UPDATE: Reporter John Harwood has raised the stakes, narrowing the “anonymous WH adviser” to the more specific “an Obama adviser.” (Huff Post):

“My comments quoting an Obama adviser about liberal bloggers/pajamas weren’t about the LGBT community or the marchers,” he wrote. “They referred more broadly to those grumbling on the left about an array of issues in addition to gay rights, including the war in Afghanistan and health care and Guantanamo — and whether all that added up to trouble with Obama’s liberal base…

…But while the administration certainly appreciates progressive new media, it remains wary of it. Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel, in particular, regards the online left as impractical and counterproductive. While Communications Director Anita Dunn and Press Secretary Robert Gibbs both have worked hard to make new media a fixture of the Obama communications strategy, the West Wing favors the old media guard — granting them access and, in the case of Harwood, anonymous quotes in attempts to advance its agenda.

Jane Hamsher:

This is what happens when journalists allow sources to take cheap shots from behind the cloak of anonymity granted for no good reason. The source doesn’t have to own it if it backfires, and the journalist gets stuck with the reputation for sloppy and erroneous reporting if they decide to dump it on you. Which is exactly what’s happening here.

NBC should release a statement either defending Harwood’s reporting on the matter or retract it.   And the White House should identify Harwood’s source, because it doesn’t do much good to claim “we love you, we really really love you” and still protect the person who said it.

OK, now the White House has officially called CNBC reporter John Harwood a liar, denying any human being at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue said progressive bloggers (which includes those LGBT bloggers critical of the admin) were the “Internet left fringe. “From the Plumline:
The White House is strongly denying a report making the rounds that it views gay critics and bloggers as part of an “Internet left fringe,” with a senior adviser asserting to me that this sentiment “does not reflect White House thinking at all.”

Yesterday, CNBC correspondent John Harwood set off a min-firestorm on the left after he claimed that the White House views gay and blogospheric criticism of the administration’s foot-dragging on gay rights issues as part of the “Internet left fringe.” Harwood claimed that an anonymous adviser said that “those bloggers need to take off the pajamas, get dressed and realize that governing a closely divided country is complicated and difficult.”

Asked for comment, White House senior communications adviser Dan Pfeiffer emailed:

“That sentiment does not reflect White House thinking at all, we’ve held easily a dozen calls with the progressive online community because we believe the online communities can often keep the focus on how policy will affect the American people rather than just the political back-and-forth.”

It’s too late. Someone said the remarks. Someone has to own them and inside the White House they know who the “someone” is and can release them to respond to this. That was not forthcoming in Dan Pfeiffer’s email. As far as the claim that the White House has the utmost respect for bloggers aside from putting some on its mailing list and holding phone conferences, the President himself made his thoughts clear just a short time ago, when discussing the problems print journalism is going through:

The Rocky Mountain News in Denver ceased operations, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer now publishes only on the Internet, and several large newspaper corporations have filed for bankruptcy, including the Tribune Co., owner of the Chicago Tribune and the Los Angeles Times.

Mr. Obama said he noted the trend. “I am concerned that if the direction of the news is all blogosphere, all opinions, with no serious fact-checking, no serious attempts to put stories in context, that what you will end up getting is people shouting at each other across the void but not a lot of mutual understanding,” the President said.

Wow. It’s all shouting. I don’t recall virtually screaming at the POTUS. I disagree with the Patience Agenda and stated clearly why. Opposition does not equal lack of context. Glenn Greenwald is spot-on today:

Every standard form of Washington behavior is on display here:  reporters like Harwood with absolutely no standards who grant anonymity to pass along playground insults.  Obama officials — part of the Most Transparent Administration Ever — who seem incapable of speaking about anything without cowardly hiding behind anonymity, even for on-the-record briefings.  Snide, Fox-News-mimicking dismissals from the Democratic establishment of any discontent or criticism of the President as coming from the fringe, Far Left.  And particular disdain for any instruments — blogs, marches and  protests — which the White House cannot control, which exist independent of the tightly coordinated, Rahm-dominated “veal pen” messaging system to which so many leading progressive organizations have meekly submitted themselves in order to ensure their own continued access, funding and future career options within the Democratic establishment.

The only thing remarkable about the comments Harwood passed on is that anyone would be surprised by them.  In that regard, the furor over Obama’s complete inaction on gay issues vividly illustrates the same elements that shape political controversies in virtually every other area — from war to civil liberties to health care and beyond:    

  • Pretty words and inspiring pageantry from the President, accompanied by endless inaction or contradictory policies;
  • Hordes of people who believe in their heart of hearts that the administration is led by such a nice, just and likable man that it couldn’t possibly be guilty of anything worse than a little benign political calculation (just as the evangelical, Texas-swaggering Bush did for Red State loyalists, the urbane, charming and highly intelligent Obama possesses all the cultural markers of a good and decent person for Blue State loyalists, and thus simply can’t be capable of anything malicious or destructive — there’s a reason Bill Maher tried to remind liberals:  ”He’s your president, not your boyfriend”); 
  • Organizations (exemplified by the truly dreadful HRC) that suck funding out of progressives and serve as liberal validators of administration conduct whose overaching devotion is to the Democratic Party and the administration rather than the causes they claim to promote (fortunately, civil liberties groups are the exception, as they have remained steadfast, unapologetic, independent and principled in harshly criticizing Obama); and,
  • Deeply personalized scorn directed at those who try to hold Democrats and the Obama administration accountable — since they’re the ones who control all branches of government with huge majorities — rather than devote all their energies to the cheap and easy partisan task of ridiculing and blaming a marginalized, impotent conservative movement which is a small minority and currently wields no power in Washington.

I have no idea who the person is who said this to Harwood or how influential or obscure s/he might be, but whoever it is, that person is anything but unusual or aberrational.  Quite the opposite.

What needs to happen is “anonymous adviser” needs to come out of the closet as it were, and man up and offer a resignation if this kind of statement is wholly against White House thinking.