Wow! The Strib enteres the Gannon/guckert story with an incredulous editorial claiming that Gannon, is conservative and GAY and therefore incapable of being a journalist and that this is a major scandal for the administration. Yet no mention on Eason Jordan and his resignation or on his comments.

I am slightly confused -- in the editorial, his homosexual connections are used to show how awful he is, yet nearly every other day the Strib condemns conservatives for their wicked desires to suppress and torture those living alternate lifestyles.

It has less to do with the fact he is gay, and more to do with the fact that he is a gay PROSTITUTE. There is a difference, even if you choose to ignore it. Prostitution is not an issue of someone's "private" life. It is a public concern... especially when advertised all over the internet.

It is not like blogger snuck into the guys bedroom and found a stash of gay porn under his mattress. He was advertising his services all over the internet. Some of his profiles are still active today.

Mitch,

I don't have time to fully engage you on the Gannon (GOP activist plant given daily passes for 2 years, avoiding full background check, in order to ask factually inaccurate soft-ball questions, in violation of White House press rules) issue, but as for Gannon's personal life . . .

. . . being a prostitute is illegal.

It's not that Gannon is gay, it's that he's an on-going criminal being given preferential access to the White House and the President.

The people behind the Patriot Act oughta be a bit more careful.
/jc

Mitch, I know you in right blogosphere were deeply troubled by Eason Jordan and it was a really big deal, but it didn't make a ripple on the left--and not because we were pro-Jordan. As I note on my blog, CNN is hardly beloved by the left. Jordan's firing was met primarily with yawns.

Gannon, however, is another piece in a sting of evidence that the White House is attempting to influence debate using propagandistic tactics (cf. Karen Ryan, Armstrong Williams, Sioux Falls, SD). That's the reason we care. I'm far more concerned about the White House using chicanery to move the debate than what some idiot exec from a crappy news outlet does.

We appreciate your strong moral principals in keeping out anyone with a stain or sin upon them from asking questions of our President. We look forward to your moral policing of the rest of the White House press pool. Please post here as soon as possible, thank you.

Slash:

Had he ever been convicted of prostitution?

I'm not asking to be obtuse. What about Gannon/Guckert's "record" as a male hooker could be reasonably expected to turn up on a *press* background check?

If he'd not been arrested, and if the Secret Service doesn't routinely try to cross-reference day-pass applicants against pr0n site owners, what's going to jump out on a background check?

Slash, are you saying that the government should know about crimes for which no accusation or charges, much less convictions, exist?

Wasn't that the kind of thing that had you all bunged about Ashkkkroft?

WHAT?? Propagandistic tactics are being used by the WHITE HOUSE?? Wow! Does Henry Waxman know about this?? This outrage must be investigated!

We must not tolerate chicanery, especially in the Oval Office, as it offends our deepest moral sensibilities. Heavens!! Someone even let a homosexual into a press conference!! An illegal gay prostitute, apparently, probably a practioner of unmentionable sexual depravity, was allowed not only onto White House grounds, but to even ask a question!! Is there no end to this madness??

It's one thing to have photo-ops with communist gunrunners and tea and cookies with cocaine dealers and elite terrorists, and, since its none of our business, serial fellatio and semen stains in the Oval Office is all very well and good -- because it's just about sex-- but an ILLEGAL homosexual prostitute in a press conference?? Now it's gone too far!!!

Start the revolution!! To the ramparts, NOW!! Down with chicanery!! Down with propagandistic tactics!! Down with illegal homosexual prostitutes asking questions!

YEEAAAAAAAAARGHHH!!!!!!

Mitch,

You asked:

"Had he ever been convicted of prostitution?
I'm not asking to be obtuse. What about Gannon/Guckert's "record" as a male hooker could be reasonably expected to turn up on a *press* background check?"

As I understand it, his porn sites and prostitution ads are on the web and were discovered with a simple Google search. McClellan, and I believe also Fleischer before him, have confirmed that they were aware of his true name (under which the porn/prostitution ads were run).

If a couple liberal blogs were able to find out this guy's real story so easily, I don't expect it's too much to expect of the White House before they start handing out daily passes to this guy for two years.

Someone made a conscious decision to let this guy in violation of White House rules.
/jc

Just to follow up, Slash; as far as you know, had Guckert ever been arrested? Charged? Charged with what, a misdemeanor or a felony?

Ever convicted?

You DO know the difference between a Day Pass and a permanent ("Hard") pass, right? Do you know the difference in the background checks involved? What trips the alarm on a day pass - charges, misdemeanors, felonies - what?

Had Guckert done ANYTHING that would have turned up on the radar of a non-police state?

Mitch-
This is from his hometown newspaper- http://www.delawareonline.com/newsjournal/local/2005/02/12discreditedrepo.html

"Guckert/Gannon failed to pay Delaware more than $20,700 in personal state income tax from 1991 through 1994, according to documents filed in Superior Court in Wilmington."

"According to court records, Guckert owed $9,484 in taxes; $7,697.69 in fines and $3,560.71 in interest."

Now, I am not sure someone should be banned from the White House because they have evaded taxes, but it does send up a red flag.

Oops, sorry. The first quotation should read:

"James D. Guckert, who reported under the pseudonym Jeff Gannon, failed to pay Delaware more than $20,700 in personal state income tax from 1991 through 1994, according to documents filed in Superior Court in Wilmington."

Oops - my last one crossed yours in the mail.

"White House Rules" - do they, to the best of your knowledge, involve googling every applicant for a Day Pass for participation in crimes, albeit victimless ones?

Then shouldn't they also be making them take a whiz test for weed?

Isn't the Secret Service much better used looking out for violence crime records? Because I'm fairly sure that's more important, no?

Also, since you yourself tied this to "Homeland Security" a few comments back - what exactly IS the tie between gay prostitution and terrorism

Mitch-
Sadly, the White House has not been very forthcoming in what they did and did not know about Guckert when they gave him day passes. They have also not been very forthcoming about what his background check consisted of. Currently there are several FOIA requests waiting responses to those issues.

But the other question that is raised is... after two years of day passes... why was he never forced to go through the long process of hard-pass approval that most other journalists go through to gain access to the White House with a rigorous background check?

Did the White House know about his prostitution past or his tax-evasion? The White House has not yet definitively answered.

According to Editor and Publisher:

"He (Ari Fleischer) said he did not know the method the White House Press Office used to keep records of those, like Guckert, who received daily press passes. White House Press Office officials did not respond to several requests today for such information."

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1000807754

"But the other question that is raised is... after two years of day passes... why was he never forced to go through the long process of hard-pass approval that most other journalists go through to gain access to the White House with a rigorous background check?"

Because to the best of my knowledge, entree to that process is controlled by the pool, not by the White House.

Off to a meeting, haven't the time to look it up, but I will in a bit...

The outrage is soaring to unbelievable heights!

Not only is there an illegal homosexual prostitute in our midst asking questions, but it's an illegal homosexual prostitute asking questions who didn't pay enough income taxes!! Meanwhile, liberal blogs using Google have uncovered the "real story" of the illegal homosexual prostitute asking questions and owing taxes to reveal the inadequacy of White House security background checks --in an ongoing effort, no doubt, to practice propagandistic tactics and chicanery in a conscious decision to violate White House rules. Why, this is scandalous!

And ridiculous. The only people who get exhaustive background checks to enter the White House (it belongs to us, afterall, not the occupants) are those who work there or on the grounds. Everybody else gets cursory checks for warrants and convictions. Warrants are referred to the jurisdiction involved and convictions are only prohibitive if they involve firearms and felony assault. White House security, if you recall, was run by a former bar bouncer in the Clinton Administration. Security is probably a whole lot better now, but the U.S. Constitution is still the law of the land and not even the White House has the right to "investigate" an individual without a warrant signed by a judge.

Any suggestion to the contrary is a delusion. But what is really ironic is the only thing driving this dead "story" is the puerile fascination with the idea that a presumably homosexual conservative asked the president a question framed in such a way as to derogate Democrats, namely, that they are "divorced from reality," which is everywhere very much in evidence as indeed it is here.

The Left in this country ran a disengenous candidate in a campaign based on myths about his 4-month tour in Vietnam and tried to use forged documents to impugn the integrity of the incumbent. The Left deservedly lost the election in the largest repudiation of a candidate in U.S. history. Now it descends voraciously on some half-wit reporter for his sexual and political orientation as if crucial principles of government and national security were involved. Meanwhile, Howard Dean has become the New Leader, having avowed his hatred of half the country and, presumably, illegal homosexual prostitutes who may or may not owe the State of Delaware back taxes. What a joke.

Send in the clowns.

Mitch,

You repeated your earlier question:

"Just to follow up, Slash; as far as you know, had Guckert ever been arrested? Charged? Charged with what, a misdemeanor or a felony?
Ever convicted?
You DO know the difference between a Day Pass and a permanent ("Hard") pass, right? Do you know the difference in the background checks involved? What trips the alarm on a day pass - charges, misdemeanors, felonies - what?
Had Guckert done ANYTHING that would have turned up on the radar of a non-police state?"

Yes.

Besides the tax fines noted above, he was advertising his prostitution services under his real name on various web sites. McClellan (but not Fleischer, who I mistakenly cited above) has admitted knowing Gannon's real name. Even to get a day pass, you have to establish that you are a real reporter from a real news source. That's why Gannon was turned down for press credentials from Capitol Hill.

I think a simple Google search would be expected to check the bona fides of someone claiming to be a reporter. A simple Google search would have (and did) turn up Gannon's public advertisments of himself for sexual services. That's a crime. Sure, we can't put a guy in jail before he's convicted of a crime, but is that the same standard of proof you require before granting someone access to the White House and Presidential press conferences??

No police state tactics necessary.

Fleischer says that he was aware that Tallon was a GOP front and refused to call on Gannon for that reason. [Of couse, there's evidence from the press transcripts and Gannon's own web accounts that he was in the press room BEFORE Tallon was ever created.] They knew who Gannon was.

And yet they bent the rules to let him in.

Either they failed to do even the most basic credential check on this guy (in which case they'er incompetent), or they knew exactly who and what he was and let him in anyway.

All the evidence points to the latter.
/jc

"I think a simple Google search would be expected to check the bona fides of someone claiming to be a reporter. A simple Google search would have (and did) turn up Gannon's public advertisments of himself for sexual services. "

Right, but does the Secret Service do this as a matter of course?

We've established that wide swathes of government and the media have no clue how to google. I have no idea whether cursory googling is part of teh vetting process for day passes. It wouldn't surprise me if it's not. You assume it is; I think it's faulty.

How about the White House press office that credentials people to get in the press room?

Fleischer says that he stopped calling on Gannon because he knew that Talon was a GOP run site.

White House press office rules require that a person be an actual journalist from a regularly publishing news source. Don't you think that requires some verification? Or is it sufficient if I show up tomorrow and announce I'm a reporter for a web newspaper, say?

In fact, press transcripts now show that Gannone was granted press passes a month BEFORE Talon was even created. So at that time, they were giving a press pass to a non-reporter under a fake name without even a fake news site.

You don't think the White House should be a little more careful?
/jc

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