Campbell Brown on Obama and Blagojevich

Posted by Dave Schilling on 12.11.2008

The CNN anchor calls on Obama to speak up, even though he's said plenty

Campbell Brown of CNN, ever the crusader for justice, has called on President-elect Obama to be more forthcoming about what he knows about the Blagojevich scandal.

I've been pretty quiet on this subejct for one simple reason: it's not of much interest to me. It's not particularly amusing, like say, the Eliot Spitzer issue. There's no tawdry sex to giggle over. It's also pretty cut and dry. There's one party to blame here, and that is Governor Blagojevich. Patrick Fitzgerald, someone who has a reputation as a straight-shooter from the Scooter Libby trial, says none of the peripheral players are under investigation. There's not much else to be said but to ask very nicely for Rod to get the hell out of office.

That leads me to Ms. Brown's assertion that the office of the President-elect isn't being open enough. She is brazen enough to bring up Bush administration obfuscation in her piece. None of us want to see a repeat of the Media Iron Curtain that the Ari Fleischers, Scott McClellans and Dana Perinos of the world erected during the last 8 years. Let's be clear-minded and remember that this President-elect is holding press conferences every day, issuing statements and letting the press grill him on a regular basis. He's not hiding, he's not rejecting questions outright like our sitting President. Campbell Brown is a smart person who has done some great work at CNN, but even she admits that not speaking freely about an ongoing investigation is appropriate. Like many in the media, I think she gets off on being self-righteous toward whomever is in power. Having crusading know-it-all journalists is an important part of our democracy. I don't deny that she has a duty to dig deeper, but in this case, I think her efforts are woefully misplaced. I'm more interested in her questioning Obama on his possible reversal on NAFTA than the Scandal du jour.