Negotiating With Myself In Public

Take a look at my Daily Photo



"Now, the temptation is going to be, by well-meaning people such as yourself, John, and others here, as we run up to the issue to get me to negotiate with myself in public; to say, you know, what's this mean, Mr. President, what's that mean. I'm not going to do that." – G.W. Bush 12/21/04.

My thoughts on how to fix the press so that Bush doesn't get away with another “Press Conference” like yesterday's [Warning - rant follows]:

FoxNews is blatantly conservative and gets huge ratings. CNN and MSNBC try to be everything to everybody and don't get any ratings (how many Keith Olbermann fans do you think stick around to watch Joe Scarsborough?).

So what one of these networks should do is fight the president at every step. Become known as the Woodward & Bernstein of the 21st Century. Be the station responsible for Rummy leaving. Be the network that forces Bush into the corner until he admits that he doesn’t have a real Social Security plan. Look harder at his appointees (or at least past the White House press releases). Don’t let up. Yes, 51% of the country will hate you, but 49% will love you and that's a lot larger audience than you have now.

FoxNews got to the top by stepping on Clinton's throat and never letting up. When people complained about this, they said it was their job as the press to stay on the story. Of course Fox is evil and there was a lot more going on than just the "press" at Fox doing its duty, but their reasoning is valid and pretty much un-debatable. It could just as easily be used for good rather than evil.

Right now, as eRobin over at Fact-esque rightly points out, the President is getting one big free ride while the press cries, "don't blame us." They're busier writing stories about how much Dubya gets away with than writing stories about what he's getting away with. Gee, he didn't answer that question at all! Well, gee, you think maybe you should do your job, go around him (maybe even sneak around behind his back, tee hee) and find out for us! Stop relying on the White House for your story! As with the whole WMD mess, we seem to always get the story too late.

Arrrggggg! Get backbones, people!

That's it for me. I'll leave the press to eRobin and the rants to the missus.