Propagandagate takes an interesting turn...

[Klast Brell]

You may also wish to consider that a gay hooker Tens of thousands of dollars in debt may just be a little bit of a security risk. Probably not the person you want to let inside the Whitehouse and in the same room with the president.

[Relbeek Einre]

Like I said... at least Clinton didn't give Monica a press pass.

Or appoint her Secretary of State.

/em cues The Rolling Stones.. "BROWN SUGAR!"

[Aabe]

Just a few questions.

Why has the media not run with this if it is true?

Blogs can be first to scoop a story or fantasy land people, what is the record of this one?

I am painfully unaware of who in charge of what in the white house. Shouldn't it be easy to see who cleared this guy? Then we can track it up from there?

[Aabe]

Like I said... at least Clinton didn't give Monica a press pass.

Ahhh but she did have access to the "Mr. Presidents family jewels".

[Relbeek Einre]

CNN, MSNBC, etc. have reported on this, and are continuing to investigate.

Why did the bloggers get the scoop on Propagandagate? Same reason, I suppose, they got the scoop on the so-called "Rathergate." More eyes see more things.

[Aabe]

If this guy is a gay hooker, it will only count against him, if he hasnt declared it to the CIA and FBI. Need to find out if it was undeclared, in which case it was a blackmailable ommission. My understanding is that as long as you disclose they pretty much give you pass on lots of items like that.

[Aabe]

CNN, MSNBC, etc. have reported on this, and are continuing to investigate..

Cool, I was just hadnt heard yet.

Why did the bloggers get the scoop on Propagandagate? Same reason, I suppose, they got the scoop on the so-called "Rathergate." More eyes see more things.

No, I understand bloggers have broken big stories, but I know some are lala land folks. I just was wondering with only a blog citation, why you were so conviniced of it. But if CNN and MSNBC are going public, it makes sense now. Thanks for the info.

I'll have to break out the popcorn and see how this one unfolds, sure to a fun one. One way or the other.

[Ddrak]

The $20,000 debt from back-taxes in NJ would deny him just about any security clearance. Being a gay hooker would almost certainly deny him the clearance to see Valerie Plame's CIA bio. EIther of the above should (but may not) deny him the clearance required to be in the same room as the President (same room is different to being permitted within X feet of him, or alone with him).

Dd

[Burz]

"weapon: 8 inches, cut"

[Aabe]

The $20,000 debt from back-taxes in NJ would deny him just about any security clearance. Being a gay hooker would almost certainly deny him the clearance to see Valerie Plame's CIA bio. EIther of the above should (but may not) deny him the clearance required to be in the same room as the President (same room is different to being permitted within X feet of him, or alone with him).

Dd

I disagree on the hooker part being reason to refuse access. If it was disclosed and just "sick and wrong" its amazing what they let you by with. Disclosed means its tough to be black mailed. But UNDISCLOSED is considered very black mailable and you get more than just your hands slapped.

But if it was undisclosed, then either the clearence crew didn't do their job and missed it (That would be boring) or Mr. Hooker was possibly offering someone more than press services. (now that could be interesting).

[Aabe]

Heh, heh, if "sick and wrong" was reason enough to deny access. I wonder how many current DC employees would loose access.

[Ddrak]

Last I looked, gay prostitution was illegal in almost all states. That will most certainly deny you a security clearance.

Dd

[Partha]

Just a few questions.

Why has the media not run with this if it is true?

Blogs can be first to scoop a story or fantasy land people, what is the record of this one?

I am painfully unaware of who in charge of what in the white house. Shouldn't it be easy to see who cleared this guy? Then we can track it up from there?

Why has the media not run with it? Couple of reasons. First, they're trained NOT to go after Bush. Second, no one wants another Rathergate. Third, until the prostitute angle broke, there was nothing there to sell papers.

As far as who cleared him, that USED to be the function of the White House Correspondents Association in conjuction with the White House. When Bush took office, the policy was changed to where the White House press secretary's office has sole credentialing power. So now this all drops in Scott McClellan's lap.

[Chants Evensong]

Unlike a lot of other conservatives, I think there is a there "there" to this story. But before I discuss that, there are some aspects of this sotry where there is no there "there".

First of all, it is relatively easy to get a daily pass.

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp ... 1000798573

Second of all, Gannon's being a probable gay prostitute is not that relevant in my opinion.

But what is really fascinating is Gannon's apparently central role in this Plame memo. This is a purported CIA memo which connects Plame in the decision making process of sending her husband, Joe Wilson, to Niger.

Here are some facts.

1. On October 28, 2003, Gannon interviews Wilson on the memo.
2. Wilson beleives that Gannon interviewed him less than a week before October 28, 2003.
3. On Ocotber 17, 2003, the WSJ came out with an article discussing the same memo and cites two people as a source.
4. Gannon continues to write about the memo as the months go by and claims to be intimately aware of the memo.
5. After Gannongate breaks, he really backs off the memo and his connection to it.
6. Other than the WSJ article, nearly all reference to the memo appears to be somehow connected to Gannon and Talon news.

Here is my working theory. The memo was a fake, possibly produced by the White House or fabricated by Talon News/Gannon. Gannon and someone else close to him sourced the WSJ article.

[Chants Evensong]

Correction:

It was not a CIA memo, but a Department of Defense memo.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dy ... ge=printer

New working theory: Memo is real, but Gannon simply lifted content from the WSJ article and confronted Wilson with it in his interview. Still, there may be a there "there."

[Relbeek Einre]

Chants, it may be relatively easy to get a press pass, but you still have to pass a background check -- one which Gannon would clearly fail.

[Chants Evensong]

Well. Regretfully, this Gannongate story is a dog. I had high hopes for some juicy Plame link, but there really is none.

Here is what happened.

Gannon joins Talon News and applies periodically for a "daily pass." During the press conferences, he draws the attention of some journalists by asking clearly politically motivated questions. These journalists do a story on him.

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washi ... ny?pg=full

The Bush administration has provided White House media credentials to a man who has virtually no journalistic background, asks softball questions to the president and his spokesman in the midst of contentious news conferences, and routinely reprints long passages verbatim from official press releases as original news articles on his website.

Now, the working theory of Gannongate is that the White House planted Gannon in the press pool by giving him a highly coveted "daily pass." Gannon, in turn, would ask soft-ball questions. This working theory is meant to dove-tail with the recent revelations that Bush paid a journalist to promote "No Child Left Behind."

However, as noted by E&P, these passes are notoriously easy to get, perhaps too easy.

http://199.249.170.220/eandp/search/art ... 1000798573

"Virtually no one is not allowed in," said Gwen Flanders, a USA Today editor who oversees the paper's White House reporters. "Getting that [day] pass is a simple matter of passing a background check and working for a news organization." But she added that there is not as much scrutiny of the legitimacy of the news organizations: "Who is in the position to say who is not legitimate?"

"Every day there are a whole bunch of people there I have never seen, and their questions make you wonder who they are representing," said Judy Keen, a USA Today White House reporter whose time there dates to 1992. "It is not as rigid and structured as people might think."

The Bush White House did not give Gannon a "coveted" daily press pass because these daily passess are not hard to get, and therefore, not coveted. Gannon simply got a daily pass because they were easy to get. And he asked political questions matching the administrations views because his views matched his own. In other words, his questions did not come from the administration; they came from his own political perspective.

Reporters are notorious for asking politically motivated questions at White House press conferences. Just look at Helen Thomas.

Next, we have the Plame link. Apparently, someone over at Kos determined [incorrectly] that someone exclusively leaked a sensitive memo to Gannon.

White House-credentialed fake news reporter "Jeff Gannon" from fake news agency "Talon News" was cited by the Washington Post as having the only access to an internal CIA memo that named Joseph Wilson's wife, Valerie Plame, as a covert CIA agent.

This determination was meant to show further evidence that Gannon was a plant for the Bush White House. It is also completely false.

First, here is the Washington Post article. No where does it state Gannon had exclusive access to this memo.

Second, it was the Wall Street Journal, and not Gannon, who broke the story.

http://www.cryptome.org/plame-memo.htm

Third, during Gannon's October 28, 2003 interview with WIlson, he asks the following question:

An internal government memo prepared by U.S. intelligence personnel details a meeting in early 2002 where your wife, a member of the agency for clandestine service working on Iraqi weapons issues, suggested that you could be sent to investigate the reports. Do you dispute that?

Here is an excerpt from the WSJ article. It is nearly identical to Gannon's question to Wilson:

The memo, prepared by U.S. intelligence personnel, details a meeting in early 2002 where CIA officer Valerie Plame and other intelligence officials gathered to brainstorm about how to verify reports that Iraq had sought uranium yellowcake from Niger.

Ms. Plame, a member of the agency's clandestine service working on Iraqi weapons issues, suggested at the meeting that her husband, Africa expert and former U.S. diplomat Joseph Wilson, could be sent to Niger to investigate the reports, according to current and former government officials familiar with the meeting at the CIA's Virginia headquarters. Soon after, midlevel CIA officials decided to send him, say intelligence officials.

It could be that Gannon was leaked the memo. But it is also possible that Gannon simply read the WSJ article and is quoting from it to frame his questions.

It is all set forth here at this blog, Justoneminute.

http://justoneminute.typepad.com/main/2 ... id_th.html

This is a horse that won't run.

Congratulations, leftist bloggers. You managed to out a conservative gay man and ruin the career of a rookie journalist simply becuase you didn't like his politics. Who is next? The assistant night manager over at the local 7-11?

[Relbeek Einre]

You know, you had me until your last line.

[Chants Evensong]

Relbeek noted:

Chants, it may be relatively easy to get a press pass, but you still have to pass a background check -- one which Gannon would clearly fail.

We don't know that he would have failed. We do not know the details of what sort of background check took place with these daily passes. We can engage in speculation and claim that Gannon would have failed the background check, but we simply do not know. All we do know is that Gannon got one. And if we beleive E&P, a lot of other "marginal" journalists did as well.

This lack of an adequate background check is, in my opinion, the only thing that Kos has exposed that is worth noting.

The background check for a daily pass was notoriously lax, and needs to be improved.

[Ddrak]

Chants has to gloss over a hell of a lot to come to the conclusion he did.

Dd