BTC News gets within spitting distance of the President

I’m writing this in the basement of the White House, at an empty desk in the warren of cubbyholes used by members of the press in between events upstairs in the briefing room. I arrived shortly after 9 am, expecting to attend the scheduled 9:30 “gaggle” and then the televised 12:30 briefing with Scott McClellan, but I’ve just been informed that both have been canceled in favor of a press conference with President Bush at 10:15.

Getting into the White House went smoothly. I rang the bell at the northwest gate, said my name and organization into the intercom, was buzzed in, passed my press ID and driver’s license through the slot in a glass window, and was buzzed into the guardhouse. A guard gave me a White House pass and sent my briefcase through a scanner. I walked through a metal detector, was frisked, and was on my way. It took just a few minutes. While I was waiting for my briefcase, a woman breezed through and I followed her down the walk to the door that leads directly into the James Brady briefing room, which is in a narrow section of the White House connecting the central residence with the West Wing. As I approached the door, a tall, thin black man walked out. He had a scraggly salt-and-pepper beard and was wearing blue jeans, a bright blue shirt, an oversized down vest, and a massive dome of dreadlocks enclosed in a voluminous knit cap. Inside the briefing room, the seats were empty, but there were a few people wandering around, setting up cameras, etc. I sat down to read until a security guy asked everyone to leave the room for the “sweep.” Just past the door at the back of the room I found stairs leading to the basement, where I’m typing this on a laptop. My plan at the moment is, if I get to ask a question, to ask:

Mr. President, do you believe that a completely independent press that functions as a check on the government is essential to a healthy democracy, and do you therefore deplore the broadcast of government-produced videos on commercial news programs without disclosure of their source?

At 10:07 I go back upstairs. I sit down a couple of times, but each time I’m informed that I’ve taken someone else’s chair. I end up standing at the side of the room with several other journalists. There is only one chair empty now, right in the middle of the front row–Helen Thomas’s chair. I idly consider walking up there and taking it, but actually I have a quite visible position where I am, just 30 feet or so from the podium. Bush enters with no fanfare, stands at the podium, talks a bit about Social Security and Iraq, and then takes questions. There are about 12 rows of chairs, and Bush calls only on people in the first five rows, which are reserved for the well-established media. We peons sitting in back and standing at the side wave our arms fruitlessly at the end of each of his answers. Finally, another reporter asks my question, although with weaker language, asking only if the practice of broadcasting unattributed government-produced videos as news “raises ethical questions.” This is the only question that seems to make Bush at all uncomfortable. He dodges it the first go round, but the reporter persists two more times. After making a weak joke (“Oh, you mean a disclosure–’I'm George Bush and I–’”), in the end, Bush blames the local TV stations who broadcast the videos for failing to disclose their source.

Once my question had been used, I got another one ready. There had been talk earlier in the press conference about Paul Wolfowitz, whom Bush has just nominated to head the World Bank. I thought this was a good opening for:

Mr. President, a month before you invaded Iraq, Paul Wolfowitz told the House Budget Committee, speaking of the costs of the war, that, “There is a lot of money there. To assume that we are going to pay for it is just wrong.” Larry Lindsey, on the other hand, predicted that the war would cost $100 to $200 billion. Current estimates by the Congressional Budget Office for the 10-year price tag for Iraq range from $200 to $400 billion. Yet you fired Lindsey and are promoting Wolfowitz. Have both you and Secretary Wolfowitz divorced yourselves from reality?

However, at 11:05 Bush complained about the stuffy atmosphere in the briefing room and ended the press conference.

Helen Thomas never showed up. I’d been planning on introducing myself, since she’s the only White House reporter I recognize, having heard her introduce Susan McDougal at a book signing. Maybe next time.