News conferences like Putins
By Hannah S. Chapman
February 18 at 6:00 AM
... Under Putin, the Kremlin has built a media empire centered around the idea of information as entertainment. Access to the president is limited to circuslike news conferences attended primarily by regime supporters who ask the president softball questions. The most recent of these conferences, held in December, included questions about stray animals, chess and kvass, a traditional drink made from fermented bread. One reporter even asked Putin how it felt to be “the most influential person in the world” ...
... Trump and Spicer are giving priority to conservative and non-mainstream news outlets, allowing questions first from such places as Lifezette, Breitbart, Christian Broadcasting and Newsmax before turning to the Associated Press, CBS or CNN ...
By framing these shifted priorities as expanding access, the Trump administration wants to portray these changes as increasing transparency. Increasing the number of news outlets with access to the White House, however, does not necessarily translate into more transparency. Rather, it reduces the platform given to professional journalists who have the resources to hold the government accountable to the people.
All that can be seen in Putin’s annual news conference. There, more than a thousand reporters from around the country and abroad vie for Putin’s attention. This carefully orchestrated event is populated primarily by state-owned and pro-state news outlets who ask easy questions to grab Putin’s attention and avoid hard-hitting questions aimed at upholding norms of presidential transparency. Professional, independent journalists are pushed aside to reduce the possibility of opposition and challenge ...
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2017/02/18/trumps-news-conferences-look-a-lot-like-putins-should-you-worry/?utm_term=.88bba1d11955