Satirist
stripped
of White House
press credential

By John Breneman

Another fake reporter was booted from the White House briefing
room today when investigative satirist Arturo DeMaunchie of
the Humor Gazette News Service was stripped of his day pass
and told not to let the door hit his ass on the way out.

DeMaunchie — believed to be an alias for Humor Gazette editor
Reid Page (also an alias) — is the latest victim of a crackdown
on White House access following the revelation that a creepy
bald alleged gay-prostitute Republican stooge calling himself
Jeff Gannon had somehow obtained press credentials.

Like Gannon (whose real name is James Guckert and who owns
a Web site called HotMilitaryStud.com), DeMaunchie drew attention
to himself by asking occasional oddball questions.

But unlike Gannon — memorably seen asking Bush how he plans
to work with Democrats who seemed to have "divorced themselves
from reality" — the Humor Gazette reporter was deemed
to have gone too far when he shouted, "Mr. President,
how can I get me some of that Armstrong Williams money?!?"

DeMaunchie (who owns Web sites called HotSatireStuds.com
and HumorHunks.org) had filed a series of exclusives critical
of the administration, including "President
drops a comic bomb" and
"Bush received faulty intelligence from God."
He raised eyebrows at a recent press conference by asking,
"Mr. President, how strongly do you support the God-given
right of every fetus to own a gun?"

While most media analysts dismiss DeMaunchie as harmless
comic relief, the Guckert affair is viewed as a significant
breach of White House security and ethics.

Critics say it is the latest in a series of surreal incidents
— PR payoffs to conservative pundits, fake town hall-style
meetings, fake Medicare "news reports" filed by
fake reporters and deadly distortion of the threat posed by
non-existence WMDs — that illustrate the challenges of covering
a White House that has divorced itself from reality.

Now three out of four pundits are calling for an investigation
into who planted this loose Gannon on the company softball
team.

Related stories:

Bush front
group attacks satire publication’s credibility   (Aug.
25, 2004)

White House
smear campaign targets Humor Gazette   (March
31, 2004)