Bob Garfield, co-host of WNYC's "On the Media," says the annual mingling of reporters, celebrities and sources at the White House Correspondents Association dinner is "repulsive." Source: CNN
http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/1605/01/rs.01.html
CNN transcript (they DO ding The Donald, of course, but crucify Barry):
STELTER: Don Lemon then flicked off Larry Wilmore with his middle finger, which I didn’t particularly didn’t want to show on Sunday morning TV. It did garner Don some criticism on social media.
Well, here’s the thing: Don and Larry are actually friendly. They hung out on Friday night before the dinner. They posed for pictures again last night after the dinner.
That leads me to the fundamental criticism of this spectacle. It’s the coziness. It’s the incestuous even. It’s one thing for a journalist and a comedian to be having fun. But what about the hobnobbing between journalists and their sources, like White House officials? That’s what makes some media critics queasy at this so-called nerd prom weekend.
These are star-studded red carpet and parties bankrolled by big companies. And the bottom line, I think, is in an election season fueled by anger at the establishment, this nerd prom is the establishment.
So the question is, should more news outlets do what “The New York Times” does and skip the dinner? Should they boycott it?
Joining me now is a dinner critic, let’s say. Bob Garfield, the co- host of WNYC’s “On the Media.”
I say “dinner critic”, Bob, because you’ve been outspoken about this over the years. You say it’s odd an ethically questionable when journalists attend these dinners. I was there last night. I went to the parties, tried to take in the whole thing.
I mentioned earlier, trying to be removed, trying to take it in and be skeptical about it. But it is a very odd and intriguing phenomenon, these dinners.
Why do you think they are troubling for journalists?
BOB GARFIELD, CO-HOST, ON THE MEDIA: Odd and intriguing and repulsive.
STELTER: Repulsive, I forgot that word.
GARFIELD: Yes. Well, where does one begin? Let’s start with these are supposed to be the watchdogs, watchdogging those in power. And they’re sitting there passing one another dinner rolls with zero possibility of any journalism breaking out.
We’re sitting there honoring a president who has stiffed the media for going on eight years now. I mean, it’s about 7 1/2 years of the worst access of a modern president.
[11:30:05]
He — his administration has prosecuted journalists for doing their jobs. The FOIA situation is out of control. That’s the Freedom of Information Act requests.
You can’t even get — never mind getting — asking a question during a photo-op. You can barely get a photographer into the president for a photo-op. And there he is, 40 feet away from you, Syria is on fire, there’s a — the Republican front-runner is running for dictator. The Russians are buzzing our military in the open seas. And there is zero chance to even ask the president a question.
STELTER: What about the argument that when you’re at these events, when you’re maybe seeing sources, that it will pay off down the line, that those relationships may actually improve access and improve reporting, not that night, but weeks or months later?
GARFIELD: Oh, because I have a social relationship with...
STELTER: That’s the idea. Yes.
GARFIELD: But — except that presumes that there really is any benefit down the line.
I see no evidence that the administration — now this is its eighth Correspondents Dinner. I see no evidence that it’s become more accessible, more transparent at all. It’s a disgrace. It’s a sham. It’s a sham of a mockery of a travesty of a two mockeries of a sham.
STELTER: Tell me how you really feel.
GARFIELD: Yes.
STELTER: But I — the reason I kind of...
(CROSSTALK)
GARFIELD: And you’re part of the problem.
STELTER: Well, tell me more.
GARFIELD: Well, you were there. CNN was there in force. How is CNN’s access to the president? It’s...
STELTER: I’m sure we would like more interviews and more access. In fact, Michelle Kosinski said to me last night, one of our White House correspondents, she said that she barely has had any access to the president.
She’s not sure that he knows who she is, even though she covers the beat for CNN, one of the biggest news outlets in the world. That does speak to this lack of access. But I wonder...
GARFIELD: One of America’s business news-like outlets in the world. I got to throw in with Larry Wilmore on that.
STELTER: You can say that if you wish. You can say that.
But let me try this argument out on you, the idea that, at this time when it seems like everything is polarized, when republicans and Democrats can’t get along, that maybe at least for one night it’s good to have everybody in the same room to see that kind of mixing, to be reminded that everybody, you know, at the end of the day, they are humans, and they are — that the administration and everybody there, right, does have something to relate to.
GARFIELD: Let’s hold hands. Kumbaya.
STELTER: I’m just trying it out on you.
GARFIELD: Yes. But, clearly, the proof is in the pudding. And the pudding is no access to the president, criminal investigations against reporters, lagging on FOIA requests, and the president doing — fulfilling George W. Bush’s greatest dream of doing a total end-run around the press.
STELTER: Now, the White House would say that they gave lots of interviews. They grant lots of access. Reporters would disagree.
But how would boycotting the dinner help with that?
GARFIELD: Well, I’m not telling anybody to boycott the dinner.
I don’t go to the dinner, and there’s a very good reason for that. I’m seldom invited.
(LAUGHTER)
GARFIELD: But — and I don’t — you know, I’m not going to tell you not to go. I just think that the event is sort of the...
STELTER: This may be a symbol of what you think is the problem.
GARFIELD: It’s the apotheosis of everything that’s wrong with journalism and government in this city.
(CROSSTALK)
GARFIELD: Everybody’s too cozy. And it’s hard for the press to fulfill its watchdog function if you’re palling around with people who you can’t even ask a journalistic question of.
STELTER: I think we think about what one of the themes this campaign season has been, especially with Donald Trump’s rise.
It’s that the media has been out of touch, especially D.C., New York media has been out of touch. And you do wonder if this is an example of that. On the other hand, I saw Katrina Pierson and Scottie Nell Hughes and Jeffrey Lord and some of Trump’s supporters at the event this weekend as well.
So, maybe you see some of the anti-establishment mixing with the establishment at this point at an event like this.
GARFIELD: Well, I guess you do. And if democracy is the better for it, I surrender, but I just don’t see any evidence that that’s happening.
STELTER: That’s why I wanted to hear from you this morning.
Bob, great to see you.
GARFIELD: Good to see you, Brian.
