Several of you have written to tell me that today's New York Times crossword puzzle is dedicated to Al Jaffee. I have a feeling that made Al very happy.
I'm dueling with some deadlines so this'll be short. The main argument I'm seeing on the 'net today is this one. Peter Baker, who's the Chief White House Correspondent for The New York Times posted this tweet…
At this point in office, Trump had given five news conferences. Obama had given two, George W. Bush three and Clinton five. Biden so far has given zero.
This brought responses like this one from pundit Eric Boehlert…
at this point in office, Trump Obama Bush and Clinton hadn't passed the most important spending bill in 80 yrs
…while others pointed out that (a) the White House has said that there will be a press conference before March is over and (b) that most of the press conferences the other presidents had had by now were joint conferences with foreign leaders where not many questions were asked and the ones that were were about matters that concerned the foreign leaders.
Anyway, I just wanted to say that it's kinda nice to turn on the TV and not see the President of the United States as much as we saw the last guy. And I don't recall him answering many questions he didn't want to answer, which is almost the same thing as not having the press conference at all.
And yes, I think presidents should hold regular press conferences but you know what would impress me more? Sitting down at regular intervals with good journalists — the kind who don't lob softballs — for one-on-one interviews where the reporter can ask follow-up questions and the president can't dodge them by calling on someone else. Anyone who's reached an important place in government has learned how to give non-answers and evasive responses.
Your standard press conference — the kind where the subject calls on this reporter then that reporter, then this reporter — makes it too easy to dodge questions. Nixon, when he held them, used to have a little chart in front of him that told him where each reporter was sitting and it was marked with the ones who were friendly or who just wanted to be seen on camera asking a question. And some of them asked pretty easy ones because they thought it increased their chances of being called on. I'd rather see my President have to sit down for an hour with Jonathan Swan or Bob Woodward or even Chris Wallace.
Okay, back to work…