B4
B
KLMNO Why we’ll miss Helen by Jon Ward
ran into Helen Thomas a few min- utes after she asked President Oba- ma a question about Afghanistan during the last White House press conference she’d ever attend. She was clearly in distress. It was May 27 and oppressively hot, and Helen, 89 years old, was hanging onto the arm of another re- porter for help as she walked in her slow shuffle along the White House’s North Lawn driveway. I fished an umbrella out of my back- pack to help shade Helen from the brutal sun and handed it to the reporter with her. I then walked to 17th Street to hail a cab to take her home. “You’re an absolute angel,” Helen said to me a few minutes later, as she sat down in the cab. I closed the door. It wasn’t until a few days ago, after the world learned of her comments that Is- rael should “get the hell out of Palestine” and that Jews should return to Poland and Germany, that it hit me. It was be- tween the time that I saw her struggling in the sun and when she finally sat down in the cab — precisely while I was hailing the taxi for her — that she had run into Rabbi David Nesenoff, who asked her the question that doomed her career: “Any comments on Israel?” The fact that Helen Thomas said what she did under pretty severe physical du- ress hardly excuses her offensive, anti- Semitic remarks, and the fact that she ap- peared to put her health in jeopardy sim- ply by showing up for a press conference on a hot day was just one more sign that
I Her tirade was outrageous, but her style is worth emulating
it was probably well past time for her to retire. In the aftermath of the outcry against her and her resignation, current and former White House reporters I spoke to agreed that Thomas no longer belonged in the modern White House press corps — because of her age, in part, but also because of how she blurred the line between reporting and opinion. “Helen had always been a tough, no- nonsense interrogator of presidents and press secretaries,” said Ann Compton, who has reported on the past six presi- dents for ABC News. “About a decade ago, when she shed her role as reporter and began a career at Hearst as an opinion columnist, Helen’s questions began to cross the line into advocacy.” I’d often had similar thoughts as I
watched Thomas do her thing from the front row of the White House briefing room, but I never felt I had much of a right to say anything about a woman who, whatever her views, was a legend to journalists and feminists. But now, as her departure sparks a battle over which news organization will squat on that cov- eted real estate, I can’t help but wonder: As zany and obvious as Thomas’s journal- ism-turned-advocacy had become, is there something the White House press corps could learn from her attitude? In particular, are we too deferential to the Obama White House and press secretary Robert Gibbs?
A couple of incidents come to mind. At
a briefing just one week after Obama’s in- auguration, for example, only two report- ers pressed Gibbs for details about the president’s knowledge of a drone strike in Pakistan — the first military action of the new administration — and they re- ceived no backing from colleagues in the room when he refused to discuss it. And more recently, in the June 3 briefing, Gibbs faced only a few scattered ques- tions on the announcement by Colorado Senate candidate Andrew Romanoff that a top White House official had dangled three job possibilities in front of him should he drop his challenge to the in- cumbent Democrat, Michael Bennet. I went to almost every briefing from the spring of 2007, when I started cover- ing the Bush administration for the Washington Times, until last fall, when I took my current job. I now go only occa- sionally, finding the sessions largely fu- tile. The benefit of not being there every day is that when I do show up, I care a lot less about asking an impertinent ques- tion that might irritate Gibbs. The down- side is that Gibbs has not called on me since I moved to my new employer. After Thomas’s resignation, I asked a number of White House reporters wheth- er they think the briefings are dynamic and tough enough on Gibbs. Fox News’s Major Garrett, who along with ABC’s Jake Tapper asks some of the best ques-
tions at the briefings, admitted that until the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico became a major story, the White House press corps (himself included) had often failed to adequately hold Gibbs’s feet to the fire. “There had long been an unnecessary
deference and sort of delicacy and deco- rum about waiting to be called upon, and rigidly adhering to what is essentially a manufactured process that Robert sought to achieve at the very beginning,” Garrett said. He added that the dynamic of the press room works best when re- porters are free to follow up and really push the press secretary, but “that has been extremely rare, for whatever rea- son.”
Garrett said things have improved in recent weeks, particularly with the press corps’s willingness to challenge Gibbs’s statements on the oil spill, and other White House correspondents I spoke to agreed. Still, Jon Stewart of “The Daily Show”
— America’s most popular press critic — used the occasion of Thomas’s retire- ment last week to ridicule the softball questions that White House reporters ask press secretaries. “Are you journal- ists, or are you rushing a sorority?” Stew- art asked. Thomas shared this adversarial men-
tality, captured in her final question to Obama: “Mr. President, when are you go- ing to get out of Afghanistan? Why are we
SUNDAY, JUNE 13, 2010
continuing to kill and die there? What is the real excuse? And don’t give us this Bushism, if we don’t go there, they’ll all come here.” It was a continuation of her persistent questions to President George W. Bush and his press secretaries on the Iraq war. “Two million Iraqis have fled their coun- try as refugees. Two million more are dis- placed. Thousands and thousands are dead. Don’t you understand, you brought the al-Qaeda into Iraq,” she berated Bush at a press conference in July 2007. Few reporters, if any, could get away with the kind of belligerence that Thom- as displayed toward presidents and press secretaries on a regular basis. Even Presi- dent John Kennedy once joked that “Helen would be a nice girl if she’d ever get rid of that pad and pencil.” As one White House reporter put it to me, there are some journalists who work on pick-ax crews, hammering away at the administration with tough articles that pull no punches and go after shortcom- ings and possible wrongdoing, and then there are the clean-up crews, who pick through the resulting rubble and explain and put into context the president’s ac- tions. We need them both. Helen Thomas, no doubt, was a proud member of the pick- ax crew. “What the hell do they think we are, puppets?” she said of the White House a year ago. “. . . They are our public servants. We pay them.”
Jon Ward is a senior reporter for the Daily Caller. He covered the George W. Bush and Obama White House for the Washington Times.
Was it
something I said
“Tell [Israel] to get the hell out of Palestine. . . . Remember, these people are occupied, and it’s their land, not Germany’s, not Poland’s. They should go home . . . Poland, Germany and America and everywhere else.”
These few words were all it took to end the career of White House correspondent Helen Thomas after fi ve decades covering presidents from John Kennedy to Barack Obama. Thomas is hardly the only fi gure undone by a spectacularly ill-advised, tone-deaf, insulting or untrue remark. But not all career-defi ning lines are necessarily career-enders. Some offenders bounce back, others rehabilitate themselves over time, others slowly disappear — and none is ever quite the same.
“This fellow here, over here with the yellow shirt, macaca, or whatever his name is. He’s with my opponent. . . . Let’s give a welcome to macaca, here. Welcome to America and the real world of Virginia.”
— Sen. George Allen (R-Va.) at a 2006
campaign rally in Breaks, Va., referring to S.R. Sidarth, an Indian American Democratic volunteer.
“Mr. Reagan will raise taxes, and so will I. He won’t tell you. I just did.”
— Walter Mondale, accepting the 1984 Democratic presidential nomination.
“As opposed to standing outside Fenway Park? In the cold? Shaking hands?”
— Martha Coakley, U.S. Senate candidate from Massachusetts, speaking in January about Scott Brown’s populist campaign.
“That’s some rough girls from Rutgers. Man, they got tattoos and . . . that’s some nappy-headed hos.”
— Radio host Don Imus on Rutgers University’s women’s basketball team in 2007.
“After extensive additional interviews, I no longer have the confi dence in these documents that would allow us to continue vouching for them journalistically.”
— Dan Rather, retracting a 2004 CBS News story about President George W. Bush’s National Guard service.
“I’m not here to talk about the past.”
— Baseball star Mark McGwire, refusing to answer questions from Congress in 2005 about steroid use in Major League Baseball.
“When Strom Thurmond ran for president, we voted for him. We’re proud of it. And if the rest of the country had followed our lead, we wouldn’t have had all these problems over the years, either.”
— Sen. Trent Lott (R-Miss.), praising the career of onetime segregationist Strom Thurmond in 2002.
“I know that it’s not possible that this child could be mine.”
— John Edwards, denying paternity of mistress Rielle Hunter’s daughter in 2008. He later said he was the father.
“I’d like my life back.”
— BP chief executive Tony Hayward, speaking May 30 about the gulf oil spill.
“And we’re going to South Dakota and Oregon and Washington and Michigan, and then we’re going to Washington, D.C., to take back the White House! Yeah!”
— Howard Dean, after losing the Iowa caucuses in 2004. “Don’t worry, it’s a slam-dunk.”
— CIA Director George Tenet, reassuring President George W. Bush in 2002 on the case for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.
“They may not have some of the necessities to be, let’s say, a fi eld manager, or, perhaps, a general manager. . . . But they are outstanding athletes, very God-gifted and wonderful people.”
— Al Campanis, general manager of the Los
Angeles Dodgers, explaining in 1987 to “Nightline” why Major League Baseball had so few black managers.
“There is no Soviet domination of Eastern Europe.”
— President Gerald Ford, in a 1976 presidential debate with Jimmy Carter.
“I actually did vote for the $87 billion before I voted against it.”
— Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) on his voting record on Iraq war funding, during the 2004 presidential campaign.
“Who am I? Why am I here?”
— Adm. James Stockdale, Ross Perot’s running mate, in the 1992 vice presidential debate.
“I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinksy.”
— President Bill Clinton in 1998, denying his relationship with White House intern Monica Lewinsky.
“Follow me around. I don’t care. I’m serious. If anybody wants to put a tail on me, go ahead. They’ll be very bored.”
— Democratic presidential hopeful Gary Hart, daring reporters in 1987 to investigate his alleged extramarital affairs.
“Bitch set me up.”
— Washington Mayor Marion Barry in 1990, after the FBI stormed a hotel suite where he was smoking crack with a girlfriend-turned-
informant.
“Every statement I make today is backed up by sources, solid sources. These are not assertions. What we are giving you are facts and conclusions based on solid intelligence.”
— Secretary of State Colin Powell, addressing the United Nations on Iraqi
weapons programs in 2003.
“She is a monster, too — that is off the record — she is stooping to anything.”
— Samantha Power, an adviser to then-presidential candidate Barack Obama, on
Hillary Clinton in 2008.
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91 |
Page 92 |
Page 93 |
Page 94 |
Page 95 |
Page 96 |
Page 97 |
Page 98 |
Page 99 |
Page 100 |
Page 101 |
Page 102 |
Page 103 |
Page 104 |
Page 105 |
Page 106 |
Page 107 |
Page 108 |
Page 109 |
Page 110 |
Page 111 |
Page 112 |
Page 113 |
Page 114 |
Page 115 |
Page 116 |
Page 117 |
Page 118 |
Page 119 |
Page 120 |
Page 121 |
Page 122 |
Page 123 |
Page 124 |
Page 125 |
Page 126 |
Page 127 |
Page 128 |
Page 129 |
Page 130 |
Page 131 |
Page 132 |
Page 133 |
Page 134 |
Page 135 |
Page 136 |
Page 137 |
Page 138 |
Page 139 |
Page 140 |
Page 141 |
Page 142 |
Page 143 |
Page 144 |
Page 145 |
Page 146 |
Page 147 |
Page 148 |
Page 149 |
Page 150 |
Page 151 |
Page 152 |
Page 153 |
Page 154 |
Page 155 |
Page 156 |
Page 157 |
Page 158