise of American greatness because I do not think he believes it.
I do not believe WH.
And spend.
The government will invest and spend.
The end.
I’ll side with the White House on this. The National Journal is not run by a bunch of 6-year-olds. They full well know that a text of a prepared speech is not news; it is a courtesy delivered to news organizations so they don’t look quite so much like idiots when they talk about the speech right after it happens.
To pretend it was some leak from the White house that they could publish despite the embargo is absurd. I hope the White House finds a good way to punish them, by not giving their reporters interviews, by cutting them out of press briefings, and never sending them text of speeches again.
I think there’s some jealousy here on Politico’s part, though.
not WINNING the FUTURE but SPINNING THE FUTURE.
W.T.F.
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