2/17/2005

Who Do You Have To Blow To Get a White House Press Pass?:
Out here in Left Blogsylvania, you can practically hear the frustrated screams of "Oh, come on" emanating from our basement lairs of justice. As evidence and inference pile up suggesting, implying, and/or demonstrating some kind of link between Jeff Gannon/James Guckert and the White House (at least the White House press office), we're waving our arms at the mainstream media and yelling, "Look, goddamnit, look over here, to the left, to the left." There's been some shaking out in the form of a couple of articles in the Washington Post and New York Times, a sympathetic hearing from Catherine Crier on Court TV, some sarcastic mocking of Gannon from Keith Olbermann (and The Daily Show, which bitch slapped the media's denegration of blogging muckrakers), and editorials from the usual suspects:Sidney Blumenthal, Frank Rich, and Maureen Dowd.

The latter is especially interesting since Dowd reveals that she couldn't originally get a press pass from the Bush White House, despite her previous access: "I was rejected for a White House press pass at the start of the Bush administration, but someone with an alias, a tax evasion problem and Internet pictures where he posed like the 'Barberini Faun' is credentialed to cover a White House that won a second term by mining homophobia and preaching family values?" And now we also know that Gannyguck had his press pass and was called on to ask questions of Ari Fleischer a full month before Talon "News" ever existed.

So, come on, where's the uproar? Let's summarize this as succinctly as possible (as many others have). Warning-do not try to diagram this sentence: a cocksucker for hire with a fake name and no news organization affiliation, whose only journalistic "experience" is a two-day right-wing "Institute," is given a daily press pass to the White House, which denies such passes to established and legitimate journalists, and is called on to ask blatantly pro-Bush questions, who eventually is placed into a fake news front for a conservative website (that apparently hires a high school student as one of its main reporters) and becomes a regular at DC press events, as well as the daily briefing, quizzing Scott McClellan, the President's press secretary who's been seen going to gay bars in Texas but who recently married, receiving a congratulations card from said cocksucker for hire, who eventually gets to ask the anti-gay President a question at one of the anti-gay President's rare news conferences, where reporters from major news organizations go begging, at the same time that the White House the cocksucker so gracelessly praises is paying off other conservative commentators to push its proposals to the public.

Now, does someone wanna tell the Rude Pundit why the fuck John Aravosis and Kos (and his Kossacks) shouldn't be pursuing this story to the ends of the earth? Even if it turns out it's just a giant fuck-up (which, really, and c'mon, we're talking monumental in the realm of fuck-ups), why wouldn't the mainstream press be going at this story - full of gay sex, power, and access - with all the viciousness of Matt Drudge and Michael Isikoff sniffing Monica's panty shields?

So where to go now? Go after Bobby Eberle, GOPUSA, and Talon "News," of course, and look into each of its "reporters" (or "transcribers"). And what's the deal with the name "Talon"? Especially since at virtually the same time Talon "News" was being created, the Pentagon was working on "Talon," a database of "raw" information about "anomalous activities" by U.S. citizens. Or that the Canadian company Talon Books is known for its publication of gay and lesbian writers. This kind of bullshit conspiracy theorizing is ludicrous, but with the outrage factor being limited right now, what's left?

Ahh, excellent question. See, what the left used to be good at in America is subterfuge and subversion. Let's get back to those Abbie Hoffman roots. The Rude Pundit has a plan. It's your weekend homework. Now, we know that Bush is stabbing his Christian constituency in the back in his lack of funding of his faith-based initiatives. The Christian right is sore, with the sweet, soft belly of a hog on a spit. It's time to poke that fucker with a stick. Get the Christian wackjobs upset, and the Gannyguck story flies. You know it. The Rude Pundit knows it.

Here's what we do: we start invading the Christian conservative websites (and right-wingers who hate gays). Try to stay as "mainstream" as possible. Hit the chat rooms and message boards. E-mail like crazy. And pretend to be Christian, conservative, and mad as hell that the President would allow someone like Gannyguck into the sanctified pure whiteness of America's house. Go on Fox's website and do the same. Never, never make it that you hate Bush - make it that you're betrayed. Fuck, if a few cranks from Focus on the Family can get the FCC to criminally raise fines on indecency, then we can use those cranks to our advantage. (The Rude Pundit is not going to list sites to contact because, in case anyone does this, he doesn't want such complaints to be seen as "illegitimate" because of the Rude Pundit's involvement.)

Here's an example (please do not copy exactly - let's make it seem as little like astroturf as possible- and don't seem too smart): "As a Republican and Christian, I'm appalled that the President allowed a known male prostitute into the press room. When I voted for George Bush, I thought I was voting for the family values candidate. Now I find out the President not only allowed Jeff Gannon/ James D. Guckert to join the media in the White House, but he called on him at a press conference. I think George Bush owes us an apology and an explanation."

Oh, what fun it could be if we get away with it. E-mail the Rude Pundit with your postings or e-mails that you sent to your "favorite" conservative writer or organization: rudepundit@yahoo.com.

And remember: our cause is just as we face evil people.