About two dozen journalists walked out on [[tag]Canadian[\/tag] Prime Minister] [tag]Stephen Harper[\/tag] on Tuesday after he refused to take their questions, the latest chapter in an increasingly unseemly spat between the prime minister and members of the national media.<\/p>\n
The scene of reporters boycotting a prime ministerial news conference was described by Parliament Hill veterans as a first. It resulted in Harper being forced to make his announcement on aid to Darfur to a small handful of reporters, photographers and cameramen outside the [tag]House of Commons[\/tag].<\/p>\n
The impromptu boycott was the latest move by journalists in their ongoing tug-of-war with the prime minister over who controls news conferences.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
Harper’s office asks news outlets to submit a list of names of reporters who have questions, and the prime minister will use the list to run an “orderly” press conference. Most reporters in [tag]Canada[\/tag]’s capital refuse to cooperate with the rule and have decided not to submit their names for Harper’s list.<\/p>\n
Fine, the prime minister’s office said. Instead of answering questions, Harper would make a statement and then leave. Fine, reporters said. Instead of showing up for Harper’s remarks, they’ll [tag]boycott[\/tag].
\n<\/p>\n
After journalists refused to be placed the list again on Tuesday, Soudas announced that Harper would be on his way shortly – and he would not be taking questions.<\/p>\n
The press gallery president then turned to his colleagues and suggested they leave.<\/p>\n
Most agreed, including a reporter for The Canadian Press, although a CP photographer stayed. Several said there was no point sticking around if the event could be covered off a television set from any newsroom in the country.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
“We can’t accept that the prime minister’s office would decide who gets to ask questions,” said Yves Malo, a TVA reporter and president of the press gallery. “Does that mean that when there’s a crisis they’ll only call upon journalists they expect softball questions from?”<\/p>\n
Note to the White House press corps: this is the way it’s done.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
It’s common to hear [tag]White House[\/tag] [tag]reporters[\/tag] criticize the president’s approach to dealing with the press. [tag]Bush[\/tag] rarely holds press conferences, routinely gives addresses without responding to journalists’ questions, and when he does interviews, the president prefers to pick reporters from a scripted list and filibuster his way through the discussion to cut down on […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7495","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7495","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7495"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7495\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7495"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7495"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7495"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}