Friday, April 15, 2005

Questions for the President

I was thinking about journalists who cover the president. I don't know if people appreciate how incredibly difficult the White House makes it to get a straight answer. Wouldn't that drive you NUTS?

I won't bore you with the reasons why; things like: no follow ups, big egos, brow beating of your editor, self censorship and "protocol".

What would you tell yourself about this situation? Would you try to craft a question so great it couldn't be dodged? Would you band together with the other people asking questions and say, "This stinks. If he doesn't answer Bob's question, I'll ask him and then Jim will ask him and we will keep asking him the question until we get a decent answer." Would you quit? Or, more likely would you sigh and say to yourself, "I'll make the best of it"?

Just for fun I thought it would be interesting to do a little series of questions I want the answers to. To make it more fun I might imagine a the few responses.

1) How would he respond while wearing Wonder Woman's Golden Lasso? What if he was compelled to tell the truth?


2) What would the typical bullshit response be to a question? "In light of 9/11, which changed everything..."


3) What would YOUR response be to the bullshit response? Don't be intimidated and you wouldn't be taken to task for disrespecting the man or the office (maybe you don't feel he has earned the respect in the first place). Maybe you aren't concerned about keeping your job. Maybe you didn't care about millions of people who were upset at kicking the shit out of his bullshit responses? Maybe you were only concerned with the truth or maybe you were trying to really represent the millions who WANT someone to ask tough questions and who are tired of the charade.

For example, "Would you stop hiding behind 9/11 and your golden moment sitting on your ass in a class room and answer the god damn question? And YES I will have a follow up if you keep giving me your bullshit answers.


The folks at Daily Kos did something like this and got a bazillion responses. I don't expect my thirteen readers to come up with a bazillion responses, but if a question comes to you post away.

1) How many times have you been arrested and what were you arrested for? (If I asked that question I'd get $8,484.00!)

2)What's the real reason you didn't take your physical and stopped flying?

3)Why haven't you attended any soldiers funerals?

4)How many "ghost" detainees are there? Where are they? Are they being tortured?

I've got a million of 'em. I kind of wish Holden of First Draft read my blog. It would be interesting to hear what he has learned from his obsession with the Gaggle. What Questions have worked? Has anyone asked The President these questions?

2 Comments:

Anonymous said...

Dear Spago: Stop whining. This is Chicago Politics. The way the game was played before we became a group afraid to offend vegetarians, unionized post office workers & lesbians. Take heart: From www.StartChange.org: On March 13, we launched the Stop Fake News campaign. Since then, over 26,933 of you sent a message directly to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and the U.S. Department of Justice.

Today, we can declare a major victory! The FCC has heard your voice and declared that TV broadcasters must disclose the source of video news releases (VNRs) produced by the government. This is what today's Washington Post article, "Broadcasters Must Reveal
Video Clips' Sources, FCC Says," said:

Television broadcasters must disclose to viewers the origin of video news releases produced by the government or corporations when the material runs on the public airwaves, the Federal Communications Commission said yesterday.
The FCC's ruling comes as video news releases produced by the Bush administration and aired as part of local television news reports have come under attack from critics who call them unlabeled Republican propaganda.
-- Read the full Washington Post Article http://www.democracyinaction.org/dia/track.jsp?key=11355120&url_num=4&url=http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A51375-2005Apr13?language=printer

FCC commissioners Michael Copps and Jonathan Adelstein said that public comments such as the 26,933 comments from our community were critical in provoking this announcement. http://www.democracyinaction.org/dia/track.jsp?key=11355120&url_num=5&url=http://hraunfoss.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/FCC-05-84A2.pdf>.

10:13 AM  
flameape said...

Kup-fai-tor ri ruhm Vuhlkansular Ri-Fainu, spahko.

5:41 AM  

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