Let's Play Stump the Press

Pres. Bush played the press like a violin. That's Howard Kurtz's take on Bush's announcement late yesterday that he had picked John Roberts to replace Sandra Day O'Connor on the Supreme Court -- after dangling false hints in front of a salivating crowd of reporters and bloggers all day long.

A prime-time announcement that bamboozles the press, draws a bigger television audience, knocks Karl Rove off the front page and limits the time for reporters to dig up controversial information?

Not a bad night's work.

As interesting as Bush's pick of the not-so-much-buzzed-about John Roberts -- which will dominate newspapers, magazines, television and blogs for the next two months, or at least until the next missing white woman -- is the choreography. (And how fiendishly clever of White House aides to tell The Washington Post over the weekend that Bush would likely wait until the end of July to give critics less time to shoot at his nominee.)

Maybe we should all start paying more attention to that man behind the curtain.