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It's Thursday, and that means it's time for the Public Eye Chat. This week's subject is CBS News producer Max McClellan. Oops. Make that Emmy-Winning producer Max McClellan.

Matthew Felling: You won your first Emmy. I feel like I should ask you if you’re going to Disney World. How's it feel?

Max McClellan: It's feels terrific - and lucky. In my case, I was lucky to be working with Lara Logan and Jeff Newton, who shot some extraordinary material in Ramadi and then let me join them to help put it together.

Matthew Felling: As a producer for Lara Logan, what does your job entail?

Max McClellan: I work with Lara to develop stories around the world for the CBS Evening News. She spends a lot of her time in Baghdad, of course, but when she's not there, she still keeps extremely busy. Aside from Iraq, we've done stories in India, Darfur, South Africa, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Israel and Syria in the last year. People often ask me if she's indefatigable. Yep.

Matthew Felling: Tell me about the story that won the award.

Max McClellan: This was a two-part series that aired on the Evening News in May 2006. Lara and her Associate Producer from 60 Minutes, Jeff Newton, spent several weeks living and working alongside US Marines in Ramadi, Iraq. At the time, Ramadi was the operational center of Al Qaeda in Iraq and one of the bloodiest frontlines in the war on terror. These Marines were involved in heavy, daily, street by street battles with the insurgents. Lara and Jeff were with them every step of the way and captured an up-close view of the war that had rarely been seen. For me, the material they shot and the interviews they did were extraordinary, not only because it gave our audience a glimpse of the intense fighting going on, but also because it showed the bravery and humanity with which these soldiers conducted themselves every day.

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In the aftermath of the White House pressroom drama that saw press secretary Scott McClellan and reporters re-enacting scenes from grade school playgrounds of their pasts, there has been a lot of talk about the relationship between the media and the administration. Even before this latest incident over Vice President Cheney’s accidental shooting, former White House press secretary Mike McCurry was publicly questioning the value of televising the daily briefing (even though it was he who instituted that practice).

Covering the White House has to be one of the more frustrating jobs for a reporter because, let’s face it, information doesn’t exactly flood out of any administration and it barely trickles out of the current one. The gig ensures plenty of air-time and bylines but most often, it’s more a chronicle of events than anything else. Still, this morning’s Katharine Seelye article in The New York Times offers up one of the more, um, unique explanations of why the press briefings sometimes become so confrontational:

Renana Brooks, a clinical psychologist practicing in Washington who said she had counseled several White House correspondents, said the last few years had given rise to "White House reporter syndrome," in which competitive high achievers feel restricted and controlled and become emotionally isolated from others who are not steeped in the same experience.

She said the syndrome was evident in the Cheney case, which she described as an inconsequential event that produced an outsize feeding frenzy. She said some reporters used the occasion to compensate for not having pressed harder before the Iraq war.

"It's like any post-traumatic stress," she said, "like when someone dies and you think you could have saved them."

“White House reporter syndrome?” The doctor is in.

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In a decade of covering the White House, "Evening News" producer Max McClellan has covered two presidents, visited six continents and even fit in a game or two of elephant polo in India while he was at it. He started at CBS News as an intern in London and started covering the White House in 1996 for the morning news. In 1999, he began covering the White House for the "Evening News," where he's been ever since. Want to know more about that elephant polo match? Read on.


So, what do you do for a living?

I'm the White House producer for the CBS "Evening News." I work along with our White House correspondents to cover the activities of the president on a daily basis. It's a job that has taken me all over the world, to six continents, and to all 50 states. It's fascinating and never quite the same from day to day. That's the nature of the news business, of course, but it also really defines the White House beat. One day we'll be doing a piece about the Iranian nuclear crisis, the next it might be a story on the president's prescription drug plan, and then something happens in Israel and all of a sudden our focus gets shifted to the Middle East peace process. In fact, much of what happens in the world today intersects with the president and his policies in some meaningful - and newsworthy - way. I learned quickly that proximity is no barometer of White House news; a story can break anywhere and within minutes it can take center stage at the White House and demand our attention. In each case, however, my job is essentially the same: to put stories on the air that are clear, comprehensive and balanced - and presented in a way that best connects with our audience. It's a lot of fun and always interesting.

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Unlike some McClellans associated with the White House, this one is more than happy to answer questions. And luckily for you, there's still time to e-mail us your questions for White House producer Max McClellan. With a decade on the White House beat, he'll likely have an answer to anything you'd like to know about covering the president.

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"Evening News" producer Max McClellan has spent about 10 years covering the White House - he began mid-way through President Clinton's re-election campaign in 1996, covering the administration for the morning news and doing the same since 1999 for the "Evening News." We spent a day
tagging along while he produced a story on one of President Bush's recent Iraq speeches. But McClellan has also had a chance to work outside the White House beat -- you might recall that he spoke to us a few months ago about his experiences covering Hurricane Katrina. He also spent 10 months in Los Angeles covering the O.J. Simpson trial and covered Pope John Paul II's visit to Cuba in 1998 as well as his funeral and the conclave last year. He's covered a lot of ground, so here's your chance to ask him anything. E-mail us your questions or post them in comments and he'll answer one on Thursday, along with 10 of our standard questions.

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When The New York Times reported last month that President Bush authorized NSA surveillance and wiretapping of Americans without first obtaining a warrant the story was an inevitable topic for reporters at that day’s press briefing. As Romenesko noted that day, however, it came as “no surprise” that White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan would not discuss the story:

Q: The New York Times -- they sat on a very important story about possible breach of our Constitution for a full year, and they reached an agreement, I guess, with somebody in the White House. I'm wondering if you could give us a tick tock about how the White House reached --


MR. McCLELLAN: I think I've already said that I'm not going to get into discussing any matters relating to ongoing intelligence activities. And that means not getting confirming or denying such reports.

This is but one example of the exchanges that seem de riguer for the White House press briefings and the morning gaggle, which begs the question, what is the point? How effective is the gaggle and the press briefing as a venue for the exchange of information between the White House and reporters?

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Some stories you’ll see on the “Evening News” are just breaking, and others have taken weeks to prepare. Today we offer you a look at a day in the life of one story that’s a bit in between. White House Correspondent John Roberts, Producer Max McClellan and Editor Rob Blache were kind enough to let me observe while they developed their story about President Bush’s second speech in his series of remarks on the Iraq war. You can watch the story below.


The Day Begins



I arrived at the CBS booth (and by the way, calling it a “booth” is right on target. I hope Roberts and White House correspondents Bill Plante and Mark Knoller all really enjoy each other’s company, because I own shoeboxes larger that that thing) in the White House press room at around 9:30 to meet with Roberts, who was accompanied by Bill Plante (who was also kind enough to field my questions as he tried to do his job.)



Checking out the “Evening News” lineup at that time revealed that the Bush speech would likely not be leading the "Evening News." With the “Detroit News” reporting that Ford’s board was considering drastic job cuts and plant closings, the lineup had that story potentially leading the broadcast. (For a more detailed look at how the yesterday’s lineup was created, you can watch the midday lineup meeting here.) Nonetheless, Roberts predicted that the Bush speech story would "definitely be in the first section" of the broadcast or the "Inside Story" in the second block.



For Roberts, the approach with stories such as this one is pretty straightforward -- "separating the new stuff from the boilerplate,” he said. With this story, he’ll focus on eliciting what is new about this speech compared to what the president has said in the past about the war and offer a "reality check" of Bush's remarks. A day earlier in preparing for the story, White House producer Max McClellan had found such a reality checker in Stuart Bowen, Special Inspector General for Reconstruction in Iraq.



Roberts was set to interview Bowen that afternoon, but before then, he had a White House gaggle, a briefing and the president’s speech to deal with. Rep. John Murtha was also scheduled to give a press conference responding to Bush’s remarks and Sen. Jack Reed would be responding on camera as well. There was also a new CBS News poll that gauged public reaction to the president and the war, which Roberts was reviewing, and would make it into the broadcast in one form or another.

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Some of the best stories are those that never make air, and in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, there are plenty of examples. While reporters, producers and cameramen are busy telling other people's stories, they gather a few of their own.



One of the hallmarks of Katrina coverage has been just that — the personal experiences of those who covered it. And some have been more emotionally revealing of on-air personalities than news consumers have been otherwise used to, as Public Eye noted recently. But we haven’t heard too much about the experiences of those behind the scenes who were also covering the story and might offer a different perspective.



So we spoke with CBS “Evening News” producer Max McClellan and CBS News cameraman Don Lee, who traveled with correspondent John Roberts during and immediately after Hurricane Katrina about what it was like to be in the disaster zone.

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