Press Sick Of Obama's Fake Town Hall Meetings

Hand picked audience and hand picked questions... So much for openness in the white house... http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2009/07/01/cbs_helen_thomas_challenge_gibbs_on_controlled_town_hall_meeting.html

I saw this on the news this morning. I loved it!
I also feel quite sure that one will not see this much if any at all on the main stream "Obama the Great" media " outlets, otherwise known as NBC,CBS, ABC.
Just my opinion but when a pro dem/pro iberal like Helen Thomas calls them out then there is something to it.
Only the ones wearing "Barack" shaded glasses and drinking liberal kool aid failed to see the media bias long befor now.

More staged pressers... This guy getting worse than Clinton with his phoniness. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4NBj-vpDoe4

Lucas McCain wrote:

More staged pressers... This guy getting worse than Clinton with his phoniness. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4NBj-vpDoe4

That would depend on what your definittion of :"is"....."is".

Wow, I guess you missed the couple of press conferences that Bush did where he had people sitting in the audience with their hand picked questions that he had been prepared for? Clinton? Really? Is everything Clinton's fault?

Lucas McCain wrote:

Hand picked audience and hand picked questions... So much for openness in the white house... http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2009/07/01/cbs_helen_thomas_challenge_gibbs_on_controlled_town_hall_meeting.html

Article

President Bush will be in Minnesota Friday for his first visit since last year's campaign. Bush will hold what's being billed as a "conversation on Medicare" at the Maple Grove Community Center. Only ticket-holding invited guests will be allowed in. The White House won't tell Minnesota Public Radio whether the Minnesota event is off limits to people who disagree with the president. Critics say many of the president's appearances are open only to Bush supporters.

St. Paul, Minn. — President Bush's focus early in his second term has been on promoting his plan for Social Security reform. He's settled into the town hall forum format he used often during the 2004 presidential campaign. The events are typically filled with Bush supporters, whom the president can count on for wild applause as he outlines his agenda.

Political analysts say Bush is using town hall forums so much because he comes across best in informal settings. Critics complain the forums offer no public policy debate and instead are crafted exclusively promote Bush proposals.

"I think it's so typical of the Republican Party to close out everybody they don't agree with," says Howard Dean, chairman of the Democratic National Committee.

Dean says the Bush administration's policy of shutting out opposition in his appearances is emblematic of what he says is an administration that has little respect for people who disagree with the president.

"There's nothing wrong with a town meeting. I think they're terrific," says Dean. "I think the problem is that these meetings that the president's having really aren't town meetings. They're really rallies with the faithful, and I don't think that gets you much in the way of policy."

The White House declined a Minnesota Public Radio request to discuss its town hall forums and criticism that the president's gatherings, billed as official White House business, seem to be open only to Bush supporters.

Dean concedes that the well-crafted meetings were initially effective, but he thinks that's changed.

"You can't fool American voters for a very long time," Dean says. "I think there was some of that that succeeded early on, but I think it's less and less successful."


Link

President Bush's appearance in Denver Monday looked like a town hall meeting, but it felt more like a pep rally with the president telling a Republican crowd it's time to reform Social Security.

"I have an idea, it's called a personal savings account," the president said, to applause from the partisan crowd.

The meeting wasn't about soliciting public opinion, it was about selling the president's plan, CBS4 News reports. As much as Mr. Bush's appearance was meant to look like a town hall meeting, in reality this was more of a campaign stop.

It was billed as a town hall-style meeting to talk about one of the most controversial subjects in the American political spectrum: reforming Social Security. And if the crowd seemed friendly, even receptive to President Bush's plan, it was likely no accident.

"Is it political theater? Possibly," said Tom Knecht, a University of Denver political science professor. "Taking hot button issues on the road is an old tactic in the presidential playbook, a way to put pressure on reluctant members of Congress."

The hand picked panelists, the softball questions and the enthusiastic crowd are all part of the packaging.

"Generally, the president's efforts to go public and influence members through that route is only successful at the margins," Knecht said. "So it generally doesn't produce a huge swing in public opinion, and the public tends to be discriminate consumers when it comes to these sorts of rhetorical efforts."

The public may be discriminate, but democrats are hopping mad. Democratic National Committee chairman Howard Dean has blasted the orchestrated meetings as being un-American.

While organizers say the president's appearance was a non-partisan affair, if you wanted anything in the way of a dissenting viewpoint you had to go outside of the hall to find it.

Some pundits say even the decision to release few details about the specifics of the president's plan is strategic, so that there's room for compromise later.

Another Bush Rally aka townhall meetingBush drops townhall idea in Germany because they wouldn't follow script

Obama's open townhall meetings breath of fresh air after Bush

McCain's townhall's staged republican rallies


Need I go on? I didn't even touch on the staged Palin rallies. Lord, they were some of the worst ones.

So all that makes it OK for Obama to do it?? So much for change and openness.. Just politics as usual..

The media is finally, slowly, starting to do its job. I've never been a fan of Helen Thomas, but in this case I say, YOU GO GIRL!

Perhaps, if we're lucky, there is still hope for America and in two and four years, God willing, change.


Why did Bush stumble over his responces to the media? He wasn't reading a script when he replied.

I don't know of any President Helen Thomas hasn't had an issue with at one time or another. You may not like it when she goes after your guy, but she's not afraid. She's on the money with this one, too.