White House press conference overwhelmed by cell phones
By Nilay Patel 
posted May 14th 2009 12:19PM
posted May 14th 2009 12:19PM
P.S.- We're actually more amazed at the second guy, who not only interrupts the briefing, but walks out of the room to take the call. Cojones!
ftlulz
Is being an Apple fan a mental disorder? What the hell was the point of that?
@Look_Around_You
Yes, yes it is.
Either this guy has a huge sense of humor or he is in fact a moron.
engadget blogs presents Schweppes the front running nominee for douchebag of the year award.
The guy who answered his phone was Bill Plante from CBS, which is why you won't see CNet putting up this video for public ridicule.
He works for Obama therefore he's a moron.
This was mentioned on last night's episode of The Colbert Report.
Simpsons did it!
I think Matt's just pointing out some further material, not claiming Engadget are plagiarists or something.
Who knew that CSPAN-3 could be so entertaining
There's a THIRD C-SPAN?!
to quote someone named gatrfan:
This is why the Obama admin is loosing control of everything...
"loosing"
This is why hicks like you shouldn't be allowed to vote.
If things are spelt rong and it meens your a hick than were in trouble.
With this press secretary (and I've watch a lot of his press conferences), I don't blame these reporters for leaving for a cell call.
Robert Gibbs is one of the worst press secretaries ever. Scott McClellan under Bush 43 takes a very close second though.
I thought it was because Chimpy McFlightsuit spent the better part of eight years messing up the country?
How dare they interrupt Gibbs' spin conference? I need my daily dose of White House apologies and clarification.
You ever notice those camera guys in the background of the press conferance making all that damn noise with the OLD ass cameras?
Look upgrade your damn cameras into the 21 century, go digital you old bastards!!.
The White House keeps those old cameras on tap in the briefing room just in case the event at hand turns into something worth putting into an Oliver Stone movie later.
You know that digital SLRs make noise, right? The mirror that causes the light to be directed into the viewfinder instead of the sensor lifts up when you snap a shot. This causes that clicking noise. Has nothing to do with them being old.
by making a comment like this i assume that you have neither seen or used a DSLR. those things cost thousands of dollars and has the quality good enough to be printed straight off as poster hanging on the empire building. and btw, just in case you don't know, resolution(ie, megapixel) hasn't got much to do with the actual quality of the image, it's just the size. much like having a xxxl burger vs. eating in michael jordon's steak house, if you see what i mean...
You see, I am ASSuming they are using old ass cameras and some of the other posters ASSume they are using SLR's.
Doesn't the vast majority of the SLR's on the market today have built in advanced noise reduction and most folks don't even bother to use it?
Uh wow... No. MrGutts you are very confused. Noise reduction has nothing to do with the click that the mirror makes. What noise reduction on a a camera DOES do, is reduce the pixel "noise". If you don't know what that is... well, google it. Most (smart) people don't use it because in-camera noise reduction is pretty pathetic and is much better done in postprocessing (on a computer).
If they are actual professionals taking professional pictures, the odds are very strong that they're using SLRs, not some dinky point-and-shoot. A pro might use a point-and-shoot for a quick, candid shot, but not for a staged event like a press conference.
MrGutts, I hate to admit but I really can't tell if your being a sarcastic troll or are just really, well, let's say "uninformed". Yeah, that's a nice way to put it. Noise reduction in a camera has to do with image noise (look it up), not the actual sound that the camera makes.
MrGutts...you are awesome! :))
Holy Crap, MrGutts, I hope you are joking. If not, how do you manage to turn on your computer... navigate to Engadget.. and then post these comments? Howww?
They are digital. All professional cameras, digital or not, still use mechanical shutters (electronic shutters just don't cut it).
Some DSLRs (like the D1x) have electronic shutters. But they still have moving parts, and the mirror still has to flip up out of the way, so they still make a fair bit of noise.
ahaha, noise reduction. love it!
There's a C-SPAN 3 ???
ESPN 8... the OCHO !!!
A squirrel that can water ski AND talk on a cell phone!
Man, I need to break out that DVD.
That's CBS' White House correspondant Bill Plante and he should be repremanded for his "too cool for school" stunt.
He should be honored by noting how pointless Gibbs' press conferences are.
He should be banded from WH press conferences for the remainder of the week! Regardless of your political standing, or like/dislike for Gibbs, this man is speaking for the executive branch of your country. Despite past/present handling of the job, it is still a position to be held to the utmost respect.
Ha! He's being raked over the coals in the comments to his own story:
http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2009/05/13/politics/politicalhotsheet/entry5011752.shtml
Ihope for his sake it was actually Obama calling. Who the hell is so important that you have to leave a White House press briefing?
At least he left the room when he took the call :P
Actually, he left the room after taking the call which is still very rude.
I agree, just ban him a bit, and if he repeats ban his whole network for a bit, it's pathetic, their job is specifically getting news about the whitehouse, and they can't even do that without ringing phones? Then they should be janitor, or CEO of GM or something.
"He should be banded from WH press conferences for the remainder of the week! Regardless of your political standing, or like/dislike for Gibbs, this man is speaking for the executive branch of your country. Despite past/present handling of the job, it is still a position to be held to the utmost respect."
banned* for one thing. For another thing, this isn't school where we're taking finals and all kiddies are told to turn off all noise makers before they enter the room or where cell phones and the like are confiscated before the exam. This is the real world where grownups live and have real world issues and if someone has an emergency and needs to take a call, then that's the way it is.
I like the fact how Gibbs tried to distract reporters from talking about the not-to-be-published torture photos by this action.
they were going to, but they realized you couldn't see the ultra-terrifying caterpillar stalking its prey in the photo, and this detracted from the real horror of the torture that was inflicted upon the innocents.
Plus most of the photos accidentally included shots of a hot meal, blankies, foot baths, ACLU care packages, and muffins (just the tops).
The press and administration in this country are a joke.
I would feel better if they were a joke.
It's actually worse...
Subject-verb-object agreement error.
At least a joke you can laugh at, the fact that this is the actual administration and the idiot press reporting it make me weep.
I stand corrected, you are both right, and it is very very sad.
wow, even people at the white house behave like school kids with all the jeering and clamor. that says a lot about your country.
@Mike
Well I don't know where you are from but I have been in the room with a gaggle of plenty of foreign dignitaries from plenty of different countries. It isn't much different. The Russkies are still my favorite. They take the whole "we really don't give a shit" look to the next level.
In fact since you have the balls to lay down that kind of statement, where are you from? Maybe I can pull up a memory of a small group of people that I will take as a representative sample of your whole country so I can make a snide statement about you and yours?
For a moment I found this entertaining but then realized that I don't give a flying f*&k about what goes on in the Press Room (i.e. the Bull Shit Excuse Room).
This is why I hate the theater. When I watch a movie and someone's phone goes off...I wish I have a BB gun to shoot their eyes out for ruining my movie. It says at the beginning to silence your phone...why are people so rude. I would not just take the phone...I'd smash it. And the second guy...I would tackle him to the ground and shove that phone up his ass.
you might want to look into some anger management classes, here is a link to get you started. http://www.apa.org/topics/controlanger.html
...you think phones are rude...
...but that shooting people is perfectly acceptable...
...i am sure that they wouldnt mind you ruining their movie with violent mutilation at all...
What's a blackberry gun?
RIM makes guns now?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BB_gun
NO don't take anger management, somebody has to not take that crap
They haven't fired Gibbs yet?
That's what everybody that clued into politics from any ideological point of view is thinking!
Wow. All the latest in spy tech gadgets and they can't get a cell phone jammer installed in the press room? I take a small $80 jammer with me to the movies. Never hear a single cell pone go off and everybody just thinks they get bad reception in the theater. Best $80 I ever spent.
I put my phone on silent...I'll know who to look for when the babysitter can't reach me if something happens to my kid..idiot
If you go to a movie you make a commitment not to be reached for 2 hours. That is a decision that you make. Having somebody pull out a phone with a bright screen in a dark theater is just as annoying as the ringer. If you're worried about your kid (or your babysitter) then you should stay home.
Jonathan,
Call back when you're a parent. Or, when you're a decent parent.
Phones have a vibrate setting for a reason. No, you shouldn't be texting randomly during a movie, but being contacted in case of an emergency with your children is a good thing.
How often do you hear cellphones go off in the theater anyway?
@GTA
You'll be able to reach them during the trailers and after the movie. I turn it off then. and it has gotten bad over the past couple of years. More and more people have become pretty brash and will answer and talk on their cell phones in the middle of the movie.
Cellphone jammers are a federal crime, just do you are warned, watch your ass.
8
so*
Yes, for all the crap about "I need my phone on just in case my wife is abducted by terrorists or the babysitter eats the kids" I've NEVER seen anyone leave an event where they couldn't get good reception.
What if you have a heartattack and nobody can call the paramedics? Joke would be on you huh.
And heartattacks happens all the time, but terrorist abducting moviegoers not so much, maybe cheney's deathgang might abduct you, or the CIA in foreign countries, but terrorist - not likely.
On the subject of cellphone jammers I read:
'Although the punishment for using one is a $11,000 fine and one-year in jail, no one has actually been charged with this crime.'
Mind you if you jam the presidents blackberry or the CIA's chief's phone, or the pentagon's top general's phone I think your chances of being fined go dramatically up probably, and the chance of losing your job as press spokesperson while doing that also I imagine.
The press and the democratic administration laughing it up. It's like a match made in heaven!
Yeah, maybe they'll put their noses as far up the Dems' butts as they put them up Bush's butt when he used 9/11 to justify breaking the country financially to finish his dad's war.
As punishment, they should send this guy to Iraq to find those "massive stockpiles of WMDs" and "caches of enriched nuclear fuel."
Oh...that's right...there were none.
@NickP, great idea. can you link me to the one you suggest? Or at least the name. Thanks
A. Turn off the damned phones.
B. Gibbs showed extreme arrogance there--amazing how full of themselves they become when empowered...
C. The second guy deserves a medal. This administration should not be intimidating anyone, especially the press which does nothing but kiss its ass anyway. However the 2nd guy is probably now on Napalitono's list for not dropping to his knees and worshipping Obama's tool...
D. Link for the jammer pls. $80 is not much to spend for that kind of serenity!
What's arrogant about maintaining control of a meeting. He was polite the first time. There's nothing more arrogant than someone with so much self importance that they not only leave their cell phone ringer on in a meeting, but actually answer it, in the front row of a televised event no less. That guy is getting appropriately rebuked for his stupidity in the comments to his own column about the incident.
Gogarty, while the reporters were out of line, it is was inappropriate and immature for Gibbs to seize cellphones. It's not a middle school classroom, its the WH Press Room. The professional thing would have been to ask those reporters to leave; not seize their cellphones. Besides, the press secretary is just a spokesperson. Seizing a reporter's cellphone may have been a joke, but its not something he can technically do. He's not a teacher in a classroom.
I guess if liberals really were "dirty communists" the secret service could have just rounded them all up and had them shot, yeah that would teach them to not be incredibly rude and unprofessional.
Seriously though, this was bad form on the part of the press core.
I should also point out that any flap about releasing or not releasing the photos, wouldn't be necessary if someone wouldn't have made the bad decision to justify/rationalize the torture of prisoners, someone else wouldn't have followed the order as it was unconstitutional, and some other incredibly dumb person wouldn't have had the nerve to want pictures.
Their cheaper now.
http://www.r2hobbies.com/proddetail.php?prod=deph82006
They're. Wasn't thinking. Brain fart.
They're. Sorry wasn't thinking. Brain fart.
now that's what i call subliminal messaging right there! (in the link)
i know it'S almost as bad
as the Myriad of all
the big tObacco companies
trying to Keep our smoking
with all thEir flashy advertisements.
Wow, kids in HS have better cell phone management than this.
I'll say...we've learned to hide it, and text only when the time is right. Good old high school...although in college, you can txt all you want, and the professor doesn't care, lol.
Ha, he threw the phone once he opened up the 2nd door.
Hope the call didn't end up being really important. Like his wife was in an accident or something.
Because as we all know the reason we keep cell phone ringers on 24/7 and choose to answer them when we're doing things like ordering at a restaurant is just so we know when someone's in an accident (because of course we can help them FROM THE RESTAURANT).
Its because everyone needs to feel important. My god what did people ever do before cell phones.
very funny, at least the guy is a good sport about it all
If Bill Plante did that to anyone else I'd think it was low class, but Robert Gibbs is so pathetic it's funny. And I thought Scott McClellan was bad...
Props to him for walking out, example of this admin. thinking they can take whatever they want form us. Plus it was an important phone call, he was getting a tip about the presidents appointment for Supreme Court.
get a cellphone jammer!
more props to Gibbs had he crushed it under the heel of his foot...alas he wimped out.
wow. i felt like i was in a grade school classroom watching that.
I don't understand why people here bashing this guy For God's Sake hes having fun with reporters, But yes you should know when and where you should have your phone on/off/vibe......etc
I bet if he would gotten pissed off and thrown them out FAUX NEWS will been all over with headlines as such "Is Gibbs a socialist? Hes kicking reporters out because they don't want to report obama's secret agenda of taking over the world.
Just relax people i rather see this then seeing press conference about being scared with the color coded "terror alerts" like we seeing the last 8 years.
I love America so as should you! Peace, Love and Beer