Enter
go-to options to keep cronies and
constituents happy, have inflamed
the Beltway media into a cyclical
bout of elite whining. The White
House press corps buffeted Jay Carney with eight questions about the
tours at his March 13 briefing.
Keep in mind all members of the
White House press corps are ostensibly real-live human beings with
free will and the tacit permission to
ask Carney just about any question
they want in the world. Also keep in
mind it’s long been established that
the reason the tours were canceled
indefinitely is because it’s keeping
the Secret Service from having to
furlough more employees during
sequestration than they would have
otherwise been required to.
In a perfect world, we could
have a fully staffed Secret Service and White House tours. But
given the choice between making
tourists in D.C. participate in any
one of thousands of alternative local attractions, and furloughing
those who support the best security
force in the history of the Western
World, what would you choose?
The answer is somehow not as
obvious to Beltway reporters as it
should be. In a twist I can only describe as deeply strange, the press
has decided that pursuing the
LOOKING FORWARD
IN ANGST
HUFFINGTON
03.24.13
White House tours story is something approaching journalistic heroism. The galactically useless Washington Post editorial board says the
coverage of this event in the lives of
Beltway elites has earned the White
House a “proper comeuppance”
for sequestration “hostage taking,”
the idea being that Washington’s
shrewd reporters have seen through
Obama’s attempts to manufacture
pain through automatic spending
... The press has decided
that pursuing the White
House tours story
is something approaching
journalistic heroism.”
cuts and — by golly! — they are
not falling for it.
All of which would be really
neat-o, if it weren’t for the fact that
sequestration is causing normal human Americans actual, life-altering
pain. Beyond this cloistered Capitol Hill redoubt, local news teams
have picked up on these stories. We
have, ourselves, endeavored to hand
the reporters who cover the White
House a litany of scoops about the
effects sequestration is already having. If the goal here is simply to give