‘Which country is more open and transparent?’

Via John McGlynn comes this exchange at the State Department press briefing on Monday:

MR. KELLY: Good afternoon. Let me start off by just kind of updating you where we are today in terms of the U.S.-China Strategic and Economic Dialogue, which you all know started today. The Secretary hosted a dinner last night for Chinese State Councilor Dai Bingguo. They discussed the agenda for today. And as you know, this dialogue is being co-hosted with the Department of Treasury. …

The Secretary will hold a private meeting with State Councilor Dai tonight, following the conclusion of today, the first day of the S&ED.

And this meeting, again, will allow them to review the day’s discussions, today’s discussions, and look ahead to the work tomorrow.

I think, as you also know, we’re going to arrange a conference call with a few officials from State and Treasury. That’ll be at 4:45. I think you’ve gotten that – the details on how to sign on and participate in that call.

QUESTION: That call is on the record?

MR. KELLY: That call, I believe, is on background.

QUESTION: Just a point of order here: The Chinese officials who are briefing
are briefing on the record.

MR. KELLY: Mm-hmm.

QUESTION: Which country is more open and transparent? (Laughter.)

MR. KELLY: I take your concerns on board and I’ll see what we can do.

QUESTION: I hope you do, because I think you should be embarrassed, actually.

MR. KELLY: Well, I don’t know if we’re embarrassed, but I do take your concerns very seriously. And with that, I’ll – I will answer your questions seriously.

Those who make up America’s imperial court are so routine in their habits now, they apparently don’t even know how crooked they appear.

Author: Scott Horton

Scott Horton is editorial director of Antiwar.com, director of the Libertarian Institute, host of Antiwar Radio on Pacifica, 90.7 FM KPFK in Los Angeles, California and podcasts the Scott Horton Show from ScottHorton.org. He’s the author of the 2017 book, Fool’s Errand: Time to End the War in Afghanistan and editor of The Great Ron Paul: The Scott Horton Show Interviews 2004–2019. He’s conducted more than 5,000 interviews since 2003. Scott lives in Austin, Texas with his wife, investigative reporter Larisa Alexandrovna Horton. He is a fan of, but no relation to the lawyer from Harper’s. Scott’s Twitter, YouTube, Patreon.

7 thoughts on “‘Which country is more open and transparent?’”

  1. Answer: It's not the United States, not even under President Obama The Divine, aka The One From Whom All Blessings Flow!

  2. Still, you've got to ask yourself – how supine is a journalist who permits himself to be TOLD if he can or can't write down something he is told?

    Too scared about losing 'access', people like the person who asked "QUESTION: That call is on the record?" simply become court stenographers. Reporter-whores. Treponema JudithMillerii – the syphilis of the Fourth Estate.

    As someone who sees the mainswamp press as an arm of the ponerocratic system, I am never seriously surprised when journalists administer professional blowjobs to the power cliques: after all, their editors have owners to contend with, and the owners are part of the recipients of government largesse (all those political ads, and all government 'programme promotion'… tens of billions of dollars a year: imagine if the NYT didn't get 'Army of One' full-age ads).

    Any person with a sense of honour would simply cease to be a part of such as system, but looking at Tom Friedman, David Brooks and their ilk, perhaps those with a sense of honour have already left (exceptions: Helen Thomas and Gretchen Morgenstern).

    Cheerio

    GT

    I would hate to think of myself as having an 'ilk'… even the ilk was Fred Reed, Marc Faber, Ben Tripp, William Lind and Murray Rothbard.

  3. No one country is open and transparent.Everyone doing cheating and all the fake with the people.But, you can say the Birmingham is good as compared to others.

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