Meet the Press, play political games with the press

I happened to catch a few minutes of Meet the Press this morning. I don't believe I've ever watched an episode of it. It's Sunday morning. I'm in church Sunday mornings and before I'm in church, I'm preparing for church.

But for whatever reason, when I got up this morning, I decided to see if there were any crazy TV preachers on.

Meet the Press was on, with the guest being Joshua Bolten, George W. Bush's chief of staff. I only watched it for 10 minutes, but that 10 minutes made me despise the game of politics.

Tony Snow, Bush's press secretary, made a statement recently concerning the stem cell research debate in which he effectively called the destruction of the embryos murder. Tim Russert asked Bolten if that's really the President's stance; does the President actually believe destruction of an embryonic stem cell is murder?

Bolten dodged the question, going through a number of hoops before coming back to his talking point that the President doesn't believe the government should fund something that many people consider to be morally wrong. Russert asked why the President wouldn't outlaw private embryonic stem cell research if it's really wrong. Again, Bolten dodged the question and returned to his original talking point.

The whole episode was extremely frustrating to watch unfold. Why can't politicians be straight up with us? For crying out loud, why can't the politicians' own advisors and spokesmen be straight up with us?

I'm no fan of Russert, but I thought his questions were very good. It's just too bad Bolten played the game of politics with those questions.

NOTE: I should add that the rest of the day was great. Note to self: never allow Meet the Press to interrupt a Sunday morning again!