As a rather obscure former member of the White House press corps, I’d like to respond to Ana Marie Cox’s cheeky suggestion they are useless or “wasted” talent. First, what qualifies Ana Marie Cox to judge? She rose to prominence by writing raunchy sex blogs at Wonkette. (Most recently, she was seen in an extended session of unfunny “teabagging” jokes with Rachel Maddow on MSNBC.) She certainly shouldn’t display the lack of self-awareness to pass judgment on journalists who (biased or not) have worked their tails off to arrive at this prestigious beat. Why the Washington Post would assign her this task is a mockery of the desperate search to be “edgy.”

It’s cute to say the White House is “where the news goes to die.” But there’s a reason why great investigative scoops don’t come out of the press room there. It’s a whirring, buzzing center of breaking news. That news may not result in a seven-part series that earns a Pulitzer for shredding our national security, but it is news nonetheless. If a reporter has a great nose for investigative news, maybe he or she should not be deployed at the White House. But that doesn’t mean the people standing on the pebbles in front of the cameras are dumber than Ana Marie Cox.

Most of the people that have offices there are delivering updates hour on the hour. That may seem like stenography, but there is a public service in the people knowing where the president is, what the president said, and where he’s going later. There is at least the promise of accountability to the public in every briefing and in every pool report.

Cox displays her talent for cheekiness and her media cluelessness simultaneously by suggesting the White House reporters are stuck with puppy news and vegetable-garden updates. Is there a White House reporter for a major network or newspaper who reported those stories as breaking hard news? I didn’t see one. It was left to the puff-ball specialists.

Our national political coverage certainly focuses too hotly and heavily on the president and not enough on Congress and the rest of the federal establishment. In part, that’s because the president is the only official who’s elected by the entire audience of the national media. I certainly want them to try and hold Barack Obama accountable instead of announcing his decisions like they’ve descended from Mount Olympus. But let’s not suggest the citizenry derives nothing from the daily bread they bake.

PS: Here’s more evidence of Cox’s talents as a pundit: “I really like John Edwards a lot. I like what he has to say. Almost as important as his political views: He seems honest. Which is something you can’t say about a lot of politicians.”