Now THAT'S "speaking truth to power".

Would that the entire White House press corps had a pair as brassy and clanging as those that this brave woman sports.

Thanks for the interview, Glenn!! It gives me a glimmer of hope that not ALL of the MSM is brain dead.

Thank God for people like Helen Thomas. It's sad that there are so few like her!

Saddam helping to plan 9/11 is NOT a myth!

It is an outright lie to mislead the people of the United States into supporting a war of aggression!

It is great to know that there are still a few reporters around who will ask the tough questions, and demand answers. It was a pleasure to read your interview with Ms. Thomas.

One problem that she did not address is the fact that the MSM is owned and operated by people who are complicit in the prevention of the dissemination of information, that those few reporters unearth.

Your recent post on the importance of the blogosphere in helping to spread that news was right on target, as usual.

Keep up the fight. Magna est veritas, et prevalebit.

myth /mɪθ/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation

[mith] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation

–noun 1. a traditional or legendary story, usually concerning some being or hero or event, with or without a determinable basis of fact or a natural explanation, esp. one that is concerned with deities or demigods and explains some practice, rite, or phenomenon of nature.

2. stories or matter of this kind: realm of myth.

3. any invented story, idea, or concept: His account of the event is pure myth.

4. an imaginary or fictitious thing or person.

5. an unproved or false collective belief that is used to justify a social institution

But there are few with the talent to slice through BS like a hot knife through butter. Thank you Helen and thank you Glenn.

"They began coming out of their shell with Katrina. They were basically unleashed then, were allowed to ask the questions to show the misery that was going on, and also to question the administration. Since then, they have become tougher. I do think that their corporate heads gave them the go-ahead during Katrina.”

I have long been an admirer of Helen Thomas, from the days as a young boy awakening to the lure of politics. It scares me, though, that Ms. Thomas, in the statement referenced above, acknowledges the sheer power of corporate journalism to shape the perception of news. That reporters "were allowed to ask questions" seethes with the saddest of cynicisms, for I have come to understand that Ms. Thomas seldom lets loose with a statement that she does not think out very carefully.

I have been wondering for some time what is happening at ground level, i.e. the schools of journalism in America, that conditions this collective, cowed response on the part of reporters. I am not naive enough to think that corporate America has not carefully shaped this kind of cowardice and feigned ignorance.

Thanks, Glenn, for the interview with a true American icon. Helen, you are my hero.

She's got more integrity in her little finger that the entire executive branch of this government (measured as biomass).

I respect Helen Thomas, and I'll grant that she may be misquoting herself, but ""Mr. President, why don't you respect the wall between church and state?" That's not an example of an honest, truth-seeking question, but of a loaded "gotcha" question that assumes what it's trying to investigate. She could have asked plenty of fairer and more useful questions about how the Faith-Based Initiatives office fails to square with the tradition of church/state separation. Thomas is usually tough and smart, but letting dumb questions like this slip out makes it awfully easy for right-wingers call her a nut.

Rocks ! ! !

Good job, Glenn.

Saddam helping to plan 9/11 is NOT a myth!

It is an outright lie to mislead the people of the United States into supporting a war of aggression!

You realize those two points are completely at odds, right?

And in any case, what evidence do you have Hussein was involved?

she's absolutely right on target.

The people who think Helen Thomas is "off the wall," well, they're off the wall.

Glenn, thanks for this interview, it was great to read, refreshing, insightful, and you did a great job.

Helen Thomas deserves the Presidential Medal of Freedom (though I'm not going to hold my breath waiting for her to receive it from the current administration) as it states, for "an especially meritorious contribution to the security or national interests of the United States, world peace, cultural or other significant public or private endeavors."

Like the Truth.

Helen, hang in there.

No kings,

Robert

I want to say its pretty sad that she is so widely praised and admired for doing the job every single one of those men and women should be doing. Nevertheless, she is, and deservedly so. We will look back at this time many years from now and see her standing alone. I hope by then the others realize they were little more than lapdogs.

Her cameo at the beginning of "Clinton's Last Days in Office":

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vN1OCrRrgVw

Glenn Greenwald and Helen Thomas - asking probing questions and demanding accuracy in the answers. That's journalism. Thank you both for your valuable contributions.

Helen Thomas should receive the Medal of Freedom!!

If we had 10 reporters in Washington whose combined integrity was that which is possessed by Helen, we wouldn't be in the shape we're now in as a country.

Thank you, Helen.

Helen Thomas says: "We have two aircraft carriers pointing missiles, and submarines, in their backyard. They are getting softer. They invited the UN inspectors to come in. So diplomacy is working."

Maybe it's the aircraft carriers and missiles that are working, and not necessarily the diplomacy?

This is the same sort of analysis one finds in the New York Times's clockwork-reliable annual story about how strange it is that the prison population is going up when crime rates are declining.