Phony journalist/Pimping for the White House

[Vance]

Heard about the Jeff Gannon/Jim Guckert muck-up in Washington? If you are an aficionado of the blogs, you've heard plenty. They're having a field day with it. But underneath all the fun lies a serious problem that hasn't got its due from the mainstream press: This White House employs a lot more kinds of fakery than the budgetary smoke and mirrors described in the editorial above.

Here's a summary: For more than two years, a reporter named Jeff Gannon turned up at White House briefings and press conferences, where he asked softball questions with a decidedly pro-Bush bent. For example, at President Bush's Jan. 26 press conference, Gannon asked how Bush could work with lawmakers like Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid and Sen. Hillary Clinton, "who seem to have divorced themselves from reality."

Well, it turns out that "Jeff Gannon" is really Jim Guckert, and he was a reporter for an online outfit called "Talon News," which was associated with the online group GOPUSA. com, owned by Texas Republicans. It also turns out that Guckert, in addition to reporting for a phony Web site, has no real journalism training and is a $200-an-hour gay prostitute. He ran numerous Web sites like militaryescortsm4m. com. The photos of Gannon that were displayed on those Web sites left nothing to the imagination about his physical attributes.

So the question becomes, just how did this character get White House press credentials, despite supposed post-Sept. 11 security requirements? Bruce Bartlett, a conservative columnist who worked in the Reagan and first Bush administrations, says that "if Gannon was using an alias, the White House staff had to be involved in maintaining his cover." In other words, the White House wanted him at those briefings and wanted him to ask his softball questions, most likely to divert attention when legitimate reporters were getting too pushy.

This is part of a pattern by Bush's minions to construct a phony reality in news coverage. Consider:

• To promote Bush's Medicare prescription bill, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) paid for phony "newscasts" that were distributed to television stations nationwide.

• Columnist Armstrong Williams was paid $240,000 by the Department of Education to promote Bush's No Child Left Behind Act.

• Columnists Michael McManus and Maggie Gallagher were paid to "advise HHS on the Bush administration's marriage policies."

• Every Bush "town hall" forum during last fall's campaign was carefully limited to supporters who would ask fawning questions. No demonstrators -- indeed, no one wearing an offensive lapel pin -- were allowed in.

• The Bush Pentagon launched an Office of Strategic Influence to provide "news" to foreign media. When it became known, it was shut down in embarrassment.

The pattern is clear: This administration will do pretty much anything to shape reality to fit its agenda.

Another powerful tool in its arsenal is intimidation. This is by far the most vindictive administration since Richard Nixon's. Ask the wrong question or write something the White House doesn't like, and your access is cut off. Unfortunately, too many of the real journalists have gone along meekly. As columnist Michael Kinsley observed, if this White House said two plus two equaled five, there would be no shortage "of media to report both sides of the question."

Once it was fairly easy to distinguish real reporters from hacks and charlatans, objective news from partisan rant. That has become increasingly difficult, thanks in part to a Bush White House that finds the confusion useful, to its everlasting dishonor.

Source: http://www.startribune.com/stories/561/5247250.html


Of course... of course. Lies, dishonor and dishonesty is their only way to get the 'results'. Well-written article

 

[Codger]

..........Of course... of course. Lies, dishonor and dishonesty is their only way to get the 'results'. Well-written article

The more things change the more they remain the same.


"Mine will be the most ethical administration in the history of the republic!"
President-Elect Bill Clinton, November 1992.

[the United States] can't be so fixed on our desire to preserve the
rights of ordinary Americans...
President Clinton, March 1, 1993: Boston Globe, 3/2/93, page 3

"I think it's plain that the president should resign and spare the country the
agony of this impeachment and removal proceeding," Clinton said. "I think the country
could be spared a lot of agony and the government could worry about inflation and a
lot of other problems if he'd go on and resign."

Clinton, a law professor at the University of Arkansas, said there was "no question
that an admission of making false statements to government officials and interfering
with the FBI and the CIA is an impeachable offense."

Arkansas Democrat, 8/6/74

BILL CLINTON'S KNOWN LIES

July 1991: Question: "Have you ever used Marijuana or any illegal drugs?" Answer: "I've never broken any drug law." - Arkansas Gazette, July 24th, 1991, p. 8B
Asked this 3 times, on 3 separate occasions, by 3 different interviewers, your Great White Hope repeated this claim. Until faced with irrefutable proof, that is.

Then he said:

March 29th, 1992: "I've never broken a state law. But when I was in England I experimented with marijuana a time or two..."

Later, in that same interview, "No one has ever asked me that question point-blank."

- The New York Times, March 30th, 1992, p.A15.

On Jan. 19, 1992 Bill Clinton said, "I want to make it very clear that this middle-class tax cut, in my view, is central to any attempt we're going to make to have a short-term economic strategy."

But on Jan. 14, 1993 at a press conference, Bill Clinton said, "From New Hampshire forward, for reasons that absolutely mystified me, the press thought the most important issue in the race was the middle-class tax cut. "I never did meet any voter who thought that."


On Sept. 8,1992, Bill Clinton said, "The only people who will pay more income taxes are the wealthiest 2 percent, those living in households making over $200,000 a year."

In response to a Bush-Quayle ad that people with incomes of as little as $36,000 would pay more taxes under the Clinton plan, Bill Clinton said on Oct. 1, 1992, "It's a disgrace to the American people that the president (Bush) of the United States would make a claim that is so baseless, that is so without foundation, so shameless in its attempt to get votes under false pretenses."

Yet the NY TIMES in the analysis of Clinton's budget wrote, "There are tax increases for every family making more than $20,000 a year!"

"While Clinton continued to defend his middle-class tax cut publicly, he privately expressed the view to his advisers that it was intellectually dishonest." (The Agenda, by Bob Woodward, p. 31)

In Business Week, July 6, 1992, Bill Clinton was quoted as saying, "When I began the campaign, the projected deficit was $250 billion. Now its up to $400 billion."

However in Time Magazine. 2 weeks later, Bill Clinton was quoted as saying, "When I started in New Hampshire working with those numbers, we felt the deficit was going to be around $250 billion a year, not $400 billion." Which is it, Bill?

But then he said on Feb. 10, 1993, "The deficit of this country is about $50 billion a year bigger than I was told it was going to be before the election." --our President said this after "discovering" that the deficit was $290 billion, $110 Billion LESS than he had claimed in July! Which story are we to believe from our president??

President Clinton said on March 23, 1993 at a press conference: "M economic package will cut $500 billion from the deficit in five years." Yet the projected deficit in 1998 with Clinton's budget is $234 billion, the projected deficit in 2001 with Clinton budget is $401 billion.(These figures come from Bill Clinton's budget document, "A Vision of Change for America."-Feb. 1993.

The Wall Street Journal Opinion-Editorial Page 2/21/95
NUMBERS GAME

It's the season to cut government, or at least to claim to, so we perked up when we heard President Clinton declare in his State of the Union address that he had cut (quote) more than 100,000 positions from the federal bureaucracy in the last two years alone (unquote).

As they say in detective work, interesting - if true. So we decided to pull out the new federal budget to check. What we discovered is that Mr. Clinton isn't lying, but he isn't telling the whole truth either. His speeches need an asterisk.

From 1993 to Fiscal Year 1996, the Clinton Administration will in fact have cut the federal government by 157,000 full-time positions. But there's a catch: 131,000 of those positions are civilian Defense jobs. Those cuts reflect the inevitable post-cold War decline in military spending, not some brave retrenchment in the overall size of government.

There's another catch: Of the 26,000 positions to be cut from the non-Defense side of Leviathan, 9,500 come from the Resolution Trust Corp. and Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. Those two banking agencies grew like Topsy to manage the savings and loan debacle, but are now cutting back as the bailout ends. The RTC is even supposed to go out of business this year. The bottom line is that over the course of the Clinton presidency, the non-Defense, non-S&L part of the government will cut a measly 16,500 full-time positions out of some 1.2 million. In essence the domestic government is conducting business as usual.

Mr. Clinton also says he's making the federal establishment (quote) the smallest it has been since John Kennedy was President (unquote). But again, excluding Defense, total executive branch employment will be 1,181,000 in 1996. Back in 1963, when JFK was President, total non-Defense employment was a mere 861,000. Maybe that should be the 1996 goal for Republican budget- cutters; they could say they got the idea from the President.

Are you referring to the guy who absolutely, positively guaranteed that if he was elected governor of Arkansas in 1990 he would serve 4 years? The one who said that a 4% income tax rate on the wealthiest 2% of the population would raise 165 billion dollars, reduce the deficit, and allow a middle class tax cut? The one who claimed that the republicans had killed the Lani Guinier nomination? The one who claimed that he had decided to make himself available to the draft after 4 acquaintances were killed in Viet Nam (rather than after his birthday had been drawn #311 in the draft lottery)? The one who claimed that "affirmative action "benefits white men?


No, he said that the new gasoline tax (4 cent per gallon) would go to a deficit reduction trust fund. No such fund has been established to date... it is going to the general fund to fund their increased social programs... check it out... call the government accounting office and ask... they are stealing your money...

And I give you my word to do it without the blame game of the last twelve years of Reagan and Bush.

The NY Times reported that people earning under $100,000 paid an additional $3 billion in '94.

But wait, Clinton and the media claimed that only the top 2% were going to pay more taxes. Was that another lie from the Clinton administration?

According to liberal Democrats, anyone who makes a dollar more than you is the "rich". On the issue of "taxes on the rich", consider the following:

Most of the "rich" are smart business men & women... they own and run their own businesses. In addition, Clinton passed a 1% increase in corporate income taxes...

If you owned your own business, or if you were the CFO of a corporation, and your cost of doing business went up, what would you do ? You'd pass this cost on...

A great many people start off "poor" and as they move up in the business world become successful and eventually become what the Democrats would currently characterize as "rich." Indeed most of the wealth in this country is in the hands of senior citizens. Many of these people at one time had no money at all.

So, the attack on the rich is not an attack on some evil group. Its mostly an attack on people who after much sacrifice and hard work have finally reached their peak earning years and are trying to enjoy and pass on the fruits of their labor.

There were many other Clinton proposals that didn't fly (thank you) which would have further parted people from their capital....Here's a couple of winners he proposed in 1992....

Imputed rent...You would pay tax on "rent" that you would have collected FROM YOURSELF...Tax real, only...NO RENTAL INCOME !!!!!

Lower the inheritance threshold...From about $650,000 to around $200,000. What has been an exclusive tax of the rich, Clinton wanted to give as a gift to the middle-class...

Newsweek reports that Clinton and the Democrats will no longer pursue the rich vs. middle class America class warfare strategy. They realize that it won't help them politically and, according to Newsweek, "President Clinton...doesn't really believe in it."

 

[Y]

Note: These White house officials knew nothing
about his past.

Jeff Gannon Admits Past 'Mistakes,' Berates Critics
By Howard Kurtz
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, February 19, 2005; Page C01

Jeff Gannon, the former White House reporter whose naked pictures have appeared on a number of gay escort sites, says that he has "regrets" about his past but that White House officials knew nothing about his salacious activities.

"I've made mistakes in my past," he said yesterday. "Does my past mean I can't have a future? Does it disqualify me from being a journalist?"

Gannon chastised his critics, breaking a silence that began last week when liberal bloggers disclosed his real name, James Dale Guckert, and a Web page, which he paid for, featuring X-rated photos of himself. "Why would they be looking into a person's sexual history? Is that what we're going to do to reporters now? Is there some kind of litmus test for reporters? Is it right to hold someone's sexuality against them?"

As for his critics, Gannon said: "People have said some of my writing expressed a hostile point of view" toward gays. "These people are willing to abandon their principles on the basis of trying to make me out to be a hypocrite. These are the same groups that cherish free speech and privacy."

John Aravosis, a gay activist who posted the pictures of Gannon on his Americablog.org, said the issue is not Gannon's right to be a journalist but his "White House access. . . . The White House wouldn't let him in the door right now, knowing of his background."

Aravosis said Gannon is guilty of "what I call family-values hypocrisy. Basically, he's asking the gay community to protect him when he attacks us."

Gannon resigned earlier this month as a reporter for two conservative Web sites, Talon News and GOPUSA, both owned by a Texas Republican activist. Gannon became a target after asking President Bush a question that slammed Senate Democrats and contained false information about Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.).

In the interview, Gannon did not dispute evidence that he has advertised himself as a $200-an-hour gay escort but would not specifically address such questions.

Dismissing speculation that he had a permanent White House press pass, which requires a full-blown FBI background check that usually takes months, Gannon said he could not get one because he was required to first get a pass from the Senate press gallery, which did not consider him to be working for a legitimate news organization. Instead, he said he was admitted on a day-to-day basis after supplying his real name, date of birth and Social Security number. He said he did not use a pseudonym to hide his past but because his real last name is hard to spell and pronounce.

Gannon said he began covering the White House in February 2003, at least a month before Talon News was created. He said he was then working for GOPUSA. Talon was launched as "a marketing consideration to separate the news division from something that could be viewed as partisan," he said.

Suggestions that White House officials coddled him or gave him special access are "absolutely, completely, totally untrue," Gannon said, adding that he was often among the last to be called on at press briefings and sometimes could not ask a question at all. "I have no friendships with anyone there. . . . The White House, as far as I know, was never aware of the questions about my past."

Asked how recently he was putting his photo on escort sites, Gannon said that "so much of this stuff" was "years in the past. . . . Anything that goes on the Internet is there forever," he said. "Every day I learn about another site where there are allegedly pictures of me."

Gannon says he was questioned by the FBI in the Valerie Plame leak investigation after referring to a classified CIA document when he interviewed the outed CIA operative's husband, former ambassador Joe Wilson.

But he said yesterday: "I didn't have the document. I never saw the document. It was written about in the Wall Street Journal a week before. I had no special access to classified information."

Aravosis and other critics cite several examples of what they view as Gannon's anti-gay writing. Gannon wrote last year that John Kerry "might someday be known as 'the first gay president,' citing his "100 percent rating from the homosexual advocacy group the Human Rights Campaign" for backing a "pro-gay agenda." Gannon said he was just reporting the facts and playing off suggestions that Bill Clinton was the first black president.

In reporting on comments by Sen. Rick Santorum (R-Pa.) that legalizing gay marriage could lead to judicial approval of bestiality, Gannon made an issue of the fact that the Associated Press reporter who interviewed Santorum was married to a top Kerry aide and described the comments of gay activists as "predictable responses." Gannon said he was not taking a stand on the issue.

Other allegations, meanwhile, keep surfacing.

Aravosis wrote yesterday on his blog that an unnamed television producer says Gannon told him the Iraq war was going to begin four hours before Bush announced it.

Gannon chuckled at that, saying many reporters sensed an attack was imminent because the White House kept delaying the routine announcement that no more news would be made that day. "You could feel it in the air," he said.

Despite the battering he has taken, Gannon hasn't abandoned plans to work in journalism and hopes to generate sympathy by speaking out.

"People criticize me for being a Christian and having some of these questionable things in my past," he said. "I believe in a God of forgiveness."


http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A36733-2005Feb18.html

 

[Vance]

Codger, okay since you posted these comments. Allow me post two of many links... http://www.compassiongate.com/promises/ for lies & broken promises. Another link for flip-flops: http://flipflops.compassiongate.com/

It is very, very and very long list of Bush and his lies along with sources. According to several non-partisan political analysts, Bush made the record for numbers of lies and broken promises in only four years. Enjoy.

Slightly sarcasm/dry humor: I don't think even Lord of Deception, Satan/Lucifer can beat him and his lies :P

 

[Codger]

I lived in Arkansas the whole time Mr. Clinton was governor there. I met him in 1968. You want to see a really long list?

My point was that, well, go back and read my first sentence in the post. Where did you see me say that Bush, or any politician didn't lie?

 

[Vance]

I lived in Arkansas the whole time Mr. Clinton was governor there. I met him in 1968. You want to see a really long list?

Sure. I have over 100 links that contains perhaps hundred thousands of lies by Bush (bit exaggerating). I highly doubt any president can top his lies. If you want to play the 'who wins' game, by all means, go for it... but warning, it probably will give some Bush voters the massive heart attacks when they start to count their lovely pResident and his lies.

My point was that, well, go back and read my first sentence in the post. Where did you see me say that Bush, or any politician didn't lie?

I wonder why did you ask me when I didn't doubt you in first place?

 

[Beowulf]

Clinton lied and nobody died.
That is the BIG difference.

 

[Vance]

Clinton lied and nobody died.
That is the BIG difference.

Ouch. That's what I should've said in my post!

But... sperms got killed! Wait, I don't believe that bible ever mention anything about sperm issue. I guess I have to dismiss my 'killed' statement

 

[Codger]

Sure. I have over 100 links that contains perhaps hundred thousands of lies by Bush (bit exaggerating). I highly doubt any president can top his lies. If you want to play the 'who wins' game, by all means, go for it... but warning, it probably will give some Bush voters the massive heart attacks when they start to count their lovely pResident and his lies.

I wonder why did you ask me when I didn't doubt you in first place?

Lol! Well, I didn't vote for Bush or Minime Bush either. When I lived in Florida I voted for an independant candidate who ran on a pro-constitution platform, and curiously, he did not receive even one recorded vote in my district? Had to be a fluke, right?

A yahoo search of "Bill Clinton Lies" had 2,320,000 hits. A Google search turned in only 1,460,000. While we might eat quite a bit of bandwidth airing presidential laundry which we both admit stinks, I don't think it would accomplish much.

 

[Codger]

Clinton lied and nobody died.
That is the BIG difference.

really? Google "Arkancide", "Ron Brown", "Vince Foster" "Clinton missle attack"

 

[Vance]

Lol! Well, I didn't vote for Bush or Minime Bush either. When I lived in Florida I voted for an independant candidate who ran on a pro-constitution platform, and curiously, he did not receive even one recorded vote in my district? Had to be a fluke, right?

A yahoo search of "Bill Clinton Lies" had 2,320,000 hits. A Google search turned in only 1,460,000. While we might eat quite a bit of bandwidth airing presidential laundry which we both admit stinks, I don't think it would accomplish much.

rofl. Okay, I am sure that it will make us more dumber if we did that

I can be honest with you that I didn't vote for Clinton either because I was a teenager at that time plus that time, I don't give any crap about politics until Bush 'won' the election 2000. That's when I start to give any crap about politics. However I must admit that I do root for Clinton for his economy, environment & families policies but I didn't vote for him (I feel bad about it though).

 

[Beowulf]

Unproven hearsay.
Bush also has quite a trail of dead bodies, but those are small potatoes compared to the 100,000 plus Iraq deaths and our soldiers', all because of his pathological lying and sick megalomania.
Next.

 

[Codger]

Unproven hearsay.
Bush also has quite a trail of dead bodies, but those are small potatoes compared to the 100,000 plus Iraq deaths and our soldiers', all because of his pathological lying and sick megalomania.
Next.

Then you deny that Clinton ordered missiles fired into Iraq? What was the death toll? 0?

 

[Beowulf]

I'm sure he had his reasons.
But that was then, this is now.
We need to realize that all this attention on Clinton are just pathetic attempts to shift attention away from Bush and his treasonous actions.

I hasten to add that I do not mean you personally, Codger, never fear. It is just that I see a hell of a lot of Clinton bashing in other messageboards and they are strangely quiet about Bush.
Go figure.

 

[Codger]

No not at all. I get tired of people hammering Bush for things that every President has done. I am not a Bush supporter. I do not believe involving our military in constant foriegn entanglements is a good thing. I remember a senior trip myself to a beautiful exotic land. I don't wish that on any boy.