Today the residents of Left Blogostan have been whoopin’ about W’s staged teleconference with troops in Iraq. Dan Froomkin quotes NBC’s Brian Williams:

“It was billed as a chance for the president to hear directly from the troops in Iraq. The White House called it a ‘back and forth,’ a ‘give and take,’ and so reporters who cover the White House were summoned this morning to witness a live video link between the commander in chief and the U.S. soldiers in the field, as the elections approach in Iraq.

“The problem was, before the event was broadcast live on cable TV, the satellite picture from Iraq was being beamed back to television newsrooms here in the U.S. It showed a full-blown rehearsal of the president’s questions, in advance, along with the soldiers’ answers and coaching from the administration.

“While we should quickly point out this was hardly the first staged political event we have covered — and we’ve seen a lot of them in the past — today’s encounter was billed as spontaneous. Instead, it appeared to follow a script.”

People of Right Blogaria deny the teleconference was staged. They base their arguments on a highly truncated version of the 45-minute pre-teleconference rehearsal that accidentally slipped through the satellite feed. Naturally, righties leave out the juicy bits, like when assistant defense secretary Allison Barber coached the troops, thus:

“If he gives us a question that is not something that we have scripted, Captain Kennedy, you are going to have that mike and that’s your chance to impress us all. Master Sergeant Lombardo, when you are talking about the president coming to see you in New York, take a little breath before that so you can be talking directly to him. You got a real message there, ok?”

Froomkin reports that even Faux Nooz admitted the act was scripted.

Here’s Shepard Smith : “At least one senior military official tells Fox News that he is livid over the handling of U.S. troops in Iraq before their talk by satellite live with the president. . . .

“As the White House tries to prop up support for an increasingly unpopular war, today — to hear it from military brass — it used soldiers as props on stage.

“One commander tells Fox it was scripted and rehearsed — the troops were told what to say to the president and how to say it. And that, says another senior officer today, is outrageous.

“It’s certainly not the first time a photo op has been staged for the president — far from it — but it’s the first time we know of that such a staging has touched off such anger.”

On comes Carl Cameron: “First, the White House and the Pentagon claimed it was not rehearsed. But for 45 minutes before the event, the hand-picked soldiers practiced their answers with the Pentagon official from D.C. who, in her own words, drilled them on the president’s likely questions and their, quote, scripted responses.

“There are folks here at the White House now walking around shaking their heads about how badly it appears to have gone.”

Keith Olbermann has the best lines, naturally. “It’s like watching the Jesse Ventura show,” he said.

Paul Rieckhoff writes for the Huffington Post,

This thing was not just staged, it was superstaged. In a disgusting display, the President again used our troops as political props in an event so scripted that it basically turned into a conversation with himself. I wish the White House had put this much effort into post-war planning when my platoon hit Baghdad.

Not only were the teleconference troops told what to say by Deputy Assistant Defense Secretary Allison Barber, they were also prevented from speaking freely by the looming threat of their ground commanders. Undoubtedly there was a PAO (Public Affairs Officer—likely someone ranking Major or higher) standing directly off-camera making sure the soldiers spoke in line with White House directives. Every troop presented an upbeat view of the situation on the ground in Iraq. There was no talk of armor issues or mortars attacks. A token Iraqi soldier in the group at one point gushed to President Bush, “Thank you very much for everything. I like you!”

To which Billmon adds,

The soldier then broke down and wept. “Please, I’ll tell you whatever you want,” he sobbed. “Just don’t put that wire up my ass again.”

Tons o’ fun!

[Update: Now the righties are linking to the testimony of one of the teleconferenced soldiers as “proof” that the stunt wasn’t a stunt. Joe Gandelman explains why, in fact, the soldier’s testimony proves it WAS a stunt. Plus, a key participant was a military spokesperson who’s been sheltered from the nastier aspects of the mission, like fighting.]

Righties are chagrined that television newsies piled on the hapless W, and the even more hapless Scott McClellan. But I think the newsies have been steaming for a long time about the White House’s phony news conferences, town meetings, and photo ops. The satellite feed gave them the chance to vent.

The newsies have a lot of bad karma to rectify. This is from today’s Paul Krugman column:

Right now, with the Bush administration in meltdown on multiple issues, we’re hearing a lot about President Bush’s personal failings. But what happened to the commanding figure of yore, the heroic leader in the war on terror? The answer, of course, is that the commanding figure never existed: Mr. Bush is the same man he always was. All the character flaws that are now fodder for late-night humor were fully visible, for those willing to see them, during the 2000 campaign….

…Why does this happen? A large part of the answer is that the news business places great weight on “up close and personal” interviews with important people, largely because they’re hard to get but also because they play well with the public. But such interviews are rarely revealing. …

… More broadly, the big problem with political reporting based on character portraits is that there are no rules, no way for a reporter to be proved wrong. If a reporter tells you about the steely resolve of a politician who turns out to be ineffectual and unwilling to make hard choices, you’ve been misled, but not in a way that requires a formal correction.

And that makes it all too easy for coverage to be shaped by what reporters feel they can safely say, rather than what they actually think or know. Now that Mr. Bush’s approval ratings are in the 30’s, we’re hearing about his coldness and bad temper, about how aides are afraid to tell him bad news. Does anyone think that journalists have only just discovered these personal characteristics?

Let’s be frank: the Bush administration has made brilliant use of journalistic careerism. Those who wrote puff pieces about Mr. Bush and those around him have been rewarded with career-boosting access. Those who raised questions about his character found themselves under personal attack from the administration’s proxies. (Yes, I’m speaking in part from experience.) Only now, with Mr. Bush in desperate trouble, has the structure of rewards shifted.

Eric Alterman has a slightly longer excerpt from the Krugman column.

Monday I predicted that the Powers That Be were about to cut W loose because he is no longer useful to them. And if I’m right, “mass media will no longer wrap Dear Leader in a rosy glow.” This is not to say that Bush news from here on out won’t still be infested with White House talking points, but I think the press on the whole will be less obsequious.

Via Daou Report, a nice commentary from MediaCitizen that argues from another angle that it’s now safe for media to criticize Bush:

That some in mainstream media are no longer giving this president a free pass to the front page is news in its own right. Bush’s plummeting approval rating might have something to do with their newfound skepticism , which raises another issue altogether: It seems our media eagerly pile scorn upon a president when his numbers are down, but give him the benefit of the doubt when they’re up.

This would suggest that mainstream media don’t inform the public based upon the objective merits of a story, but merely tailor their reporting to respond to the flux and flow of popular opinion.

I’ll leave that frightening theory to be sorted out by the media analysts at Pew and PEJ. …

One way or another, W’s goin’ down.

Other stuff: Via Matt Y at TAPPED–is Noam Scheiber seriously suggesting that progressives agree to bomb North Korea in exchange for national health care? And when will these boys figure out that there are other ways to be serious about national security than threatening to bomb people? Jeez.