{"id":13078,"date":"2013-02-28T19:46:31","date_gmt":"2013-02-28T19:46:31","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2013-02-28T19:46:31","modified_gmt":"2013-02-28T19:46:31","slug":"spokeskid_jay_carney_says_old_man_woodward_has_his_head_in_the_sand","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/admin.rushlimbaugh.com\/daily\/2013\/02\/28\/spokeskid_jay_carney_says_old_man_woodward_has_his_head_in_the_sand\/","title":{"rendered":"Spokeskid Jay Carney Says Old Man Woodward Has His Head in the Sand"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Listen<\/a><\/p>\n

RUSH: I should say I\u2019ve been keeping track of this at PJ Media. <\/p>\n

AARP is not happy with David Plouffe\u2019s tweet about Woodward being too old to do his job well anymore. They are not happy about it. There\u2019s nothing they can do about it but they\u2019re not happy about it. Woodward is the first guy to actually draw blood from this regime in five years — and that, the regime doesn\u2019t like. <\/p>\n

Our old buddy Ron Fournier at the National Journal has a piece about this, and he said you people are being bamboozled if you think this is about threats.<\/p>\n

The reason this story is important to you has nothing to do with threats. “The fight between the White House and journalistic legend Bob Woodward is a silly distraction to a major problem: The failure of President Obama and House Republicans to lead the country under a budget deadline. Woodward-gate is a distraction the White House welcomed, even encouraged, as part of a public-relations strategy to emasculate the GOP and anybody else who challenges Obama.”<\/p>\n

This is Ron Fournier writing this! This guy\u2019s a former lapdog.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

“It is a distraction that briefly enveloped my reporting last weekend, when I essentially broke ties with a senior White House official. Yes, I iced a source — and my only regret is I didn\u2019t do it sooner. I decided to share this encounter because it might shed light on the increasingly toxic relationship between media and government, which is why the Woodward flap matters outside the Beltway.”<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t know about that. I don\u2019t think it\u2019s “toxic.”<\/p>\n

I think these two sides love each other too much. I think Obama loves the media too much and the media certainly love him too much. It may be a stretch to say he loves them, but he appreciates the fact that they\u2019re in his back pocket or that they have been there. At any rate, “On Saturday, White House press secretary Jay Carney accused Woodward of being ‘willfully wrong\u2019 on a story holding the White House accountable for its part in a legislative gimmick called sequestration. …<\/p>\n

“Carney isn\u2019t the first press secretary to criticize a reporter. Presidential aides do it all the time…” Fournier writes, “I had angered the White House… Going back to my first political beat, covering Bill Clinton\u2019s administration in Arkansas and later in Washington, I\u2019ve had a practice that is fairly common in journalism: A handful of sources I deal with regularly are granted blanket anonymity. Any time we communicate, they know I am prepared to report the information at will … and that I will not attribute it to them.”<\/p>\n

Anyway, his point here is that this Woodward flap is a distraction that the White House is encouraging as part of a PR strategy to emasculate the Republicans and anybody else that challenges Obama and that, “It is a distraction that briefly enveloped my reporting last weekend, when I essentially broke ties with a senior White House official,” meaning he now identifies him. Now, Fournier\u2019s close here. This is about emasculating the GOP. I don\u2019t know if he gets it. Maybe he does.<\/p>\n

This is about making sure the GOP gets blamed for everything — and, see, that\u2019s where Woodward went off the reservation. That\u2019s what I think everybody\u2019s missing. Everybody thinks that Sperling is mad at Woodward for writing that the regime is moving the goalposts — meaning: “Making it impossible for there to be a deal,” which the White House does not want. I think what they\u2019re really mad about is that Woodward is telling everybody that the sequester was Obama\u2019s idea.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s what undercuts the regime. The regime\u2019s whole premise is based on making people think this is a Republican idea — and here is Mr. Watergate Emeritus, Mr. Beyond Reproach, Mr. Credibility, Bob Woodward, saying, “No, no, no! The president came up with this idea,” and he\u2019s written it two or three times. The public blames the Republicans. It\u2019s been a successful campaign. That\u2019s why they\u2019re mad at Woodward, because Woodward\u2019s out there saying that it\u2019s not the Republicans. It\u2019s Obama who did this.<\/p>\n