Goose, meet gander

Oh goody. Background checks for reporters.

Secret Service takes on new credentialing role for conventions
For the first time this year, the Secret Service has a hand in credentialing the media; during previous conventions only the Congressional press galleries were in charge of credentialing the media. Members of the media began hearing more about the Secret Services’ role in the credentialing process as they began to attend walk-throughs at the convention sites in Philadelphia and Cleveland, leading BuzzFeed Washington Bureau Chief John Stanton to issue a strongly worded letter to fellow journalists, urging them to speak up about the new processes. In his letter Stanton cited concerns about the background checks, the lack of a clear appeals process, and the involvement of a third-party subcontractor, urging his fellow journalists to express their concern over the process.

What? Suddenly the lamestream muddia doesn’t like background checks to exercise a Constitutionally-protected right? I can hardly wait for the Journalism License, and bans on hi-cap word processors.

I wish I could be optimistic enough to hope this would give them some perspective on the rest of the Bill of Rights.

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6 thoughts on “Goose, meet gander”

  1. DO YOU UNDERSTAND YET???
    Gun control is not about the guns its about the control. Let this sink in free born men and women, let it sink in real good. Oh wait, this is the Zeman’s. They know.

    Some excerpts;

    -background checks, the lack of a clear appeals process, and the involvement of a third-party subcontractor
    -It seems like an unnecessary step and it gives them in my mind a new and troubling precedence to try and exert authority
    -It creates a logistical burden, a troubling precedent for their ability to have almost a de facto say in who is qualified
    -What if they use this as precedent to extend to other campaign events
    -stems from a 2013 presidential directive
    -Access control includes background checks on anyone
    -secure zones
    – ‘zoned’ credentials
    -go through the security check and take a special shuttle service to the site
    -telling us we’re just going to have to live with it
    -they said there is no appeals process to anyone excluded from a secure zone
    -It looks like we’re going to be doing this regardless of people’s bad feelings about it

  2. I can hardly wait for the Journalism License, and bans on hi-cap word processors.

    Why stop at high-capacity word processors? “Journ-o-lists” should be content with paper-and-ink manually-cranked printing presses, libraries (full of paper books, where research happens), and “express” mail sent via courier on horse-back.

    Y’know, because that’s what the Founders had access to, and they couldn’t possibly have imagined the information excess we enjoy today. Therefore, it must be A-OK to ban telephones, televisions, computers, the Internet, Air-delivered mail, and cameras. Surely they don’t need these things to exercise their rights as a free press! [/sarcasm]

  3. And if we are really going to consider what was in common use during the founding, I think we need to change how they report. No more “slang”, I think a few “thee and thou” thrown in would be good. Perhaps limit the reporting to the topics of the day. In other words, no news stories on google glasses, self driving cars or the latest iPhone adventure.

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