gigot, we hope to see you all here next week. gigot, we hope to see you all captioned by closed captioning services, inc. >> on fox news watch. >> i think it's on the website, if you want to see it. the obama white house takes another step in side stepping the press acting as its own news service, with videos, pictures, opinion and twitter blasts, all positive and unfiltered. has the mainstream media ignored the issue? the president's supreme dom knee makes her rounds with lawmakers and mum to the media yet, this picture gets some in the press crying foul, really? five california teens take heat for their pride in the red, white and blue. did the media coverage add to the controversy? efforts in the gulf continue as the oil spill blame game played out on capitol hill. is the president playing along? and an old man and his old men's magazine try to stay relevant in the internet age.

36-24-36 with a couple of extra dimensions. president obama began the week by introducing his nominee for supreme court justice to the nation and to the press. elena kagan, spent time with members of congress and ignoring the media. she did sit down and answer some questions on camera. >> public service has been an opportunity to take my legal skills and to take my legal training and work on tomorrow of the really important public policy issues of our time and i did that both in the white house and or in the administration of president clinton and justice department as solicitor again in this administration. >> jon: that interview was not conducted by a journalist, but by a white house staffer. posted on the white house website. making concerns that the obama administration is making every effort to side step the press to put out an unfiltered message

that tries to make the president and his people look good in every circumstance. josh, a white house reporter for politico.com joins us now from washington. josh, this has been a recurring theme of ours on news watch and i know you've done a lot of work on it as well. the white house takes its own photos and puts out its own videos and twitter feeds. where is the transparency? >> well, john, you know, i really have no problem with them putting out their own photos and doing their own interviews if they want to. the issue is really do the regular press, the independent press get access to the same thing and are able to present it, the way they want to present it? in this case, with the supreme court nominee, elena kagan, that was emphatically not the case, she's off limits to interviews from the press which is usually the case with most supreme court nominees and all we have is sort of official news portrait from the white house. >> jon: well, there hasn't been an official white house press conference by last summer,

countered that saying they've done all of these individual interviews. do they counter balance? >> yeah, i don't know if the press conferences are actually all that important, but what really seems some of the regular white house reporters is that president obama really doesn't take questions on a day-to-day basis. you know, most presidents, even president bush who wasn't incredibly transparent usually took questions every day or two while he's at the white house in the course of his regular event and president obama does not like to do that. i don't know if it's press strategy or just personal preference. the white house staff has said that they feel it slows things down to have to bring the press pool in and out, but at any rate, the president shies away from that and as a result you have reporters feeling like they don't get to know what the president's thoughts are really on the news of the day. >> jon: does that mean they're busy trying to manage the message they're not living up to the transparency promise? >> i think, you know, in some ways they live up to it. they put officials out to do web

chats. if you take the new media stuff as part of that transparency in terms of the number of online discussions, the number of blog posts they put up. there's an element of transparency to that, but it isn't totally independent transparency, there's no sort of third party person checking what they're doing or making sure that other questions are asked that they might not be comfortable with, so more of an official news. >> jon: that's precisely the point. you know, it's stretching the point, but pravda use today put out the soviet news. if the american people aren't getting it through an independent journalist, what are they getting? >> well, you know, that's a byproduct of the internet age anyone including the white house can put up what they want to put up. the question are the filtering journalist, the legacy media or even members of the new media

getting the same level of access to ask the same questions and i think at times that's been lacking and i know the white house claims they're working on it, but certainly, this in-house kagen interview was a step in the wrong direction. >> jon: josh, thank you. and judy miller, syndicated columnist cal thomas, jim pinkerton fellow new america foundation and news day columnist elliss henican. here is a little about how the media did cover nominee kagen. >> accomplished poker player, opera lover and given that nickname that justice marshal gave to her, she's five foot three, brian. >> she's long been a five foot three powerhouse. >> her interests reflect her openness, she loves softball and poker. >> jon: my mom was five feet so i guess i know from whence she comes. you were shaking your head during josh's interview about the white house and

transparency, you don't seem to agree? >> no, i mean, especially because josh himself has done much of the reporting that supports the view that this white house is really trying to micromanage news in a way that we haven't seen recently and their numbers speak for themselves. 46 q & a's by this president, versus 147 with president bush and 252 with bill clinton. that's, that says all i need to know. >> jon: in the case of elena kagan, jim, we're about to, at least nominate or maybe appoint to the supreme court a woman who could be there what, 30 years or more. shouldn't we get to know her a little bit. know more about her? >> with well, the press would have to be a lot more curious about her than they are. they were all over clarence thomas and his personal life 20 years ago. and yet, the press seems perfectly content to just accept that kagen is a fine person and that's that.

>> jon: why is that, elliss? >> well, listen, lazy reporters. i'm tired, i've got to tell you, about reporters belly aching about this stuff. now what, it's the white house's job to try to sell her and the media's job to go and find out stuff about her and the relationships have ever been thus, we're never satisfied with the access and they always party after party, cal, want to give us-- >> this is like an infomercial, the video that they put out. i expect billy may to come back from the other side and say, buy this product it's kaboom and everything! this is propaganda. they said with yuri and drop-off, he loves jazz and listens to the voice of america, what does that have to do with the supreme court or the law. >> jon: and something else, makes you wonder what it has to do with the supreme court. the wall street journal ran this photo of elena kagan playing softball earlier in the week. it was criticized by doing so launching questions about her sexuality. the journal responded saying the allegations are absurd and the

attempt was not to make connections between her sexual orientation and the photo. what's going on there? >> well, shame, shame, shame on andrew sullivan for raising her sexual preferences whatever they may be. i want to know things about her, her judicial philosophy, not specific things about her, the positions she would take on the court, but her judicial philosophy. the new york times was prevented from sitting in on a class in hunter high school with her brother. another cousin was chided by talking about the fact that the family liked to debate at the table. the white house is trying to shut all that off. you're right, elliss, we do have to do more. >> jon: all right, we have to take a break and you can get more on the stories that we cover. log on to foxnews.com/fox news watch and see and hear some interesting things you won't see here on tv. up next, why did wearing the american flag cause a mainly controversy in california and the media.

. >> high tension in high school. after five teens wearing american flag t-shirts get punished for their pride. the dispute getting major media attention, but has the coverage fanned the flames of controversy? and playboy magazine adds a new eye popping feature. detail next on news watch.

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>> jon: all right. it's an emotional issue, did it get the kind of coverage that it deserved? >> the media should have been asking, why is the school in the united states of america observing a battle between mexico and france? the supreme court has ruled that burning the american flag is legitimately protected speech, but wearing it on a t-shirt is not? how come the reporters aren't asking that. why are you laughing? >> well, of all the issues you could find in that story. >> yeah. >> celebrating cinco de mayo appears to me-- >> it's mott not american for heavens sake. >> let's eat burrito's together. believe me we have a diverse culture and celebrate a lot of stuff. that's not the issue. there's pandering on both sides of this, a symbolically potent issue. nobody has the clean hands. kids did it to make a point and school district can it to make another point. >> you're saying the kids who wear the american flag are culpable for doing something

wrong. >> they did something to poke a finger in their classmates' eye, probably have a right to do it, but not a sweet thing to do. >> and i'm just fascinating by this, the principal violates their constitutional rights and kids express the constitutional rights and in your mind both are bad. >> why don't we nice to each other, kids. >> is it so evil to wear the american flag? >> you have a right to do it. so what do you prove. >> she says. >> you're a patriot? >> roger eber-- >> on the big day. >> jon: roger ebert the film critic, known for point of view. tweeted thursdayly, kids to wear the american flag on the 5th of may should join those who wear a hammer and sickle i'm for school uniform. have a small--

everybody wears the same thing and we won't have the problems. >> is this effectively the school clamping down on free speech. if so defenders of the first amendment ought to be-- >> sure you'd think they'd be all-- this began in 1969 when the sprek in tinker versus des moines decision, kids have a right to wear protest uniforms against the vietnam and main street media said, this is great we know that all protests will always be against the evil conservative establishment. now, they've discovered, there's kind of a counter establishment of conservatives protesting liberals and can't allow that. >> that sums it up. can't add anything to that. >> that's good. >> i'll bet the t-shirts though are made in china, check the labels. >> very busy, and-- >> they have a right to do it, but let's also be nice, how about that. >> thank you, rodney king. >> kumbayah to you, too. >> should that be a media issue with everything going on today. should we focus on this? >> and michelle has said that--

>> a journal i could think of courageous enough to regularly photographs of and maps of american with mexico annexed on, free speech. >> the media should be interested in what the real agenda is-- >> i am not turning to michelle for ethnic understanding, i'm afraid. >> elliss will defend to the death your right to say it. >> jon: is the cleanup hindered or help the oil spill. >> congress looks for the answers to the gulf oil spill and everyone points fingers in the bill spill blame game. is the media playing along? and the president gives advice to new graduates. >> information becomes a-- >> is his media message mixed? answers next on news watch.

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>> coming of age in a 24/7 media environment that bombard us with all kind of content and exposes us to all kind of arguments, some of which don't always rank that high on the truth meter. and with ipods and ipads and xboxes and playstations, none of which i know how to work. [laughter] >> information becomes a distraction, a diverse, a form of entertainment rather than a means of power, emancipation. >> president obama warning graduates about the free flow of information. did we hear the leader of the

free world correctly? he said, cal, that information can be a distraction and a diversion. what are we missing? >> right, what the administration wants to tell you, unfiltered by anybody else. the dirty secret he's talking about fox news channel, limbaugh, levin. he wants to listen to him only. >> this is a parent that doesn't have enough hand to carry the gadgetry. he had the national security administration give him the special blackberry. >> as michael sheerer of time magazine pointed out he does know how to use the machines and has used in the past. i can only agree with cal the perspective of being in the white house has so persuaded him that anything other than what he's telling the american people ought not to be trusted, even the mainstream media isn't reliable enough, that's why they go to our threaten in-house video operation.

>> jon: does it come back to the fact he wants to manage the media 24/7. >> he's smart enough to know he winter do it even though every president wants to. and chutzpa, is that the word, the man, whose technology is responsible for his election in part. he used this new technology better than anyone and the idea he's now having second thoughts about it is interesting. >> i'm not going to try to manage her pronunciation of chut pa. some of the people across this table from time to time. if we're going to be smart media consumers we have to filler silliness out. and this is a guy that had to contend with the allegations of birthers and-- >> on nbc. >> fair enough we don't have to embrace it all naively. >> let a thousand flowers bloom.

>> agreed. >> jon: let's move on to the blame came in capitol him. the guys in charge of british petroleum, tolds spill was caused by the failure of a safety device that company built. and that company said bp was in charge and a third company hired to plug the exploratory well didn't do it right and president obama said something about it on friday. >> bp is committed to pay for the response effort and we will hold them to their obligation. i have to say though, i did not appreciate what i consider to be a ridiculous spectacle during the congressional hearings in this matter. you had executives from bp, halliburton falling over each other to point the finger of blame at somebody else. the american people could not have been impressed with that display and i certainly wasn't. >> what about media reaction to what the president had to say there, elliss. >> kind of well said, right? most people i know blame the

companies that dump the stuff in the water and we've got to divide among the three who did exactly what. but let's make sure we get some ability to pay for that stuff. don't hire 75 million dollar bailout, get rid of that. >> the new york times had a front page story which exposed this administration for granting a lot of rights for drilling without approvals, without the proper licensure. now, if this were the bush administration doing something like this, the media reaction would have been like its reaction to the bush administration's failure on katrina. it would be orgasmic, over the top. obama is basically getting a free pass. >> no, he's not. in fact, i was impressed with the president's remarks on friday when he said there's more than enough blame to go around and some of it is right here in the federal government because of this agency which has been out of control and not, cal, just under obama, but for a long, long time. but judy, if this had happened under the bush administration, i believe that all three networks

would have been there permanently in louisiana covering every oily bird there and instead, it's one more story from washington. >> give it time. >> jon: when we come back, 3-d technology isn't just for the movies anymore. >> a new feature in playboy magazine may make some want to reach out and touch. that's next on news watch. ... for strong bones, i take calcium. but my doctor told me that most calcium supplements...

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>> jon: according to box office, mojo.com, "avatar" is the top film domestically and internationally and the number 3-d movie. a format we'll be seeing in the future. producers are racing to create products and programs to put 3-d programs in your home. and now, playboy magazine is trying 3-d as part of a promotion with hbo and an effort to help it's sagging sales. it comes with 3-d glasses and for those fans that only buy the magazine for the articles. they have a new website called the smoking jacket.com. playboy says you can see everything from the magazine my nis the stuff that will get you in trouble at work. that is a wrap on