Opinion: Ticket Pool Report: Aboard Air Force One with Pres. Bush

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As The Ticket has explained before, part of the duty of covering politicians in public life is sharing so-called pool duty. Representatives of each media like print, TV, photography, etc. are chosen to cover certain events and provide notes back to their absent colleagues.

We’ve been providing full copies of the written notes from pool reports in recent weeks such as a Pool Report here and a Pool Report here. Today, The Ticket has a special treat courtesy of our colleagues at the Swamp and Ken Herman, the White House correspondent for Cox Newspapers.

Herman videotaped a recent day’s tour of duty as a print pool reporter as President Bush traveled from Washington on Air Force One to Atlanta for a closed congressional fundraiser, which the former Texas governor has proven so successful at, in terms of attracting dollars from party faithful in recent months.

The video from Herman via the Swamp is about three minutes, 40 seconds long and gives a glimpse inside at least part of the president’s plane, as well as the fare offered to traveling media and the actual boredom of traveling with the nation’s chief executive but being barred from witnessing his actual event.

Also, readers should note that the media on such travels do not ride on taxpayer dollars. The news organizations are billed for their share of the costs.

-- Andrew Malcolm