White House reporter brings 60 years of experience to campus

By Chhun Sun

In journalism, she is referred as “the first lady of the press.”

Mass communication and journalism professor Tommy Miller describes her as a no-nonsense, hard driving reporter who never asks softball questions to any president.

“When you’re talking about presidents and politics and elections, probably the top two to three people of that subject is Helen Thomas,” Miller said. “Let’s put it this way: I wouldn’t want to be interviewed by Helen Thomas for something I did wrong.”

Thomas, who will speak Friday at the Satellite Student Union at 10:45 a.m. for the Roger Tatarian Symposium, called “Campaign Conversation,” is known to seat front and center at presidential press conferences. Recently, however, President Bush has moved her sit to the back of the room and will not call on her to ask questions, journalism professor Greg Lewis said.

Miller, the journalism department’s Tatarian chair, said when he asked Thomas to speak at the symposium, she was honored because she worked with Tatarian, a Fresno State alumnus who taught journalism here for15 years. The day before she is scheduled to speak, Miller said, she will visit Tatarian’s widow, Eunice, and son, Allan, who both live in Fresno.

“He’s one of the most outstanding editors I’ve ever worked under,” Thomas said of Tatarian by phone from Washington, D.C., where she is currently a news columnist for Hearst Newspapers. “So there’s a lot of nostalgia in this.”

Thomas said she will talk about her position as a White House correspondent, in which she has served for 57 years for United Press International.

“I always talk about covering the White House, covering Washington and what’s going on,” said Thomas, who’s been covering political news since the 1940s. “The election’s coming up, the war in Iraq and where I think this country is going. I think it’s very important to get out of this war, if possible. I think war is terrible and obviously, that’s a naïve statement I just made, but I think it’s best to work things out peacefully and to a diplomacy.”

Thomas’ role as a leading woman in journalism, Miller said, began during a time when it was difficult for women to make themselves known in the field.

“Among people who may not know much about journalism and journalists, and not know the name of some journalists,” he said, “she has an image in that many years in the ‘60s was the one who closed the news conference with the presidents.

“Part of her role in the leaders of the media was to make a decision when it was time to close the news conference, when she got up and said, ‘Thank you, Mr. President.’ ”

Thomas has traveled around the world with every president since John F. Kennedy, and during that time, she compiled enough stories and experiences to write three books, including her latest, “Thanks for the Memories, Mr. President: Wit and Wisdom from the Front Row at the White House.”

Thomas said out of the presidents she had covered, none of them had a good relationship without the press.

“None of them like the press and you can’t blame them in any way, but at the same time, we cannot have a democracy with a free press,” she said.

And that includes the current president, Bush.

“He doesn’t hold enough news conferences,” she said. “I think he’s too secretive and we should get more information. I think we’re sadly lacking with what we ought to know.”

That’s the attitude she has applied to her work—to seek the truth. Her speech will also include a message to anyone interested in journalism.

“Once you go into journalism, you’ll never regret it. It’s exciting. It’s an education everyday. You’ll always have to keep learning,” Thomas said. “You’ll make a contribution to democracy because you’ll help to inform the people. And truth will always be your main goal.”