The Witch in the White House

Added to post on Jan. 31: Enjoyed this interview with the new press secretary. It's with an old friend, so it's a very favorable environment, but that intelligent, competent Willow vibe is not reduced by this:

It’s been 10 days since Joe Biden was inaugurated president of the United States.

We need a Washington press corps that will hold him accountable. And we need a president whose administration speaks straight and clearly, answering reasonable questions. Being president means you’re a lightning rod for criticism—and as has been said, if you can’t stand that heat, get out of the kitchen.

Still, one of the many odd aspects of the recent odd administration of Donald Trump was the way in which press briefings at the White House began, and then how they ground to a halt. Apparently, neither Trump nor his minions saw answering questions as a part of what government should do. Overall, the White House held few press briefings, with one Trump press secretary giving exactly zero during her tenure.

White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki during her first press briefing on Jan. 20, 2021. She has giving a briefing every business day since--a sharp contrast to the previous administration. All images on this post from Wikimedia Commons, both of these are screen shots from White House video.

I just watched the official White House You Tube video of Jen Psaki’s first press briefing, held the evening of Jan. 20. And then I watched samples of the two initial Trump press briefings—the odd crowd size rant at an unscheduled Saturday session on Jan. 21, 2017, and the first official press briefing on Jan. 23. They were both by then White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer.

Sean Spicer at a press berating session.

The contrast between the Sean Crazy Show and the Psaki Fact Briefing was clear. Sean didn’t get along well with reporters—but then again, Sean was telling outright and obvious lies. Remember the bizarre, fact-denying narrative of crowd size during those odd first days of the Trump presidency? It was a foreshadowing of many strange days to come, of President Trump urging Americans to ingest bleach or altering a weather map with a Sharpie.

Sean Spicer, what a guy! And he was followed by three female press secretaries, none known for their factual truth telling.

Future governor of Arkansas, Sarah Huckabee Sanders.

There was Sarah Huckabee Sanders, who famously claimed that she had heard from “countless” members of the FBI about how grateful they were when President Trump fired FBI director James Comey. (Maybe zero counts as countless?) And Sarah is now on her way to becoming governor of Arkansas, heaven help us.

Stephanie Grisham

Next in line was Stephanie Grisham, who served for about a year and gave exactly zero press briefings. I think we should demand a refund of her government salary—White House press secretaries are named by the president, but as government employees, they work for us, and a press secretary who spends about a year never speaking publicly with the press in the briefing room is not fulfilling her job.

Kayleigh McEnany--I shall smile and I shall lie and then I shall fade away.

Then there was Kayleigh McEnany. What to say about her? In the middle of a pandemic, she defended the U.S. leaving the WHO because of it’s “clear bias towards China.” McEnany is no ninny—she’s an educated woman, but she seemed to think sniping at the press was her role.

Now, we have Jen Psaki, a veteran of the Obama administration, speaking to reporters in the White House briefing room. She gives a briefing every business day, which seems like a good thing for press secretary to do. She speaks calmly and factually—in listening to her first briefing, held on Jan. 20, I didn’t detect any point where she clearly lied or deliberately mislead the press.

And she didn’t get lost in irrelevancies. There were no wild claims about crowd size, nor berating the press for imagined slights.

What a breath of fresh air. I don’t want the press to go all euphoric—their job is to hold the powers-that-be accountable, and it’s inevitable nice old Joe will have to make hard and controversial decisions that Psaki will have to defend. Reporters need to ask her hard questions, but based on her first 10 days on the job, I think she’ll handle them calmly and competently without resorting to carpet bombing attacks on the media.

She’s off to a good start. Forgive me for this, but to me, she looks and sounds like Willow from "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" who grew up and moved to Washington after attending UCS (University of California—Sunnydale). She has more confidence now, but still has the same kind of nerdy, intelligent demeanor.

And after the craziness of the past four years, it’s kind of a comfort to have a calm, smart, powerful and competent witch as White House press secretary.

Alyson Lee Hannigan (left) who played Willow on "Buffy the Vampire Slayer," an mage from her Buffy days, and Jen Psaki (right) from when she was a wee lass working in the Obama Administration. Clearly the same person. Witches can be tricky.