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22:31 - 21 February, 2005
....Try to imagine this scenario: John Kerry wins the presidency and appoints a press secretary who grants a White House press pass to a fake reporter with a fake name representing a fake news outlet. And what if this "Jeff Gannon," whose real name is James Guckert, gets called upon daily to lob softball questions at White House briefings? Bloggers on the left are no less bullies than those on the right. But it's possible that mainstream U.S. news organizations resent the liberal-bias tag so much that they're more susceptible to pressure from the right. Whatever the case, the "Jeff Gannon" story is legitimate: On Jan. 26, at a time of heightened national security, a phony reporter with a pseudonym and ties to the Republican Party got to sit just a few feet from the president at a nationally televised news conference and was called upon -- ahead of dozens of actual reporters -- to ask an inanely sympathetic question. How does something like this happen? Frustrated bloggers on the left would love to get the White House press corps -- leery, possibly lazy, but definitely not lefty -- to find out. I also am not a "Liberal Blogger". What is a Liberal Blogger anyway? I will say that I am:
The bottom line here is protocol was not followed with regard to security and background checks for a so called journalist.
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