Letting The Grownups Sit At The Kids Table

Politico's Michael Calderone is all upset that blog news outfits like HuffPo and now TPM are getting White House press pool credentials.   I say old bean, who let the bloggers into the pool?  Marcy Wheeler is merciless in her critique as she notes Calderone interviews NY Times reporter Peter Baker, who is just...concerned....

While at the WaPo, Baker frequently partnered on stories with both Mike Allen and Jim VandeHei, now at the Politico giving blowjobs to Cheney. In fact, Baker covered the White House during the entire period of the discovery of JimmyJeffGannonGuckert, but he is not known to have complained about covering the White House with a gay whore working for a partisan outlet (though to be fair, GannonGuckert never contributed to the press pool). Before working at the WaPo, Baker worked for the Moonie Times, which lost $40 million last year to provide a mouthpiece for a far-right cult leader.

As far as I can tell, Baker has never won a Polk Award — though Josh Marshall has.

Also, as far as I can tell, Baker has also never complained that Fox News participates in the White House pool, in spite of the fact that it, like Fred Hiatt’s editorial page, produces “pieces with strongly argued points of view.” Nor has he complained that it, like the Politico and the Moonie Times, is owned by right-wing big money.’

Nevertheless, Baker is very worried about his credibility if he has to rely on pool reports from the HuffPo and TPM.

And quite frankly, it goes to show you just how far blog news outlets have come.

Hey, I mean Les Kinsolving at WorldNetDaily gets press credentials, you know.