The systematic effort to undercut journalists, to strip them of their traditional influence in national affairs, represents the Bush administration taking steps to "decertify" the professional press corps by "trying to unseat the idea that these people, professional journalists assigned to cover politics, have a legitimate role to play in our politics," according to Jay Rosen, journalism professor at New York University. He views that effort, along with James Guckert's (aka Jeff Gannon's) ascension at White House press briefings, as being closely linked: "Creating 'Jeff Gannon' as a credible White House correspondent and creating radical doubt about the intentions of mainstream journalists (in order to decertify the traditional press) are two parts of the same effort."

One way to diminish the press is simply to refuse to deal with it at all. The Bush administration's record of ignoring the media stands in stark contrast to previous administrations. "Of course people in the White House, no matter what administration, are always angry at the press," says New Yorker writer Ken Auletta, who detailed the White House's relationship with the press last year. "Nixon would actually call up owners of media companies and try to get reporters he didn't like fired. But even Nixon and then Reagan and Bush and Clinton, they all felt the obligation to hold press conferences. The difference with the Bush people is they made the determination they didn't have to talk to the press except in an election year. And that's worrisome."

The choice has been a conscious one, according to Suskind. "When I was at the White House in 2002, I had a variety of discussions with them about their newfangled message control machine, and their prized discipline. They made a clear decision: We will ignore as best we can the mainstream press and let's see if there's any penalty for doing that," he says. He notes that the position of Karen Hughes, Bush's former chief communications advisor, was, "'We're not concerned; we don't see there being any penalty from the voters for ignoring the mainstream press.' And there's been none to date. "

There's certainly been no penalty imposed by the press corps itself. While the revelations about Guckert, a former male escort who spent his days cutting and pasting White House press releases and posting them as "news" stories, may have been embarrassing to the White House, officials were not castigated by the D.C. press, which generally turned away from the unpleasant story. ABC and CBS never even bothered to mention the three-week-running scandal. After three weeks of ignoring the story, both the Los Angeles Times and the Wall Street Journal on Friday finally introduced readers to Gannongate, coming to the benign conclusion that there have always been eccentric reporters inside the White House briefing room, and that Gannon was simply part of that tradition. (Those who think the Times and the Journal were justified in ignoring Gannongate for so long because it didn't qualify as news should note that for the week of Feb. 21, "Jeff Gannon" was among the "Top Ten Gaining Queries," according to Google's weekly tabulations.)

The Bush administration's contempt for journalism, and its routine willingness to cross ethical lines, has shown itself in specific ways that predate the recent headlines about Williams, Guckert and company. ABC News anchor Peter Jennings recalled to the New Yorker that he "did a story on a senior figure in the Bush White House and was told in advance, 'It better be good.'" Last year Pentagon managers repeatedly ordered the department's widely read clipping service to omit articles critical of the military and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, according to the Washington Post. This year the Pentagon announced it was adding more Defense Department-run Web sites aimed at people in the Balkan region in Europe, as well as an audience in North Africa. Disguised as independent news outlets, the Web sites are written by freelancers hired by the DoD, but overseen by U.S. military troops trained in "information warfare." During the election, Vice President Dick Cheney banned New York Times reporters from his campaign plane.

"Presidents like spin and secrets, journalists don't, so this is a relationship fraught with potential discomfort," Times executive editor Bill Keller told Salon last year. "But I admit we're puzzled over what seems to be a more intense antipathy at this White House, especially since the campaign heated up."

And when touring the country to promote the controversial PATRIOT Act, then-Attorney General John Ashcroft refused to meet with print reporters; he only granted brief interviews to local television reporters, who generally ask less probing questions. Ashcroft's spokeswoman justified the information clampdown by saying it was a matter of "explaining key facts directly to the American people and not having as much of a filter from people who are already invested in having a different view of it." This extraordinary statement not only made it clear that Ashcroft felt no obligation to answer pointed questions when he was discussing public policy, it essentially charged mainstream reporters -- all of them -- with bias.

Ron Suskind argues that the Bush administration has rejected the fundamental idea of debate and intellectual exchange. "Other administrations ceded to fact, and saw the benefit -- the value -- to meaningful public dialogue based on fact," he says. "They understood that was one of their obligations, to engage with people who were there to ask pointed and pertinent questions and demand answers to them. They understood that's how it worked and that that was the precedent. This administration has said, 'What does that have to do with me?'"

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