Last week during the terrible fires in California, the Federal Emergency Management Agency held a press conference to discuss it’s response to the disaster. After the mess that was Katrina in New Orleans, FEMA figured it needed to put on a good face and appear to be doing good job.

The best way to have a press conference make you look good is to control it by using your own people and that’s exactly what they did. You still need to let the press in on the event, but you don’t really want to take direct questions as they may be to revealing, so you notify them of a 800 number to call and listen in on the conference. You only give 15 minutes advanced notice of the conference so there’s no way for reporters to attend in time. Then you fill the conference room with employees of the agency, turn the camera on and start the employees asking soft questions.

Sounds like a simple screw-up by some peon in the agency doesn’t it? That’s exactly what they want you to think too. You see, if you look a little closer, you just might understand what may have really just happened. First, the person giving the press conference is the #2 at FEMA, you don’t risk the #1 with a test like this. Second, the idiot responsible for this circus, the director of external affairs for FEMA, Pat Philbin, was scheduled to move on to director of public affairs for the director of national intelligence. You don’t get offered that job unless you know people and things deep inside the government.

What I see in this event is an administration attempt to try what can and can’t be done in the realm of press conference control. This particular plan failed spectacularly, but don’t think for a minute they aren’t going to go back to the drawing board and try it again with a different angle. They would love nothing more than the ability to write the news directly and cut out the reporter middleman. The current administration clearly believes it’s above the law and can do no wrong.

It’s getting to the point where it’s harder and harder to find another country and say they are more evil than us.

Meh!