We can't get to the truth, because the republicans blocked the investigation. Well it's this way...it would be nice to know how he got in there. You know, who approved his daily passes? We can't find out, cause the republicans blocked the investigation. Well it would be nice to know what Gannon, the admitted gay prostitute, was doing there on those 200 visits, often the visits were scheduled on non press days, but the republicans blocked the investigation.
We might know quite a bit more about what happened, and then I could tell you more, but the republicans blocked the investigation. Voting along party lines the judiciary committee voted not to investigate. All 10 democrats voted to investigate how such an unqualified person with a prostitution background, offering up softball questions in press conferences, who never really wrote anything except copy and paste Whitehouse press releases and worked for a phoney news web site, got 200 daily passes to the Whitehouse, and who even signed the log as Bulldog...but the republicans blocked any investigation.
Statement of John Conyers, Jr.
H.Res. 136 Gannon Resolution of Inquiry
Judiciary Committee Markup
March 16, 2005
We are here today because we have an Administration that is all
too willing to flaunt the law, and a Congress that refuses to investigate
even the most serious ethical transgressions. Whether it is torture at Abu
Ghraib, sole source contracts with Haliburton, or the outing of a CIA
operative, this Congress has been unwilling and unable to ask the hard
questions or issue the difficult subpoenas.
We are here today because it simply defies credibility that a phony
reporter, operating under an alias, who couldn’t get privileges in the
House or Senate press gallery, could receives scores of consecutive
White House “day passes,” without the intervention of someone very
high up at the White House. Can anyone believe that while Pulitzer
Prize winning journalists are being turned down for White House press
passes, a fake journalist working for a Republican-controlled media front
operation could receive virtually open-ended access to the White House
press room in the absence of preferential treatment?
We are here today because the Administration has either rejected
or ignored every bona fide request for information concerning Jeff
Gannon. On February 9, Rep. Slaughter asked the White House how
Gannon was able to obtain his special access – her request has been
ignored. On February 10, Rep. Slaughter and I asked the same question
of the Secret Service – we received a non-responsive response. On
February 15, Rep. Slaughter and I filed a FOIA request with the
Department of Homeland Security – again, no response. In the light of
this stonewalling, we have no choice but to ask this Committee and this
Congress to do its job and request these materials from the
Administration.
We are here today because we are simply unwilling to tolerate the
continued manufacture of news by our government. Taxpayers don’t
want their money used to pay reporters to recycle Administration
propaganda. Citizens can no longer tolerate paying reporters for their
opinions while we can’t fund our jobs and poverty programs. Americans
don’t want the White House press room to churn out releases that
reporters like Jeff Gannon plagiarize and report as their own.
What we have today is a government by fiat, not a system of
checks and balances. If we wont investigate this scandal, where will we
draw the line? If we don’t act now, when will we say enough is enough?
I urge the Members to vote yes on this Resolution of Inquiry.
Orca |
