Wednesday, September 24, 2014

Ministry of Truth

"White House press-pool reports are supposed to be the news media’s eyes and ears on the president, an independent chronicle of his public activities. They are written by reporters for other reporters, who incorporate them into news articles about President Obama almost every day."
Sometimes, however, the White House plays an unseen role in shaping the story.

Journalists who cover the White House say Obama’s press aides have demanded — and received — changes in press-pool reports before the reports have been disseminated to other journalists. They say the White House has used its unusual role as the distributor of the reports as leverage to steer coverage in a more favorable direction.

While the overwhelming majority of pool reports pass through the White House without delay or amendment, some have been flagged by the administration’s press staff, which has demanded changes as a condition of distributing them.

4 comments:

deborah said...

For a long time the press cooperated with the White House. For example they refrained from publishing about FDR's mistress and his being wheelchair-bound. And would rightly keep war secrets.

Trooper York said...

Actually for Kennedy and Clinton they kept whore secrets.

bagoh20 said...

" And would rightly keep war secrets."

And this is war to the Whitehouse. Just ask anyone in the Administration about who is more evil ISIS or the Republicans.

They would answer "neither - it's the climate change deniers."

deborah said...

Not for Teddy Kennedy. But that was post-Watergate, I think.