BY B. JAY COOPER
Reprinted from BJayCooper.com

Reed Cherlin, a former assistant press secretary in the Obama White House, wrote a provocative piece for Slate proposing eliminating the daily White House press briefing. He argues, accurately, that the briefings have become a “preening” exercise for the media and a “first, make no news” goal for the Obama press office team.

If those two conditions were to be true and constant, I’d agree with Mr. Cherlin. But, they needn’t be.

I worked in the White House press office in the late 80s, before the Internet and before the onslaught of cable news channels and their ubiquitous talking heads who typically take one extreme position or another and take it over and over all day. The briefings have become even more performance art than they were in my day. But, and I don’t mean to sound like my father but, “in my day,” they also served a purpose. Continue reading →