I found a very interesting article in the
New York Observer from earlier this week by way of journo
Laura Rosen's thoughtful blog
War and Piece. The story is about James Wilkinson, who headed up media relations at Centcom in Doha, Qattar during the war part of the war. He was, apparantly, widely hated by the press. And he's been hired to run the press center at the Republican National Conventions at Madison Square Garden next summer. Read the whole thing because this is one of those back-stories you don't find very often. Here are the money grafs.
Iraq Media Guy Rebuilds Qatar At the Garden
by Ben Smith
There are three theories on why Mr. Wilkinson’s Doha operation was so tense.
The first is Mr. Wilkinson’s and Mr. [Lew]Lambert’s [DoD media consultant]: the inevitable jealously of the embeds.
The second one belongs to Mr.[Michael] Wolff [of New York Magazine, Mr. [Michael] Massing [of The Nation] and a number of other reporters that The Observer contacted.
"It was a very well-designed, well-executed effort to control the information. They did a great job for them, a terrible job for us," Mr. Wolff said. "Wilkinson was, I think, instrumental. He certainly represented himself as the brains of the operation."
The third is Mr. [Peter]Boyer’s [of the NYT]: that Mr. Wilkinson was just not up to the task.
Said Mr. Boyer: "If they run that convention the way they ran the CentCom press operation,
you might wish to acquaint yourself with the term ‘President Dean.’"