Says CBS Radio's Mark Knoller:

"It's a stunning and unsupportable statement," pronounced Mark Knoller, CBS Radio correspondent. "Transcripts of McClellan's press briefings provide more than ample evidence of the intense scrutiny imposed on the White House and its policies by members of the press. Most days, McClellan left the briefing room lectern positively spent by the pounding he faced from reporters."

See?  Tough, hard-hitting questions asked, job done.  What do you want, people?  Now David Corn at Mother Jones has an even more outraged piece defending his and other journalists' harsh interrogations of McClellan:

Some of us made the case when it counted--back in 2002 and 2003, before the war was launched, and in the following years--and we also maintained that the deceptive measures of the Bush administration extended beyond its PR campaign for war in Iraq. Yet back then McClellan was doing what he could to thwart such efforts. Now he says the media failed to confront the Bush administration forcefully enough. Which is true. But when reporters did try, McClellan put up a stonewall. So his complaint is like that of a thief who, after pulling off a caper, gripes that the incompetent police did not nab him. This is absurd. After all, before each press briefing, did McClellan go to the men's room and use a bar of soap to write on the mirror, "Stop me before I spin again"?

Corn then continues with examples of harsh questioning he had for McClellan during the days of the revelation of the Plame leak, before finishing thus:

I was a bit flummoxed by his response. How do you deal with someone who tells you that two plus two is not four and sticks to that position? McClellan was engaged in basic stonewalling: repeating an inaccurate assertion to fend off an inconvenient question. He did this throughout his stint as press secretary, saying whatever he could to protect the president and keep the truth under wraps. He's right these days to remind us that the media screwed up bigtime by not sufficiently scrutinizing White House claims about the purported treat from Iraq and the Iraq war. But as a fellow who made the job of reporters tougher by mangling and obscuring the truth he's in no position to accuse anyone of failing the nation.

Gee, David, I don't know.  Do you really want to know how you deal with with someone who tells you that two plus two is not four?  You call them an idiot or a liar or both--to their face and in print.  You call them out.  You refuse to report their assertions as if they had equal weight with the truth.  You refuse to give the issue the "balance" that has become the golden calf of the modern media.  Sometimes there's no way to present a story as "fair and balanced", because to report the story fairly would require you to report it entirely without balance.  And when that is the case--as it is so often with stories involving the lies of conservatives on issues from global warming to healthcare to foreign policy--then it is your obligation as a public servant and member of the fourth estate to choose <u>fairness over balance</u>. If you were 1st grade Johnny's teacher questioning Johnny about his homework error in stating that 2+2=5, you wouldn't report the story like this, would you?

The teacher as well as many leading scientists went on the record with their belief that 2+2=4.  However, Johnny insisted that 2+2 does equal 5, and that any assertions to the contrary were politically motivated attacks on his character.  When questioned further, Johnny deferred to his Daddy who helped him with his homework for further comment.

It hardly matters how forcefully Johnny was questioned, does it?  What matters is how forcefully obvious the reporting afterward makes clear that Johnny was lying and stonewalling.  In the end, that's the final product the public reads and consumes--not C-SPAN coverage of the actual briefing.  What should not be done is to give Johnny's statements equal weight with the teacher's in every press report.

And yet that's exactly what the press did--time and time again.  Take, for instance, this WaPo story about Bush's deflecting questions on Rove's involvement on the leak:

The White House has previously said Rove was "not involved" in the leak, but an internal Time magazine e-mail shows he mentioned that Wilson's wife was a CIA agent to Time reporter Matthew Cooper before she was publicly identified by name as an operative in a July 2003 op-ed piece by syndicated columnist Robert D. Novak. Rove, through his lawyer, has confirmed that he talked to Cooper but denied providing Plame's name or leaking classified information.

Asked today if he has spoken with Rove about the Plame matter and whether he believes Rove "acted improperly in talking about it with reporters," Bush said: "I have instructed every member of my staff to fully cooperate in this investigation. I also will not prejudge the investigation based on media reports. We're in the midst of an ongoing investigation, and I will be more than happy to comment further once the investigation is completed."

Pure balance.  Pure dispassion.  Pure journalism--or what passes for it these days.  But it's neither fair, nor the truth.  A journalist interested in fairness might have said shockingly <u>partisan-sounding</u> phrases like "Bush evaded the question, saying... or at the very least "Bush refused to confirm or deny his previous statements".  Phrases that might actually inform the reader when it's clear that bullshit is being perpetrated on their heretofore unsuspecting heads.

As Kagro X said, you're supposed to be angry about being lied to.  And you're supposed to show it.

Even if it means being more fair than balanced in your reporting.