Lawmakers press White House on "Gannon"

[jswordy]

I know there is already another "Gannon" thread, but thought this worthy of a new one.
:shrug:

WASHINGTON -- With the mystery of "Jeff Gannon" deepening, Rep. Louise Slaughter, D-N.Y., yesterday renewed her call for the White House to explain its relationship with a conservative ex-reporter linked to an online gay escort service.

Slaughter said the relationship between the White House press office and "Gannon," whose real name is James Dale Guckert, was "anything but typical." The White House should "stop the stonewalling and come clean," she added, following up on her initial request a week ago.


http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/212561_gannon18.html

[kweerwolf]

1. "Stonewalling"? LOL!

What an odd choice of words. I wonder if Slaughter chose that word intentionally since "stonewall" is a word closely linked to the gay movement because the riots at the Stonewall Inn in New York City back in 1969 is considered the birth of the modern gay rights movement. Perhaps she was needling the White House for it's connection to a gay escort service with her remarks.

[stevedeshazer]

3. "Stonewalling" is what Nixon was accused of doing in 1974

In this connotation, it means not providing information by stalling or obfuscating, rather than the "stonewall" riots you refer to.

[ginnyinWI]

34. oh please let it be so for Bush--hang it all on him!

That guy deserves ever so much more to be done to him than Nixon ever did! And that is saying a lot! He needs a "watergate"--only SuperSize it!

[mcg]

42. 'stonewall' entry at dictionary.com

http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=stonewall

“I want you to stonewall it, let them plead the Fifth Amendment” (Richard M. Nixon).

[silvermachine]

7. LOL

That one went right by me! Excellent article all 'round.

[ausiedownunderground]

41. Go Slaughter!!!!!!!!!!!

If this Slaughter women is starting to get some "guts" then the "Liberal" Blogger machine needs to get behind her. We need to provide her with info!!! as well as the British Press journalist guy!!! Lets get this potential "Treason" case GLOBAL! I know in Capitalist Individual America information is money, personnel money, so it is important to try and make a "buck" out of what you've found out, but in this case we are going to try and "take down" The Pilsbury Doughboy himself!!! And that is dangerous! This guy is a major cornerstone of "The Bush Gang". Doing it individually could lead to your "surprise disappearance"!!! Take note AmericaBlog!!!!

[wishlist]

2. Dems need to start asking tough questions on TV shows about his pay

Since Gannon has had a pervasive role in spreading RW propaganda over the past couple of years and has been blatantly selling himself in other ways, Democrats ought to be on TV asking whether he received any public payola from this Administration either directly or indirectly to reward him for his propaganda efforts. I think we taxpayers are entitled to know when and how our tax dollars are spent on propaganda.

[Skidmore]

4. I'd be curious to know what his

standard of living is since he was no major reporter or personality. How lavishly does this guy live? Has anyone explored how his standard of living matches up to the status of his personna?

[calimary]

11. I would love to see them say something like this:

One would think the wrong-wing would APPLAUD any efforts to wipe out a "heinous gay scourge." (Maybe we should start another squeeze play...)

Imagine Howard Dean or someone else prominent and outspoken - announcing something like:

"I applaud the loud and ardent efforts of the conservatives and republi-CONS in Congress and the media who are rising to the defense of the White House insider who went by the name of "Jeff Gannon." I'm pleased to see they're coming around to a more tolerant attitude, and backing off their persecution of the gay lifestyle and gay internet commerce efforts. It's encouraging to see them defend this man and his many varied, creative and enterprising efforts to make a living. Perhaps they're finally rediscovering the 'compassionate conservatism' they promised more than five years ago."

Would that be sweet or what?

REASONING: That might well have all the Pat Buchanans and limbaughs and guy-whose-name-rhymes-with-vanity and the other holier-than-thou apologists and Pharisees suffering from an outbreak of exploding heads. So to speak. It would certainly help back them into a corner. SO.....I thought you condemned and abhored the gay lifestyle. You said it was ungodly. Now, you're defending one of its most prominent practitioners. GOOD FOR YOU! After all, the BIBLE says "judge not, lest ye be judged..."

And the WAY it's worded can be another knife stuck in and twisted. If you just have a LEEEEEEETLE bit of fun with it, they wind up looking even worse.

[Laurab]

31. Oh, that would be great

maybe we should start a letter writing campaign applauding them? I mean, their acceptance of all these things is a great step for them - surely they should be commended & loudly!

[nolabels]

12. Yea, that 's a good question, why are they not asking it yet

Is he a full fledged credentialed whore or just a novice trying to build his resume? Taxpayers should at least expect professionalism when paying for such services.

[sandnsea]

36. I've been asking

Since Feb 9, I've been asking. Everybody else wanted to follow the gay stuff and Plame.

[rodeodance]

37. the gay prostitute stuff is more inticing you know--but seems to be going

NOwhere (made a few rumbles only) even if the Pres. who wears religion on his sleeve--
If the WH paid him--now that would make a splash!!
But how to find out about his spending habits, or where he gets his money? A blogger?

[Norquist Nemesis]

5. I'm beginning to wonder just how deep this goes

Thinking...speculating...

You know those money-handling problems DeLay is having? Could there be ties with that mis-handling of money in Texas and the Texas activist that funded the Talon/GOPUSA websites?

(Now we have a "some say this goes very deep from the WH and throughout the GOP")

[Les BOOGIE]

10. story in today's Houston Chronicle about TX connection but no

mention of delay

try chron.com

[mountebank]

13. Or link it to the gay escort scandal that was quickly quashed in '89.

Check out Minstrel Boy's post in GD:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=3085974&mesg_id=3085974

[calimary]

14. Hey, as they say on NPR - "All Things Considered..."

Who's to say it DOESN'T go that deep and that wide? Especially since, the more you dig into this, the more you find so many of these same names intertwined. People working together now or who did so in the past, in business together, in bed together (husbands and wives) and where they're working now and their many dangerous liaisons and who they've been fundraising with and whose checks they're cashing and where their money's coming from and who's sending them money and bankrolling who/what else and ...

Reminds me of those National Geographic or Animal Planet specials wherein you see the boa constrictor wrapped around itself and its prey, coiled over and under and around every which-a-way.

It just goes ON AND ON. What a tangled web we weave...

[Karmadillo]

6. What did the Indumbent know and when did he know it?

n/t

[Dhalgren]

8. I'm just waiting for the cum-stained dog-collar...

[chelsea0011]

9. NYT Dowd had interesting column a couple days ago

she talked about how hard it was to get WH press pass even though she has covered two presidents including Bush 1. When they finally agreed to renew her pass privileges she was told it would take months to do the security check. The WH is corrupt. WAKE UP MEDIA!!!!!!!!!

[CONN]

30. Sex, Lies, and Jeff Gannon...

Check this report by Justin Raimondo:
http://www.antiwar.com/justin/?articleid=4879

[keopeli]

15. Kicked to combine duplicate threads N/T

[Goathead]

16. Lawmaker presses White House on 'Jeff Gannon'

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/212561_gannon18.html

WASHINGTON -- With the mystery of "Jeff Gannon" deepening, Rep. Louise Slaughter, D-N.Y., yesterday renewed her call for the White House to explain its relationship with a conservative ex-reporter linked to an online gay escort service.

Don't know if this is a dupe or not. Finally, somebody is doing some digging. Go Slaughter!

[itzamirakul]

17. Let's see how long the White House and the MSM

will just completely ignore her.

The rightwing pundits are already defending Gannon and saying that the left is causing him to lose his income/livlihood...poor guy.

They give inane, senseless reponses to any comparisons to Dan Rather's forced retirement.

What about Brit Hume? Is this pompadoured piggly-wit just going to be able to mis-quote FDR in order to further the GOP agenda and get away with it? Where's our outrage?

[EFerrari]

19. I thought all Talon reporters were volunteers? n/t

[itzamirakul]

20. Where did you get that info?

Someone was paying the little squirt...paid propaganda is what Gannon has been dishing out. The website for Talon News can be traced back to Texas connections with the
White House.

And what is so pathetic is that the right wing red-voting supporters of Bush are so heady with victory that they can't even see that they are swallowing his shit by the bucketloads, put out there by fake news pundits like Gannon. One thing is for sure...you cannot shame people who have no shame.

[EFerrari]

27. I've read so much, it's hard to remember. But the last place

I saw it mentioned was either in the Olbermann blog or in WaPo or NYT this morning. See if I can check.

My point would be, were I able to track this down, that someone was paying this guy but not for fake journalism. So, if he quit a volunteer job, it doesn't endanger his livelihood.

Lemme see what can be found.

[rodeodance]

38. thanks for your time in this effort

[EFerrari]

28. Froomkin's col: Scandal that keeps on giving

quoting a Salon article:

Eric Boehlert in Salon writes: "Thanks to the continued digging by online sleuths, there's now documented evidence that Guckert attended White House briefings as early as February 2003. Guckert, using his alias 'Jeff Gannon,' once boasted online about asking then-White House press secretary Ari Fleischer a question at the Feb. 28, 2003, briefing. The date is significant because in order to receive a White House press pass, Guckert would have needed to prove that he worked for a news organization that, in the words of White House press secretary Scott McClellan, 'published regularly,' in itself an extraordinarily low threshold. Critics have charged that while Talon News may publish regularly, it boasts ** a nearly all-volunteer news team that includes not a single person with actual journalism experience.** (The team does, though, have quite a bit of experience working on Republican campaigns.) In other words, the outfit is not legitimate or independent, two criteria often used in Washington to receive press credentials.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A35093-2005Feb18.html

[EFerrari]

39. New source on volunteer status from NYT

(I guess that means, don't forget your pillar of salt )

http://nytimes.com/2005/02/20/national/20gannon.html

[calimary]

22. One would think the wrong-wing would APPLAUD any efforts

to wipe out a "heinous gay scourge." Maybe we should start another squeeze play...

Imagine Howard Dean or someone else prominent and outspoken - announcing something like:

"I applaud the loud and ardent efforts of the conservatives and republi-CONS in Congress and the media who are rising to the defense of the White House insider who went by the name of "Jeff Gannon." I'm pleased to see they're coming around to a more tolerant attitude, and backing off their persecution of the gay lifestyle and gay internet commerce efforts. It's encouraging to see them defend this man and his many varied and creative and enterprising efforts to make a living. Perhaps they're finally rediscovering the 'compassionate conservatism' they promised more than five years ago."


Would that be sweet or what?

That might well have all the Pat Buchanans and limbaughs and guy-whose-name-rhymes-with-vanity and the other holier-than-thou apologists and Pharisees suffering from an outbreak of exploding heads. So to speak. It would certainly help back them into a corner. SO.....I thought you condemned and abhored the gay lifestyle. You said it was ungodly. Now, you're defending one of its most prominent practitioners. GOOD FOR YOU! After all, the BIBLE says "judge not, lest ye be judged..."

And the WAY it's worded can be another knife stuck in and twisted. If you just have a LEEEEEEETLE bit of fun with it, they wind up looking even worse.

[Skittles]

18. LISTEN UP FREEPERS: THIS IS A *REAL* SCANDAL

not like all the made-up shit you went after Clinton for - now ask your tiny little pinhead minds WHY ISN'T THIS ALL OVER THE "LIBERAL MEDIA" 24x7 ???????????????????????????????????

[Griffy]

24. Like talking to a dog.... blah blah freeper blah blah... they're clueless!

when you read what they write, you know they are ill informed, brainwashed or just plain dumb. We should mostly ignore them and work to raise awareness of the propaganda going on.. this will bring the house of bush down! without the noise machine they are helpless!

[merwin]

21. Hey! Seattle PI is MSM :-)

[Zan_of_Texas]

23. So is the Houston Chronicle.

Covered it today. Front page.

They went to the Houston angle, which is the owner of GOPUSA, Bobby Eberle. (PS I tipped them of that, and sent them a bunch of blogged research from Kos several days ago.)

I think they missed most of the main points of the story, but at least it's a start.


Web sites operator stirs up politics, journalism debate

Scandal places his Pearland-based Internet enterprise under a microscope

By RACHEL GRAVES
Copyright 2005 Houston Chronicle
Feb. 18, 2005, 12:59AM
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/front/3045613

(PHOTO online: Bobby Eberle, former aerospace engineer, operates two conservative Web sites out of his home in Pearland)

Until employing a reporter who used a fake name to gain access to the White House and insult Democrats during a nationally televised briefing, Bobby Eberle managed to keep a low profile while amassing a conservative Internet following.

Though Eberle was a delegate to the Republican National Convention in 2000, Texas Republican officials this week declined to talk about him and even denied knowing him.

But Eberle - a former aerospace engineer who has never contributed to a political candidate and works out of his $225,000 home in a sprawling Pearland subdivision of new, color-coordinated burgundy and beige brick houses - finds himself a key player in a tawdry scandal that has captivated Washington. Eberle is the owner, president and CEO of two Web sites, the openly partisan GOPUSA {gopusa.com <http://gopusa.com>} and what he says is a nonpartisan news organization, Talon News {talonnews.com <http://talonnews.com>}.

The sites hit the national radar when Talon's Washington bureau chief, going by the name Jeff Gannon, asked President Bush during a White House briefing last month about working with Democrats, whom he described as "divorced from reality."

MORE

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

25. The question is, what is the source of funding for GOPUSA and Talon?

Eberle? Fat Cat GOP contributors? US Taxpayer dollars?

[b...]

26. how could we find out? n/t

[progressivebydesign]

29. I remember researching them in the thick of Rathergate...

.. I'll try to remember what I found out, or point you in the right direction. Often.. a meandering Google search is your best bet.

I'm good at this type of research.. here's how. Start with the GOPUSA site and read thru some different pages, find a few names, etc.. then follow the trail and keep going in a few directions from where you started. Also.. the creative use of phrases is a winner on the search engines. try: gopusa donor eberle

[understandinglife]

32. When CBS smells blood in the water -- and, yes they definitely do....

....Rove, shrubber and the neoCONsters should begin hiring lawyers (or moving "off shore").

Not only that, but the boardroom dudes at CBS may be seeing some mega$$$$ in turning gagman, rover and the $hrubber into a 24/7 feeding frenzy that would even rival a 'survivor series' starring S Peterson, Ms Lewinsky, Janet 'the oops' Jackson and her brother 'silicon nose' Jackson.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.ph...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.ph...


Peace.


"DO YOU ENJOY BEING A CITIZEN OF THE ROGUE SUPER_POWER?"

[DU GrovelBot]

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[Why Syzygy]

35. hehe

now he's an 'ex' reporter.
Well he never reported anything other than the Gop talking points.

I think we are getting our hopes up that the other 48% of America will wake up and give a damn.

However, SALUTE to Rep. Slaughter.
And any others who will badger the criminal justice system that has taken hold of OUR COUNTRY ..
..... until we get it back.

Come on home mamma.

[LibertyorDeath]

40. .

:kick::kick::kick: