If Bush is going after Irish reporter, think what he does to Cnn, Msnbc,

[59millionmorons]

You know damn well he threatens these news outlets all the time, by telling them they will lose access. We already know thanks to Keith Olberman that they try to feed them talking points.

[HEyHEY]

1. Ya Bush start pissing off the Irish now

:eyes:

[Rebellious Republican]

2. Hey demdem, could you spare us a few more crumbs or a link?

[59millionmorons]

3. Link

http://www.unison.ie/irish_independent/stories.php3?ca=9&si=1205871&is...

[morgan2]

4. any link without registration required?

[59millionmorons]

5. read this

THE White House has lodged a complaint with the Irish Embassy in Washington over RTE journalist Carole Coleman's interview with US President George Bush.

And it is believed the President's staff have now withdrawn from an exclusive interview which was to have been given to RTE this morning by First Lady Laura Bush.

It is understood that both RTE and the Department of Foreign Affairs were aware of the exclusive arrangement, scheduled for 11am today. However, when RTE put Ms Coleman's name forward as interviewer, they were told Mrs Bush would no longer be available.

The Irish Independent learned last night that the White House told Ms Coleman that she interrupted the president unnecessarily and was disrespectful.

She also received a call from the White House in which she was admonished for her tone.

And it emerged last night that presidential staff suggested to Ms Coleman as she went into the interview that she ask him a question on the outfit that Taoiseach Bertie Ahern wore to the G8 summit.

[mark11727]

11. Now I'm upset...

...And it is believed the President's staff have now withdrawn from an exclusive interview which was to have been given to RTE this morning by First Lady Laura Bush...

Great. Another twenty minutes of ODL pissing and moaning how everyone piles on her poor dear husband.

Sweet baby Jeebus, gimme a break.

[Blecht]

9. use bugmenot

get a login for any nonpay site that requires registration at http://bugmenot.com

It's great.

[Rebellious Republican]

8. Thanks demdem, I just ran across your other post and saw it there

:toast:

[veggiemama]

20. WH also cancelled Carole Coleman's interview with Laura . . .

<snip>

THE White House has strongly criticised the RTE interview with President Bush, claiming that journalist Carole Coleman constantly interrupted him, preventing him from getting his point of view across.

The interview, broadcast from the White House on Thursday, 24 hours before the President's visit to Ireland, so displeased President Bush and his advisers that it led to the cancellation of another RTE exclusive yesterday, an interview with the President's wife Laura.

The interview with President Bush, where he was asked questions about the Iraq war and the Middle East among other issues, was the first with an American president by RTE in about 20 years.

During the increasingly tense interview Ms Coleman asked what she termed "tough" follow-up questions to Mr Bush on issues such as weapons of mass destruction.

Five times during the brief interview Mr Bush asked Ms Coleman to allow him to finish answering his original question.

At one stage he pleaded: "Please, please, please, for a minute, okay. It'll be better if you let me finish my answers, and then you can follow up, if you don't mind."

A spokeswoman for the White House told the Sunday Independent yesterday: "It is true that the reporter interrupted him a number of times and prevented him from making the points he was trying to make."

She said there had been concerns in the White House and the Irish Embassy in Washington that the reporter had "overstepped the bounds of politeness" in her questioning.

"The issue was not the questions but the fact that she was not letting the President answer them," she said.

The spokesperson added that the President was used to aggressive questioning. The questions were not impolite but t the reporter was not allowing the President to answer them, she reiterated.

She said that given the type of interview conducted by Ms Coleman it was "appropriate" that Mrs Bush's office had cancelled the interview planned with her.

The interview led to a White House complaint to the Irish Embassy. Aides to the president afterwards told Ms Coleman that she interrupted the president unnecessarily and was disrespectful.

RTE, however, said it "totally stands over the conduct of the interview and Carole's journalism."

They were also very pleased with the national and international public response to the interview with several radio and TV stations asking to rebroadcast it.

An RTE spokeswoman said their Washington office had been told that the interview with Mrs Bush was not now going to happen. It had been arranged for 11am yesterday.

<<

http://www.unison.ie/irish_independent/stories.php3?ca=9&si=1205976


It would be just grand if some of y'all would let Bertie Ahern know what you think about Bushco's actions--and give Carole Coleman and RTE your support. Let him know what patriotic Americans really think! Here's Bertie's contact page:

http://www.taoiseach.gov.ie/index.asp?locID=172&docID=-1

[Cleita]

6. The Irish weren't beaten down by the British after eight hundred

years of persecution, I doubt if the Chimperor is going to phase them one bit. Our news and media sources should start fighting back.

[KoKo]

7. Exactly "demdem" some stuff about this is leaking out in the last few

weeks. Thanks for this post. I think Chimp overplayed his hand on this one. Now if the Irish reporter is fired then we know it's Global and that Chimp is only one part in the silencing of the voice of the people, but if there's backlash then we have hope.

There was a post on DU about Cheney calling to silence reporters and some DU'ers were "Shocked" they never heard about this. But those of us "media mavens" who had been here awhile and been through the early Salon
Mag. days following the "Hunting of the President" with Conason/Lyons and Murray Waas knew that the RW was threatening folks back then.

With Bush they don't just threaten they send the "suits and dark glasses"outside your place of work or home, after they've threatened your employer.

These are scary dudes...thugs...criminal minds...:scared:

[Cleita]

10. Yes, they are criminals no different than the Mafia.

We the people are going to have to get them out of our government and then make sure this never happens again.

[calimary]

12. Exactly. Remember when Keith Olbermann asked Joseph Wilson about this?

Olbermann had Wilson on as a guest, after he'd gone on "Meet the Press" and talked about reporters telling him of White House intimidation tactics against them. He quoted one reporter as saying he'd be "Gitmo'd" if he wrote anything oppositional to bush, and another described threats to his editors (they'd go over his head and threaten his boss - and HIS boss), adding "I have two kids in private school and a mortgage to pay" - indicating his livelihood was at risk. Maybe his career (like maybe a threat that he'd never work again - don't scoff. I know this from personal experience. It HAPPENS).

If that wasn't bad enough, WHILE Olbermann is talking to Wilson about that particular press intimidation, Olbermann holds up several pieces of paper and turns to the camera and says that what he's holding are three emails from the White House, with recommendations for questions to ask Wilson. Olbermann read the quote from one of those pieces of paper "I understand you've scheduled Joseph Wilson as a guest. Would you please call me?"

And also remember, Helen Thomas was shoved to the back of the room, literally, at White House Press Conferences, after she had the gall to ask an uppity question. And if THAT wasn't bad enough, NOBODY in the rest of the White House Press Corps complained, or in ANY WAY stood up for her. NOBODY SAID OR DID SQUAT.

This just proves they've been at it so long they're getting sloppy. Not covering their tracks as stealthily as they had been. AND - perhaps more important, the Teflon has worn off. The media IS starting to wake up a little. It should be interesting to see what happens after this weekend. I'll know more when I've seen the film, tomorrow night. But if the media is SHAMED by this, by all the facts and truths and realities and events that happened - that they IGNORED OR SUPPRESSED - they WILL get comments from viewers and listeners and readers (THAT'S A HINT, BY THE WAY...) perhaps they'll continue to wake up. I bet there'll be people contacting the media, wondering WHY these things were glossed over or completely hidden, and WHERE the coverage is, and WHERE the questioning is, and where the true balance and fairness and integrity and all those other MOST essential traits of a true journalist are?

Already, David Gregory of NBC and Terry Moran of ABC are in fuller voice, Christiane Amanpour is back covering the war, after an unexplained absense (she was critical of biased news coverage, and suddenly you just didn't see her on the air anymore). CBS has been getting more gutsy. Its own Dan Rather told the BBC a couple of years ago that he'd be "necklaced" if he presented less-than-fawning coverage of the White House. "Necklaced" is the actual word he used. It depends on public reaction. For now, they're all busy with their so-called Lisa Myers-type "truth squads," trying to debunk the movie. Obviously the message will take awhile to sink in.

These people will only feel, and be forced to face the heat - if WE apply the heat, in the first place!

I am so glad you brought this up, demdem! I hope everybody remembers that! And you are correct. They ARE trying their intimidation tactics with the Irish now. As dick cheney would say to somebody he doesn't like: ... well, you know the rest.

[Cha]

13. I'll bet David Gregory and Terry Moran are

frothing at the bit to bet a piece of bushco.

[Vickers]

16. Great post, Calimary, thank you.

:toast:

[Shopaholic]

17. The White House should be exposed for the bunch of bullies

that they are! Thanks to Keith Olbermann for exposing the "talking points" from the White House and letting us in on what we already highly expected--the press follows the "scripts" that they are handed by this White House! How does the press-this bunch of spineless losers even sleep at night knowing how they are betraying every single thing that this country was founded on? How do they live with the knowledge that they are supporting * and his band of thugs and that their inactions have directly led to the deaths of hundreds of American soldiers and thousands of Iraqi citizens? Free press my ass! Watch that interview with Carole Coleman with * from Irish TV and find out what a reporter is really supposed to do!

[LittleApple81]

14. For those of you who want to see/read Bush's Irish interview with Coleman,

Here you go:

WH transcript:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2004/06/20040625-2.html

video:
http://www.rte.ie/news/2004/0624/primetime/primetime56_1c.smil

[Karenina]

24. UNBELIEVABLE!!!

Condescending, patronizing, RUDE, finger-wagging, FACTUALLY INACCURATE responses... UN-FUCKING-BELIEVABLE!

[Randypiper]

15. Here's a link

Sidney Blumenthal
http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1245877,00.html

With Congress in Republican hands, checks and balances were effectively removed. Most of the media was on the bandwagon or intimidated. Cheney himself called the president of the corporation that owned one of the networks to complain about an errant commentator. Political aides directed by Karl Rove ceaselessly called editors and producers with veiled threats about access that was not granted in any case. The press would not bite the hand that would not feed it.

[Shopaholic]

18. And of course the American press won't print Sidney Blumenthal's

column! Spineless cowards! Worthless bastards. . . . This column should be required reading by every American citizen!

[DeepModem Mom]

19. kick

[OETKB]

21. The Greater Danger

It is Mr. Bush's right to get miffed if he does not like the way he is interviewed, but here's the rub. By complaining to the GOVERNMENT OF IRELAND instead of the TV station itself, he threatens the 4th estate. No government should be admonishing the role of the press or trying to set its policy. This constitutional right of a free press must be vigorously protected or dictatorial ambitions of our leaders will not be exposed.

[bushneedstogo2]

22. Why do they are give in to him

I don't understand why they give in and apologize to him.

[FormerOstrich]

23. I never cease to be amazed at the sheer

audacity...

I guess they have warned * to tone down his Messiah complex. Yet, he does so poorly. From the transcript (my comments in blue):

THE PRESIDENT: Listen, I think that God -- that my relationship with God is a very personal relationship. So now it's personal after we have been hearing about it all this time. Is it just me...but doesn't he display/communicate about it a lot for it to be considered "personal"? And I turn to the good Lord for strength. And I turn to the good Lord for guidance. I turn to the good Lord for forgiveness. See? I knew he couldn't refrain from talking about it

But the God I know is not one that Is not one what George? Not one to turn the other cheek? Not one to what? -- the God I know is one that promotes peace and freedom. But I get great sustenance from my personal relationship. That doesn't make me think I'm a better person than you are, by the way. Really? Why would you say that? I think this little comment speaks volumes. Obviously, if you didn't believe yourself to be better, it would not occurred to you say this. Or is it...since you think you are chosen but it's okay you still tolerate the non-chosen? I think..not only do you think yourself better, you are convinced you are. Therefore, you want to stress you can still tolerate the commonners.....by the way.... Because one of the great admonitions in the Good Book is, don't try to take a speck out of your eye if I've got a log in my own. Can someone with more Good Book knowledge than myself explain to me what he is trying to say here?