Stephen Spruiell attempts to transcribe some of the conversation from last night’s talk between former White House press secretary Scott McClellan and Dan Rather for the National Review Media Blog:
RATHER: A lot of journalists thought that — let’s set aside present company — that it was pretty well known that if you did tough questioning… that you would expect the campaign to try to injure — if not destroy — your credibility as a journalist. Did you take part in those kinds of conversations? Did you hear those kinds of things?
McCLELLAN: I didn’t directly, I didn’t hear anything like that. [Upper East Side liberals emit sarcastic guffaws.] No seriously, I don’t think I… my focus was on domestic policy moreso than on the, on the broader issues… if that happened, it happened at a higher level than I was at that time, if people were directed to do things [...]
RATHER: Is there a special operation in the White House or in the Executive Office Building next door to it that seeks to orchestrate, perhaps even run some of what’s on the Internet?
McCLELLAN: Certainly there’s a large operation, part of the communications operation is the office of strategic iniatives, working to make sure that… the blogosphere has a tremendous amount of influence, and they just want to make sure that we’re helping to shape some of that narrative…
RATHER: To your knowledge, are there bloggers who are paid by the White House political operation? Some campaigns have —
McCLELLAN: — not to my knowledge, but that was not an area I focused on.
