Political Reporters Give Campaigns Final Cut

I wouldn't do it - simply because I wouldn't want to be a water-carrier for anyone.
But I'd probably just not use quotes and meet with them anyway. It is important to know where a campaign is going and what message they are trying to push.
At some point in the next month or so, someone is going to say something they shouldn't (figuring it would be cut) and it will get out one way or another.

 

In a situation with so much conflict, so many people looking to push their own agenda, you have to chalk this up to a failure at a managerial level. Otherwise, the standard play here is, "Well, Senator X is going on the record about this and you can't?"

After two weeks of The New York Times reading like the Washington Times ("The White House declined to go on record about the alleged flag-burning rituals held in its basement...") I think we'd see the end of this.

 

I agree that it's bad, but it's nothing new. Reporters didn't write about FDR's wheelchair, for instance.

 

Same plotline, different players: http://www.texasobserver.org/cover-story/washington-post-reporter-allows-college-officials-to-alter-story-on-controversial-test

 

No tweets allowed!

http://www.politico.com/blogs/media/2012/07/the-vps-remarks-will-not-be-tweeted-129919.html#.UA7I64994UA.twitter

 

Thinking back on this case, that call a few months ago where a Romney flunkie said on a conference call "We'll have to get back to you on that" on his opinion about some position or another ... it's still a dumb-ass thing for a presidential candidate's campaign to do, to be so unprepared on an issue, but I wonder if they assumed they'd get a do-over or veto power so it didn't matter what their answer was. They would certainly be justified in assuming that, anyway.

 

Interesting question but not sure if we can discuss given the politics ban.

 

I posted this story in the other thread on this topic, and wanted to share it here. (Background: I'm a former sports writer now covering politics.)

I have already run into this once, halfway at least. A presidential campaign staffer asked to see in context the quote I was going to use in a story. A quote from said staffer, no less. Not even a candidate. I begrudgingly complied - which in hindsight I don't feel altogether proud of. In my defense, at the time I was unaware of this practice and wasn't sure exactly why the staffer wanted to see the quote. Although I obviously had a suspicion. Anyway, it didn't wind up an issue because the staffer was fine with the quote. (It was a fairly soft piece anyway. I'm surprised they even asked.)
I will say with certainty that had the staffer asked to alter or eliminate the quote, I would have respectfully declined. I'm still new and naive enough to this side of the business that I don't care about pissing off such sources. And I am not going down that road. You want to be protective of your comments, think of that before you open your mouth. I can handle sources being less than forthcoming. I'm used to that. I'm not going to start editing my copy for them.