It's as if they think it's 1991 -- or even 1961.
Drudge is currently linking to a "trash talk" story at Ynetnews.com about how, with a microphone still on, French President Nicolas Sarkozy said that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu "is a liar." U.S. President Barack Obama's response, also audible, was: "You're fed up with him, but I have to deal with him every day!" That's not necessarily the most disgraceful aspect of the story. What follows after the jump, which explains why the story is just coming out now, is at least as reprehensible:
The surprising lack of coverage may be explained by a report alleging that reporters present at the event were requested to sign an agreement to keep mum on the subject of the embarrassing comments.
A member of the media confirmed Monday that "there were discussions between journalists and they agreed not to publish the comments due to the sensitivity of the issue."
He added that while it was annoying to have to refrain from publishing the information, the journalists are subject to precise rules of conduct.
What?
First, did they really think it would stay quiet (they may not care, as long as it stays quiet enough that the relatively disengaged don't catch wind of it), and second, who in the world elected them the world's information gatekeepers?
Let's try to imagine that any journalist would agree to such a restriction or hesitate to violate it even if he or she did agree to it if a conversation like this involving a Republican or conservative, or really just about anyone other than Barack Obama would have occurred. Neither can I.
As partial evidence that the embarrassing comment blackout was honored, the three AP items from the summit (here, here, and here) contain no reference to what Ynet revealed.
The least the establishment press could do is stop calling themselves reporters and properly refer to themselves as stenographers.
Cross-posted at BizzyBlog.com.
