NPR: Attorney General to Website: Let's Be Buddies Again

Attorney General to Website: Let's Be Buddies Again

A few month ago, the center-liberal website/blog TMPMuckraker.com ran an article about what it alleged were a series of "false statements DOJ spokesman Brian Roehrkasse had made during the course of the US Attorney scandal before being promoted to Director of the Office of Public Affairs at the end of last summer."

After the article appeared, TPMuckraker and its mothership, Talking Points Memo, suddenly found it was persona non grata with the DOJ and saw its supply of press releases from the department dry up. Josh Marshal says this sudden dry spell also started right around the time Mr. Roehrkasse got his new job as the head of the office that sends them out.

Marshall says that various explanation for the dry spell followed - "like an apparent budget shortfall or bandwidth dearth that made the costs of sending us their email press releases prohibitive."

Well, Rep. John Conyers (D-MI) and others took the matter up with the new Attorney General Michael Mukasey ... and he must have found a few extra dollars in the kitty because on Friday, the press releases once again began pouring into the TPM in-boxes.

Roehrkasse told The New York Times that the issue was whether TPM was a "credentialed" news organization.As Marshall writes in conclusion, " ... suffice it to say that we are no more 'credentialed' today than we were in October. So I'll let people draw their own conclusions."

What Marshall is too modest to mention is that his and TPM's reporting on the DOJ fired-attorney scandal last week won a George K. Polk Award for legal reporting.

4:00 PM ET | 02-25-2008 | permalink

Comments

"What Marshall is too modest to mention is that his and TPM's reporting on the DOJ fired-attorney scandal last week won a George K. Polk Award for legal reporting."

Excellent point, but here's a questions:

Why did NPR largely ignore and continue to overlook this story?

The Whitehouse has been stonewalling on this scandal and NPR doesn't cover the most recent developments.

On February 14, 2008, the first time in more than 20-yrs The House passed a contempt resolution against White House chief of staff Josh Bolten and Harriet Miers, 223-32.

Both Bolten and Miers declined to testify as a result of an assertion of executive privilege. The resolution included both a criminal contempt citation and the authorization for the House Judiciary Committee to sue the White House.

NPR has more important stories like interviewing Glenn Beck, and bios of Bugs Bunny and Darth Vader.

Sent by Ron Gordon | 12:12 PM ET | 02-26-2008

Hey Rob

I'm actually going to disagree with you on this one. NPR's Ari Shapiro did a lot of reporting on the situation with the Attorney General's office. (Run a search through the archives and you'll find many stories.)

But more than that, you have to remember the missions of the two sites you mention - TPM and NPR. TPM is a politics blog that occasionally ventures into some stories on society in general. (And they do it very well, as the Polk Award shows.)

But NPR does more than just news. Music and feature pieces are also part of our mandate. Those stories about Bugs Bunny and Darth Vader are some of our most viewed pieces each week. It's not that we don't do the DOJ stuff - it's just that we also do a lot more.

Tom Regan
Host, Newsblog

Sent by Tom Regan | 12:24 PM ET | 02-26-2008

Mr. Regan,

Thanks for your reply.

However I beg to differ, NPR only covered the story after the fact, has has ignored the contempt citations and there has been no NPR coverage of the on going investigation.

I just preformed a search "a contempt resolution against White House chief of staff Josh Bolten and Harriet Miers" it only showed two stories the most recent July 2007. Proves my point.

NPR has ignored this story since the Attorney General resigned, which was only the tip of the iceberg of the politicization of the Justice Department.

It seems to this two decade listener, under the current administration, NPR has embraced the safety of infotainment at the expense of investigative journalism.

(Sorry, not trying to make this a "troll duel")

Sent by Ron Gordon | 2:17 PM ET | 02-26-2008

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