How did someone with Gannon/Guckert's journalistic credentials get into the WH press pool? By accident?
How much cash did the Clinton administration give to journalists in comparison to the Bush administration?
I don't know what bloggers Gore referred to. Exposing Dan Rather's typewriter mistake was easy. Great job by bloggers, who shamed the professional journalists.
Stewart was soft on Kerry (and Sanatorum and others), but isn't it sad that you expect a comedian to conduct critical interviews with politicians? Isn't that the job of the news media?

1.) I watched the NBC video Martin recommended in his first comment. After 1:45 minutes Deputy Assistant Sec of Def Allison Barber tells the captain: If the president gives a question "that we have not scripted," then you, Captain Kennedy, have the chance to impress us all. What do you make of that?

US soldiers have a very tough job in Iraq. They should feel free to tell the president honestly what they think about the situation in Iraq. They should not be abused for advertisements for president Bush, but this seems to have been the only purpose of such a "dialogue." Do you see any other purpose?

2. Re your hypocrisy test: You don't need to wait for the Democrats to return to power. You could look at Republican statements, when they were in opposition.

Today, many Republicans accuse Democrats of not supporting the president in times of war and not supporting the troops etc, but look at what they said during the Kosovo war. The two wars are very different from each other, but these statements still reveal hypocrisy in my humble opinon.

"You can support the troops but not the president"
-Representative Tom Delay (R-TX)

"American foreign policy is now one huge big mystery. Simply put, the administration is trying to lead the world with a feel-good foreign policy."
-Representative Tom Delay (R-TX)

"Explain to the mothers and fathers of American servicemen that may come home in body bags why their son or daughter have to give up their life?"
-Sean Hannity, Fox News, 4/6/99

"Victory means exit strategy, and it's important for the President to explain to us what the exit strategy is."
-Governor George W. Bush (R-TX)

These and more quotes are here:
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2005/6/18/161016/461

> If the soldiers were really told what their answers should
> be, I agree with you. What I have read does not indicate
> that was the case:
>
> http://278medic.blogspot.com/2005/10/speaking-with-president-bush.html

He does not deny it (but he says he does not like the media reports). And he says:
"First of all, we were told that we would be speaking with the President of the United States, our Commander-in-Chief, President Bush, so I believe that it would have been totally irresponsible for us NOT to prepare some ideas, facts or comments that we wanted to share with the President."

What is preparing facts? Anyway, I am not at all insinuating that they were told to lie or make propaganda, but I believe the PR folks listened to what they prepared to tell the president and made sure that there was nobody in the group, who would dare to ask the president a question like a marine did one or two years ago. He asked Rumsfeld, why aren't there enough armoured vehicles. This was a major blow to the administration. As far as I know, a journalist suggested to this marine to ask the question. Thus I can understand that the administration wanted to prevent something like that again.

Bush backing FOX News wrote:
"The questions pitched to the troops by Bush were choreographed on the president's goals for the war in Iraq and the upcoming vote this weekend on a new Iraqi constitution. Privately, at least one senior military commander told FOX News that he's outraged by the way the young soldiers were coached. Others pointed out that despite efforts behind closed doors at the Pentagon to spin what happened, the tape of the event tells the story of soldiers who were being 'scripted' and given answers that had been 'drilled through' — in the words used by Deputy Secretary of Defense for Internal Communications Allison Barber on a tape that captured her 45-minute practice run of the event. (...) Paul Rieckhoff, director of the New York-based Operation Truth, an advocacy group for U.S. veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan, denounced the event as a "carefully scripted publicity stunt." Five of the 10 U.S. troops involved were officers, he said. "If he wants the real opinions of the troops, he can't do it in a nationally televised teleconference," Rieckhoff said. "He needs to be talking to the boots on the ground and that's not a bunch of captains.""
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,172262,00.html

I think what makes the media angry is that this event was announced as a spontaneous and give and take video conference with the president, who wanted to hear from the troops with firsthand knowledge about the situation what was really going on. I think that is not possible if you give each soldier so little time to speak his mind.

I think the purpose of the photo-op was to do something for President Bush, not for the troops.


> As far as Republicans changing their tune, I think 9-11 had a
> lot to do with that. In president Bush’s case you could also
> have quoted his statements concerning nation building,
> another area where he has changed his mind.

It makes sense to change one's mind on nation building after 9/11. That's why I did not mention this flip-flop.
However, I don't understand why having an exit strategy was important before 9/11, but isn't now.
And I don't understand why you could support the troops but not the president before 9/11, but can't make this differentiation now.

It is my understanding that the senators you quoted claim that they received the wrong intelligence information.