HuffPo Coordinates Question With Obama

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As if the press hasn’t already been fawning over Obama enough, the White House resorted to coordinating a question with the Huffington Post at today’s press conference.

Against White House protocol, the communications department contacted Huffington Post blogger Nico Pitney and asked him to query Obama on the specific subject of Iran for the second question of the press conference.

Politico’s Michael Calderone reports:

In what appeared to be a coordinated exchange, President Obama called on the Huffington Post's Nico Pitney near the start of his press conference and requested a question directly about Iran.

“Nico, I know you and all across the Internet, we've been seeing a lot of reports coming out of Iran,” Obama said, addressing Pitney. “I know there may actually be questions from people in Iran who are communicating through the Internet. Do you have a question?”

It has since been confirmed by deputy press secretary Bill Burton that the White House did in fact contact Pitney in advance and plan for him to ask about Iran.

Pitney asked:

“Under which conditions would you accept the election of Ahmadinejad, and if you do accept it without any significant changes in the conditions there, isn't that a betrayal of the — of what the demonstrators there are working towards?”

It is unknown whether Obama knew exactly what the question was going to be, but if he wanted to address the issue of accepting Ahmadinejad’s legitimacy, coordinating with the Huffington Post would be an easy way to do it.

Acts like this call into question the Post’s credibility at a time when the Post is trying to increase its influence. It made an impact in last year’s election—the Post's reporting included exposing Obama’s “bitter gun owners” comment—and it now have a regular spot at White House press conferences, but if the Post wants to be taken seriously, coordinating with the Obama White House isn’t helping. The Post has come under question, too, for having their investigative reporting program unready and publishing unskeptically a doctored video of John Gibson making derogatory comments about Eric Holder. Oh, yeah, and plagiarism isn’t helping the it's cause either.

In 2005, the Bush administration was under fire for granting press credentials to James Gucker (aka Jeff Gannon), who wrote for Talon News, a conservative website, and lobbed softball questions during press conferences.  

Democrats were so riled up by Gannon that they demanded an investigation:

Democrats in Congress are trying to keep an embarrassing GOP scandal alive by asking that the official probe of White House propaganda be widened to include how an alleged gay hooker with an alias got into the press room every day.

...

Slaughter and Conyers also wrote to the special prosecutor probing who identified CIA agent Valerie Plame to the press, urging him to subpoena Guckert's diary.

(New York Post, Feb. 24, 2005)

Since Obama is the first president in office in the modern media era, he has the priviledge of having a reporters from an unabashedly liberal website covering his press conferences, but one would think they would draw the line at coordinating questions. 

Meanwhile, Obama was dismissive of one of Jake Tapper's tough questions on healthcare.

—Mitchell Blatt is the editor of the foreign affairs blog Bombs and Dollars.


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Too bad there's never any

Too bad there's never any Newsbusters reporters asking questions at these press conferences.

It is well known that Bush certainly coordinated with Free Republic, Hot Air and Newsbusters when he was in office.

/sarc

One of the 34% who thinks George W. Bush was a great President. One of the 61% who wants to bring back the stock and pillory (yep...approval for Congress now at 39%...do you believe that!?).

Glad this is finally here

Glad this is finally here as some of us have posted about this....HuffnPuff once again has another inside track.

Nothing like power as the leftists grin and get away with this....again.

Can anyone imagine is this was say a blogger from NBs during a republican administration, say when President Bush was in office, or say Michael Yon was there to be called on....my oh my the msm would have went berserk.

Doubling down on stupid is not a particularly good idea. ~Andrew Breitbart

Huffington Post

Hard core leftist on the fence broke URL. Draw your own conclusions as to why Obama selected them. 

JDW

DAILY WAVE

When people fear their government there is tyranny.

When government fears the people there is liberty.

Mitchell.. Let's highlight this one again...

It has since been confirmed by deputy press secretary Bill Burton that the White House did in fact contact Pitney in advance and plan for him to ask about Iran.

Let's hightlight that one again... it was the Obama White House which picked up the telephone and called Pitney and invited him to ask a question about Iran and coached him on what question to ask.

This is how a free and independent press works?

Gee - rather reminds me of a certain Katie Couric interview with Pres. Obama: "Sir, we're going to have to ask you a question in the course of this interview - we don't really want to, but there is a lot of attention out there right now from the right on this one...sooooo just prepare for it, and I promise, no matter what you say, I will not ask any follow questions of you on the matter... OK?"

(;~> gary

Gary.... Bulls-Eye! Righ

Gary....

Bulls-Eye!

Right on mark....that is a great example.

Doubling down on stupid is not a particularly good idea. ~Andrew Breitbart

bt.. well, when the target is..

.. larger than Obama's ego - how does one miss?

Seriously now.

(;~> gary

So, he is writing the

So, he is writing the questions...?

Teleprompter reversal

I was curious, and even commented, on the report that Obama was doing this press confernece without teleprompters.

Now I know why.

The teleprompters were for the lefty audience, just to make sure they quoted the question correctly.

Wouldn't do for Obama to give his prepared/memorized answer to a botched question now, would it?

___________________________________ 

Liberals constantly demand that we accept a glaring falsehood as truth; Obama's elimination of the word "terror" will make terrorist acts less terrifying

WH caught stuffing its tongue in its hip pocket again

First Gibbs says that there was NO coordination.

A number of iterations later, Gibbs says that not only was there coordination, but the WH called the HuffPo wonk.

Another day, another lie.

 

Wanna see what 'no

Wanna see what 'no coordination' really looks like?

Just wait for obamas health scare thing with ABC tomorrow.
___________________________________ 

Liberals constantly demand that we accept a glaring falsehood as truth; Obama's elimination of the word "terror" will make terrorist acts less terrifying

TnT... Not watching

TnT...

Not watching it.

Relatives coming from the coast anyway, even if I was to slip...which I wouldn't have....I think.

Seriously though, I had NO intentions of watching this...ever.

Besides that...it will be all over the place on the internet and other networks anyway...talk about a free ride/infomercial.

Speaking of which...Linda Douglas was also on the Washington Journal this morning hawking this BS for her man for abc....it's her glorious job, which she does gladly with glee.

Doubling down on stupid is not a particularly good idea. ~Andrew Breitbart

I'm with you BT -- I

I'm with you BT -- I immediately turn the TV off if I see Obama show up anywhere. There's just so much God a person can take during a day, and besides I've got to get a cure for this sudden tingle that's just showed up.

___________________________________ 

Liberals constantly demand that we accept a glaring falsehood as truth; Obama's elimination of the word "terror" will make terrorist acts less terrifying

If they do not ask in advance

How can he have the answer on the teleprompter in time to read the answer? He also has to have time to get the right answer from his puppet masters...

 

“Less 1984 — More 1776"

What I am amazed at is how

What I am amazed at is how many stories are coming out now about how
the WH is messing up.  Biden was right, it hasnt been 6 months and he
has been tested(and failed).  He wanted the job and from day 1, he has
been overwhelmed.  Is there any news on if Sotomayor has paid her
taxes?  It is time to stand up and take responsibility.  He needs to
stop blaming Bush.  Fewer people are watching the MSM as they try to cover for him.

Government's first duty is to protect the people, not run their lives.

Ronald Reagan

obama

jessieH     Doesn't surprise me a bit. He won't answer OUR questions. He CAN'T answer questions from the people. The telepromter only answers liberal questions.