—-gate
: On l’affaire Gannon, Robert Cox of The National Debate asks:
Does anyone else find it amusing that the leading liberal blogger, Kos, is among those leading the charge in attacking a guy for acquiring a press pass while writing for a partisan, advocacy web site.
This IS the same Kos who, as Chris Nolan noted, showed up at a “Western DNC” event wearing a press and was credentialed at the DNC, right?
Seems to me this is another “whose ox is getting gored” story.
Hmmmm.
: On l’affaire Jordan (I agree with Jay Rosen that we shouldn’t be —-gating everything until we know it’s a —-gate), Hugh Hewitt says that Jay, Mickey Kaus, and I are bloggers from the left who are following the Jordan story. OK, thanks. But the real reason I decided to blog it is more because I follow media. I learned my lesson in l’affaire Rather, when I missed the media story because I was following the mud. Note that the media story takes a little more time to develop as we watch who does and doesn’t report on the tale. That’s why I was late posting on l’affaires Gannon and Jordan, but I did.
: Jay Rosen has a great post this morning on various media fallout clouds from the Jordan and Gannon stories.
: Just asking: FoxNews has covered the Jordan story. Have they covered the Gannon story? (I wish TV news were searchable, too! But it’s not, so I’m asking you.)
CNN has covered the Gannon story. Have they yet made a mention of the Jordan story?
The NYTimes has covered Gannon. Has it covered Jordan?
Jeff Gannon on GoogleNews. Eason Jordan on GoogleNews.
: ABC Radio News called this morning on these stories. Their angle seemed to be that bloggers are a nasty mob going after people. I said this is about people having a voice and more voices and good (usual soundbite). They included in this the tale of the Baltimore mayor, below. I said that tale proved just how effective the internet is at getting to the truth, for in the old days, this stupid political hack would have smeared mud on an opponent in the background and here he did it on the internet and was found out for the smearer he was.
: UPDATE: Someone smart responded to Cox (above) with some points I’d like to make. The response was made on an email list and I didn’t get the OK to use his name so I’ll paraphrase the points:
He said that the real question and the real issue is whether the White House put a ringer in the press corps. If that happened, it’s a misuse of the power; it’s a fraud on the public. I absolutely agree with that.
What if the White House did not actively coconspire with “Gannon” to stack the press deck? Motive still matters. They surely knew he came from a — cough — friendly — cough — news service. If they didn’t let in someone from a service on the other side, then it’s still stacking the deck and that’s still wrong.
Next point: Kos was credentialed as a blogger and wasn’t given a rare space in a Presidential press conference and wasn’t called on by said President to ask a softball question. Fair point.
Is the only issue scarcity of seats or power of the event? Or is it consistency? Kos says he’s not a journalist but an advocate but he gets press passes. In a world of opinionated media and citizens’ media, I can argue in favor of that easily. But then we have to ask where is this OK and not: Is it OK to give an advocate a press pass at a political convention or on a campaign bus — but not OK at an FCC press conference or a White House press conference? If you give such passes to advocates from one side, should you give them to advocates from the other? It’s not a simple issue from either side of the prism.
Cox still has a point about — what should I call it? — hypocrisy, no? He complains about political advocate getting press access but he gets press access. I score that one for Cox.
But this respondent raises one more important point: There is a rhetorical trick in the air with people taking one perceived sin from one side and putting it against a perceived sin from the other side and thinking that is both equivalent and balanced. Are Gannon and Jordan equivalent and does reporting both of them make the reporter balanced? Ditto Bush’s and Kerry’s service records? It not only makes for fake column-a/column-b cable-news balance, it even motivates the press to go after somebody from one side when they start reporting on a scandal from the other side so it can seem balanced.
: UPDATE: The smart person paraphrased above is David Weinberger. Just got his OK to say that.
