the kicker

Take Our Pundits To Work Day

February 24, 2009

White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs brought MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski (and Morning Joe viewers) on a “behind the scenes” tour of his office this morning. Apart from the actual seeing of the space (new-looking beige carpets, staff hard at work at their desks, a fireplace in Gibbs’s office), the segment wasn’t particularly revealing. Highlights included:

BREZEZINSKI (picks up pile of neck ties on Gibbs’s office sofa): Look, Joe. [Gibbs] has ties just to make sure he looks pretty for all of his live shots.

GIBBS: You like this tie? I thought you might like those ties.

SCARBOROUGH: I like the one you have on…

And:

BRZEZINSKI: What has surprised you the most about dealing with the media from the podium as opposed to on the campaign trail?”

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GIBBS: You know, I knew this would be the case but every day there is a group of folks in here that give me a notebook about this thick on probably anywhere from 30 to 50 issues that I have to know because I could get asked anything when I walk out there. So I have to do a lot of reading and preparing to understand that they could ask me anything from the economic crisis to Afghanistan and anywhere in between…

And that’s “as opposed to on the campaign trail?”

Liz Cox Barrett is a writer at CJR.