choad wrote:

phreddy wrote:

From the "open and transparent" administration.

I could link a thoroughly local story with identical details I wrote Monday but I'm disgusted with the whole fucking subject. The cunts in this case were also Demonrats, not that it matters. I walked in packing a toothbrush and an ancient, filmless 35mm Canon, expecting a holding cell, and unwilling to surrender my only camera worth shit. Still have a throbbing headache. Later.

The weird thing is that it's all done in an adolescent retribution sort of way.

phreddy wrote:

The weird thing is that it's all done in an adolescent retribution sort of way.

Exactly. The way I describe it here is middle age adults regressing to high school.

Last edited by choad (2011-04-29 14:00:31)

I say it's necessary. How else will the internets be full of pictures of presidents picking their respective noses.

tojo2000 wrote:

While this *is* fucked up, the subject of this post is also one of my pet peeves.  This is not a First Amendment issue.  The First Amendment doesn't guarantee the right to film anywhere you want, and it doesn't guarantee any reporter's right to be in the White House press pool.

Exactly! Unlike voting, it's a privilege, not a right.

You may not like it (nor do I), but limiting the form of media coverage is a long recognized procedure.  If you've ever been in a courtroom where there is press coverage, you would know.  If the ground rules are set and known to the reporters, and there is no attempt to edit what the reporters quote, it is well within norms. 

The story here, for what it is worth, may be why the White House staff would threaten to ban the reporter.  To me, it depends on whether they threatened to ban the reporter only if the reporter continued to violate the ground rules.  The ground rules would be meaningless, of course, if they just let the reporter back in despite repeated violations.  On the other hand, if it was just petty retribution, then it pretty much sucks.

Tall Paul wrote:

tojo2000 wrote:

While this *is* fucked up, the subject of this post is also one of my pet peeves.  This is not a First Amendment issue.  The First Amendment doesn't guarantee the right to film anywhere you want, and it doesn't guarantee any reporter's right to be in the White House press pool.

Exactly! Unlike voting, it's a privilege, not a right.

I can't believe I'm hearing this from a couple of liberals.  Do you really believe the president should have the right to choose those who report on him?  And worse, ban those who submit a story, video, or photo he doesn't like?  It may be a privilege for a particular news medium to be a part of the White House press pool, but assignment of the personnel who represent those media in the pool does not belong to the president.

Last edited by phreddy (2011-05-02 11:23:42)

Dmtdust wrote:

I think I am with Phredd on this.  OMG.

Every so often our radical ideas cross paths.

tojo2000 wrote:

phreddy wrote:

Tall Paul wrote:

Exactly! Unlike voting, it's a privilege, not a right.

I can't believe I'm hearing this from a couple of liberals.  Do you really believe the president should have the right to choose those who report on him?  And worse, ban those who submit a story, video, or photo he doesn't like?  It may be a privilege for a particular news medium to be a part of the White House press pool, but assignment of the personnel who represent those media in the pool does not belong to the president.

And I can't believe that you still have such a hard time understanding what the First Amendment is.  Yes, the President has the right to say who can be in the press pool.  He does not have  the right to say who can report on him.  Those are two different things.  Now just because he has that right doesn't mean he should exercise it, of course.  I have the right to do lots of things that I shouldn't do.

Here you go tojo.  Read it yourself.  The part that reads Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of the press means that the president has no authority under the law to do so.  By using his office to control and repress the actions of journalists who are reporting on him he is, in fact, abridging freedom of the press and violating the first amendment.

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

phreddy wrote:

Here you go tojo.  Read it yourself.  The part that reads Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of the press means that the president has no authority under the law to do so.  By using his office to control and repress the actions of journalists who are reporting on him he is, in fact, abridging freedom of the press and violating the first amendment.

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Yes, I've read it.  I also comprehend it.  Being in the press doesn't get you invited to every party, and doesn't get you free access to every building.  Have you noticed that there is a press pool?  How can Obama restrict who can attend his press conferences?  Isn't he abridging the freedom of all of the other newspapers that don't get a seat in the press pool?  The answer is no, because he can't prevent anyone from reporting on the subject, but there is no law that says that the President can't decide who to invite to his press events.

phreddy wrote:

It is a direct attempt by Obama to intimidate reporters into censoring their own work for fear of losing their places in the pool and perhaps their jobs.  It is a vile heavy handed violation of the first amendment.

Ok, here you go, the acid test.

Let's say I make ass fun of you, personally, publicly, revealing for all to see you are, in fact, a flaming hypocrite.

This isn't a hypothetical. I do it every day. Why, I did it just 20 minutes ago, to someone else, and he's already ripshit.

How would you react?

This is not a very compelling a First Amendment issue, unless you construe the First Amendment to entitle you to be in any room you wish with any type of recording device you want.  All presidents restrict access to their briefings and press conferences.  Some are let in, some are not.  If the president simply denied access to all reporters, or to all hostile reporters, there would be a more compelling issue. 

You may have noticed that a significant number of republican candidates in the last election would only talk to friendly press.  This did not seem to bother conservatives very much.  Was it a First Amendment issue then?  Not really.  Both may be kind of stupid and obnoxious, but that doesn't raise it to level of being a violation of the constitution.

phreddy wrote:

Again, the issue for me is that a particular reporter is singled out and publically punished for airing a newsworthy moment that is an embarrassment to the guy who controls access to the media.   It was a direct message to all pool reporters that stepping out of line can cost you your job.  No, she wasn't detained and thrown into a gulag, but this is far worse than refusing an interview or restricting access to a limited number of reporters. To me it's a clear infringment upon freedom of the press.

Was she fired by her paper?  I didn't think so, but really haven't followed the story that closely.  Do you know whether she knowingly violated established ground rules for the event?  If she did, or she refused to comply with the ground rules going forward, the White House staff response would be more justified.  If they were not established ground rules, then I agree with you.

As a legal concept, "freedom of the press" does not mean that reporters are guaranteed access to any given event, nor that they can ignore ground rules that other reporters in attendance must follow.

Taint wrote:

Phreddy, while I may not be crazy about a reporter being singled out either, I can't disagree with the White House's actions, if only because of incidents that happened during the Bush Administration. Remember when one of the "experienced" White House reporters turned out to be a hustler with connections? It was needlessly embarrassing - and distracting - for not only the White House, but the press corps, as well.

The press was not banned. A particular media outlet was not banned.

The White House Press Correspondents' Association pool reporting guidelines warn about "no hoarding" of information and also say, "pool reports must be filed before any online story or blog." While uploading her video probably was the best way to file her report, Carla may have technically busted the letter of that law.

But the guidelines also say, "Print poolers can snap pictures or take video. They are not obliged to share these pictures...but can make them available if they so choose."

I strongly agree with you: the White House is in the wrong. I don't agree that this is a first amendment issue. She probably, more or less, sort of broke a rule. The response is heavy handed and stupid. But it is not an infringement of the First Amendment.

It's procedural. And it does make the White House look bad. Obama needs to own up to that.

I have to agree with Taint, who beat me to the military fetish rent boy reference. (Apparently Karl Rove put him in the press pool because he loved and admired the "reporter's" soft balls, but that's a different story) The press pool's establishment was predicated on the idea that the President's time was of value and shouldn't be wasted. They are given the right to a direct physical presence inside the White House and a seat in all press conferences in exchange for following a set of ground rules. In this day and age when the republican party has a 'news network' dedicated to making the repubs look good and the dems look bad, I'm not calling for a constitutional hissy fit because some journo broke the rules and her organization was asked to replace her.

More press banning by Obama.  If Bush had banned every journalist or newspaper that published an unflattering story, he would have had zero press coverage.