Feb.
15th, 2005 WASHINGTON
- A week has gone by and more has happened than I can
mention.
I have acclimatized to the workings of CongressDaily (CD),
and am
in a pretty set routine. Here's an insider's view at how CD does
it twice a day:
When I arrive at 9 a.m., usually my executive editor, Keith,
and
senior editors Jack and Chuck are busy searching newspaper
Web sites and e-mails for potential news stories dealing
with
Congress
or congressmen. I join them, searching several newspaper
sites
(including The State) for news about new congressional
candidates
or visiting congressmen. I turn in a list of potential news
items to
Chuck or Keith, who assign worthy stories to other
editors
or me to rewrite as news briefs for our AM or PM
edition,
depending on how late it is.
While I wait for stories to come in, work becomes really
slow. A
few days ago, though, I was assigned to help the other CD
intern with
our biennial "Where Are They Now" segment, where
we track down
outgoing representatives and senators. The runaround trying
to find
them can be excruciating at times, but it definitely fills
time that
otherwise would be very wasted.
Around 3 p.m., our PM edition is posted on the Web, and
it's my job to deliver a number of printed versions to various
staffers and
departments in National Journal's Watergate office, which
occupies the
floors above and below us. It's my "paper route," - a
crazy path in and out of cubicles looking for reporters
and editors.
My
co-worker Mikala is very happy that I'm there to take that
job from
her.
Even though I have barely adjusted to the routine, Keith
has
already sent me on assignment to cover two press conferences.
They
are written as news briefs for the AM edition, which means
no byline. But it's still an opportunity to get my feet wet
without the pressure
of total coverage.
So far I have covered an airline industry press
conference protesting a new airport security fee and a
conference
held by two senators announcing a farm subsidy reform bill.
For the
most part I listen and gather lots of facts, but for the
airline
conference I fielded a question, citing an expert's opinion
about
airlines being frustrated with having no say in how security
is
handled. (It was a lot more elaborate than that, but that
is the basic
gist) The leader of the conference said he would have to "quarrel
with [my] presumption," and gave me a more politically
correct take on airline
relations with the Transportation Security Agency.
I felt embarrassed and exhilarated at the same time. Part
of me
expected the rest of the press corps to give me dirty looks
for going
off-topic, and the other part of me expected cheers that
I wasn't
asking "So, would you and your counterparts like to
restate your
presentation in one sentence for the fourth time?"
Don't
worry, I'm
not trying to be a prying, firebrand journalist. I just
have noticed
that press conferences seem to be more about the PR and
less about
discussing facts and the future.
Another of my assignments is to hound
senators after
"policy lunches."
Every Tuesday I go to the Hill and deliver packets
to field reporters (who are all very nice, by the way), but I also go
to hunt down senators after these lunches. Each party has its own
separate lunch to discuss policies on current issues, and my job is to
find senators as they leave the lunch and ask them about policies
discussed and other issues. I usually have to fight a mob of people
shoving microphones in senators' faces, as evidenced by my picture of
Senator Graham to the right.
As an aside, I really enjoy listening to
our senator talk to reporters. It may just be a Southern thing, but
he speaks so much slower than most politicians I've talked
to. I think that's just so his message will be clear, as he is
breaking from Republican orthodoxy by with his ideas for
Social Security overhaul. True to that South Carolina
independence evidenced by Inez Tenenbaum, Graham said he and his Social
Security ideas are "a one-man island."
Usually, though, party leaders make it easy for the policy
lunch
reporters by speaking at the "stake-out," which
is this impromptu
podium near the lunch rooms where reporters amass. Senate
Majority
Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., usually speaks before the lunch,
and
Senate Minority Leader Reid, D-Nev., and Sen. Rick Santorum,
R-Pa.,
speak afterwards. I got to ask them both about Senator Graham's
ideas, since they were the first things I thought of.
What
really
amazes me is not the
somewhat-personal-but-still-politically-ambivalent answers
Santorum
and Reid gave me, but rather the sheer fact that I, an
intern whose
credential card is only a week old, could field questions
to some of
the most influential men in American politics today. It
still gives
me the chills. So that is how my work day usually shapes out.
Away from
work, I
have attended various Democratic groups' meetings at the
DNC meeting
to elect Howard Dean, and saw him speak several times.
I've gotten
used to the metro, not before making many wrong turns.
Learning the
city's street system (Numbers up and down, right to left;
Letters left
to right, bottom to top; States diagonally!) is easy on
paper, not so
easy walking around.
And I plan on going to a lot more
political
events with my intern crew, since we all have Senate
passes that are
good for nearly anything. I plan on going to CPAC, and
hopefully I'll
meet up with Tommy Preston, my fellow Gamecock who I
just learned got
a scholarship to attend the conference! Way to go, Tommy!
Maybe we
can listen to Ann Coulter rant like old times.
So that's my week. I promise not to unload so much on
the next post. But like this post, Washington exhibits
a lot more in a week
than you would expect. I'm still amazed how some of the seasoned
journalists here can stand the information overload sometimes.
There's always some debate or forum happening here; it's like a 68 sq.
mi. college campus. Anyone who says Washington is
out of ideas and
not going anywhere is flat out wrong.
Until the next post,
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