KO getting some props from Frank Rich

[Clark2008]

On "Countdown," a nightly news hour on MSNBC, the anchor, Keith Olbermann, led off with a classic "Daily Show"-style bit: a rapid-fire montage of sharply edited video bites illustrating the apparent idiocy of those in Washington. In this case, the eight clips stretched over a year in the White House briefing room - from February 2004 to late last month - and all featured a reporter named "Jeff." In most of them, the White House press secretary, Scott McClellan, says "Go ahead, Jeff," and "Jeff" responds with a softball question intended not to elicit information but to boost President Bush and smear his political opponents. In the last clip, "Jeff" is quizzing the president himself, in his first post-inaugural press conference of Jan. 26. Referring to Harry Reid and Hillary Clinton, "Jeff" asks, "How are you going to work with people who seem to have divorced themselves from reality?"

If we did not live in a time when the news culture itself is divorced from reality, the story might end there: "Jeff," you'd assume, was a lapdog reporter from a legitimate, if right-wing, news organization like Fox, and you'd get some predictable yuks from watching a compressed video anthology of his kissing up to power. But as Mr. Olbermann explained, "Jeff Gannon," the star of the montage, was a newsman no more real than a "Senior White House Correspondent" like Stephen Colbert on "The Daily Show" and he worked for a news organization no more real than The Onion. Yet the video broadcast by Mr. Olbermann was not fake. "Jeff" was in the real White House, and he did have those exchanges with the real Mr. McClellan and the real Mr. Bush.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/20/arts/20rich.html?

Also - there are six reporters, by Rich's count, who have been shilling for the Bush Administration.

Keith, :yourock:

:loveya:

[Me.]

1. Who Are The Six?

Can't get in

[Clark2008]

3. Here's what Rich says

By my count, "Jeff Gannon" is now at least the sixth "journalist" (four of whom have been unmasked so far this year) to have been a propagandist on the payroll of either the Bush administration or a barely arms-length ally like Talon News while simultaneously appearing in print or broadcast forums that purport to be real news. Of these six, two have been syndicated newspaper columnists paid by the Department of Health and Human Services to promote the administration's "marriage" initiatives. The other four have played real newsmen on TV. Before Mr. Guckert and Armstrong Williams, the talking head paid $240,000 by the Department of Education, there were Karen Ryan and Alberto Garcia. Let us not forget these pioneers - the Woodward and Bernstein of fake news. They starred in bogus reports ("In Washington, I'm Karen Ryan reporting," went the script) pretending to "sort through the details" of the administration's Medicare prescription-drug plan in 2004. Such "reports," some of which found their way into news packages distributed to local stations by CNN, appeared in more than 50 news broadcasts around the country and have now been deemed illegal "covert propaganda" by the Government Accountability Office.

[pacalo]

2. Keith was given credit by Catherine Crier, too...

http://www.crooksandliars.com/2005/02/16.html#a1607

Catherine is outraged by "Jeff", too.

[Clark2008]

4. I love this!

As a KOEB charter member, it does my heart good to see such a talented man get some credit outside the sporting world.

[pacalo]

5. The fact that Catherine was so serious about getting the facts out

to her audience just made the credit given to Keith even sweeter. :)

[Clark2008]

6. And wasn't she a judge?

She didn't start her career as a journalist.
How ironic is it that all the people yelling for more media credibility aren't the reporters themselves.
Geesch. What has Murdoch driven us to?

[pacalo]

9. And it's interesting that the WH-henchman faction of the corporate media

which includes Catherine's former CNN associate, Wolf Blitzer, is attempting to deflect the focus onto the blogging world. The bloggers are holding a mirror up to the corporate media & they don't like it.

Here's some info on Catherine:

Prior to her accomplished career in television journalism, Crier presided over the 162nd District Court in Dallas County, TX as a State District Judge. When she took the bench in 1984, she became the youngest elected state judge in Texas history. From 1982 to 1984, Crier was a civil litigation attorney in Dallas and before that, an Assistant District Attorney and Felony Chief Prosecutor for the Dallas County District Attorney's office from 1978 to 1981.

In 1996, Crier received the Les Femmes du Monde Award which is sponsored by the Dallas Council on World Affairs. The Ex-Students' Association of the University of Texas at Austin awarded her the 1990 Outstanding Young Texas Ex Award. She was recognized as one of TV Guide's "Dynamic Dozen" in 1990. Also in that year, the American Bar Association's Barrister magazine honored her among their "Twenty Young Lawyers Who Make a Difference."

http://www.courttv.com/onair/shows/crierlive/bio.html

[Pithy Cherub]

7. Keith deserves every accolade and any marmalade he gets....

Keith is iconoclastic and original which is completely the antithesis of herd journalism. This in and of itself exposes the rivalry and other sordid under pinnings of how newsrooms work. Love the fact that Keith enjoys going to work and leaving with his dignity beautifully clothed and on display...unlike his peers.

:loveya:

[Clark2008]

8. Tee hee

The operative word here is "clothed," I think. ;)

[pacalo]

10. Did you catch the last two lines in Frank Rich's column?

I loved it:

With real news this timid, the appointment of Jon Stewart to take over Dan Rather's chair at CBS News could be just the jolt television journalism needs. As Mr. Olbermann demonstrated when he borrowed a sharp "Daily Show" tool to puncture the "Jeff Gannon" case, the only road back to reality may be to fight fake with fake.

[Patsy Stone]

11. That's my guy!

For KO: :loveya::loveya::loveya::loveya:

Who else rocks like that? Not too many out there I can tell you! It's nice to see he's getting the props he deserves. Um, not that it's news to the KOEB. :)

:yourock:

From today's Countdown newsletter:

* More on Gannon/Guckert... using his alias "Jeff Gannon," he boasted online about asking then-White House press secretary Ari Fleischer a question at the Feb. 28, 2003, briefing. Talon did not even exist then. The organization was created in late March 2003, and began publishing online in early April 2003. (salon.com)

[spinbaby]

12. Earlier thread, same article

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x3128002

[Generator]

13. Excellent!

The P word!!!!

Olbermann!!!

The Daily Show!!!

Karen Ryan (The Daily show bit on that called it INFOGANDA-I will never forget it that's when I found DU and realized things are very very rotten in Denmark)

The nexis of it all-manufactured consent. I don't agree with everything Chomsky believes, but on that he is spot on.

All manipulation, all bias news with no FACT check to get your result.

Anything for FOUR MORE YEARS.

America, baby, you've been HAD.

[crispini]

14. Floaty hearts for KO!

:loveya:

[Shopaholic]

15. It's also being talked about on industry websites

See
www.tvnewser.com

[Clark2008]

16. I'm wondering who this "insider" is

From your link, Shop: "The most amusing part of Rich's column was him calling Olbermann a 'real newsman,'" one insider said. "So when he was on ESPN, he was a 'real' score reader?"

So, who's the jealous asshole "reporter" who doesn't realize that KO has a Communications Arts degree from Cornell University?
:mad: