here:

http://digg.com/politics/Tucker_Carlson_unintentionally_reveals_role_of_the_US_press

Exactly what is "new" about what Tucker revealed?

Who said it was "new"?

The institution of the Big Media is the way it is, and Tucker simply said as much. Others have said it, too. Anyone who has been a part of it, or even close to it, knows as much. Not only is it outwardly decadent and corrupt, it is corrupting.

But is that news?

The fact that you think you're well familiarized with X doesn't mean that X isn't worth discussing. There are other people besides you.

I imagine that anyone engaged in a toe-to-toe slugfest with Hillary might well come to think of her as a monster. To me, that simply means that she's a formidable opponent, and that the huge stakes, mountains of money, time pressures, and physically exhausting regimen of campaigning are enough to knock even the best and brightest off center.

I do wish that our presidential candidates didn't have to engage in a year-long Iron Man competition when running. It would be better for their health, and our understanding of the issues, if it weren't necessary. Unfortunately, it is necessary. No one invented the system we have -- like Topsy, it jes grew -- and no one can uninvent it. It has all the defects that our society as a whole has, and won't be fixed unless and until we fix the rest of what is wrong.

With all due respect to Glen Greenwald, Ms. Peeve (whose recent gloating article on getting Ms. Power fired is pretty nasty) has not revealed the exact circumstances of the 'interview." I get the strong impression that it was not an interview at all, rather a discussion in a very informal setting over wine, etc. after a lecture of seminar about Ms. Powers book. It may have had something to with Sergio Vieira de Mello the UN hero for which she worked who was murdered in Iraq.

This raises a big question, were the circumstances in which she was speaking such that she did think that she was not giving an interview -- was she encouraged to have a relaxed and opne conversation and mousetrapped. Such conversations are not uncommon in Washington or London, and breaking the rules Despite the somewhat peevish tone of the Scotsman's denials, the circumstances have been left completely undescribed. Heaven forfend that I be seen as agreeing with Tucker Carlson, but circumstances can give rise to an inference that a conversation is private and not for publication. In any event, I suspect that as chief Westminster lobby correspondent for the Scotsman, Gerri Peeve has just engaged in a very career limiting move.

By the way, I know a little about this -- I was approached by a journalist for a publication at one point in a role I had in an informal setting. They asked me about some statements that an entity was making that were, shall we say, not very true, not false, but just a wild exaggeration. I said I could not say anything, they asked some more, begged me to explain what ABC meant, I said that on background I would walk them through the factual information that was public and what it meant. I told my organisation's PR people after -- they had a heart attack. They told me that NO-ONE talks to journalist A or ANYONE working for Publication B because that cannot be trusted. Lo and behold, they headlined my comments as an attack on the other company, and sent it around via wire services. Ouch, but actually, for a supposedly important publication, I have noticed that their coverage sucks, it appears that my entity's PR department was not the only one that refuses to let anyone talk to them and has reduced them to a press-release publisher.

To be blunt, few professions in my experience are as sleazy as journalism -- and a Gerry Peeve's ambition to be promoted form the Scotsman (and its stable of minor regional newspapers) would have meant that she will make a story out of anything. In any even, it will be a long time before she is briefed again by anyone in Westminster.

From the perspective of someone Glenn Greenwald that sort of distrust of the press is bad. A lot of background briefing is not about covering things up, it is about pointing journalists (some of the most ignorant people I have met are journalists) in the right direction to get an important story, or explaining technical issues to them. Most journalists know nada, zip, about the technical aspects of what they report on. Witness Joe Connason making a fool of himself in Salon over Rezko and the Obama house. The real story is not the Obama house and the lot, but the way it is being spun and by whom -- but Connason cannot get an Illinois property lawyer, developer or real estate agent to explain it to him first, so he can make sense of the real story?

I caught that segment on Tucker's show and I was embarrassed for our country. Here was a real journalist being lectured by a snotty,arrogant,immature symbol of the corruption of our press! Can you imagine the conversation she is having with her collegues today?

However the press has an exception to it's lapdog response to power and that is "the Clinton Rules". I would love to see you examine the reasons for this. I would also love to see a historical point by point rebuttal of many of the lies, smears and myths about the Clintons that have been pushed by the press to the point that many Obama supporters accept them as fact.

It has been a real dissappointment to me that the writers online that I have come to depend on to set the record straight on matters of government and press malfesence have failed to do this.

Another failure of progressive online writers is their unwillingness to address the misogyny that has surfaced in the progrssive left.This has been shocking to me, it is like the 'dirty little secret' on the left this election cycle. It is being addressed on feminist blogs only. I could be wrong about this but I have never read any discussion of this problem other than on Media Matters in relation to the CNBC gang of women haters.