Thanks to some spectaular investigating work from the blogosphere, it appears that the White House repeatedly gave temporary press credentials to a "Jeff Gannon" from TalonNews, which is not a legitimate news service, but a mouthpiece of some Texas Republicans.
OK, so what, you may ask? It seems that Mr. "Gannon" is actually James D. Guckert, who has been connected to gay prostitution websites. John Aravosis at AMERICAblog has dug this up and provides the whole sordid story at "A Man Called Jeff".
This is a must-read. How did a male hooker get that kind of access? What, you mean Republicans aren't morally superior to Democrats, as they've been telling us for years?
2 comments:
Robert Oppenheimer, as he watched the nuclear fireball at the Trinity Test Sight on July 16, 1945, quoted the _Bhavagad Gita_: "Now I am become death, the destroyer of worlds." What has always interested me, however, was not Oppenheimer's sense of the poetically destructive. The man standing next to him, upon hearing Oppenheimer, said "Now we're all sons of bitches."
For one group, as Reinhold Niebuhr might call them, Children of Light to claim "moral superiority" over another is not only arrogant, it easily descends into dangerous. That danger, so ominously evident in the machinations of the modern Republican apparatus, allows for any method, any means and a resort to any hypocrisy to obtain, consolidate and, in the case of Mr. Gannon/Guckert, maintain their power. These people use opposition to "gay marriage" as a tactic to gain re-election, but utilize a gay man as one of their "journalistic" mouthpieces to further their message. It's not too far removed to quote my late father in saying that "fundamentalism is the antiChrist."
I continue to believe that we progressives have awakened (just) in time to muster enough courage to fight back. I also believe that the Bush people overplayed their hand with the Terri Schiavo travesty. What remains problematic, however, is that progressives are relatively unorganized and conditioned toward "bi-partisanship" or, if one will, "being nice." If we don't continually remind ourselves that bipartisanship is only a code word for ruthless attainment of power, we will continue to lose. And more Guckert/Gannons will get to lob softball questions at Presidential Press Conferences. God help us--
Robert Oppenheimer, as he watched the nuclear fireball at the Trinity Test Sight on July 16, 1945, quoted the _Bhavagad Gita_: "Now I am become death, the destroyer of worlds." What has always interested me, however, was not Oppenheimer's sense of the poetically destructive. The man standing next to him, upon hearing Oppenheimer, said "Now we're all sons of bitches."
For one group, as Reinhold Niebuhr might call them, Children of Light to claim "moral superiority" over another is not only arrogant, it easily descends into dangerous. That danger, so ominously evident in the machinations of the modern Republican apparatus, allows for any method, any means and a resort to any hypocrisy to obtain, consolidate and, in the case of Mr. Gannon/Guckert, maintain their power. These people use opposition to "gay marriage" as a tactic to gain re-election, but utilize a gay man as one of their "journalistic" mouthpieces to further their message. It's not too far removed to quote my late father in saying that "fundamentalism is the antiChrist."
I continue to believe that we progressives have awakened (just) in time to muster enough courage to fight back. I also believe that the Bush people overplayed their hand with the Terri Schiavo travesty. What remains problematic, however, is that progressives are relatively unorganized and conditioned toward "bi-partisanship" or, if one will, "being nice." If we don't continually remind ourselves that bipartisanship is only a code word for ruthless attainment of power, we will continue to lose. And more Guckert/Gannons will get to lob softball questions at Presidential Press Conferences. God help us--
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