Political transparency in the age of social media

>>> a point been transparency in the age of social media .

>> it's a conflict of the times. these days when you've got social networks and everybody is able to find out that he did play basketball with his friends and who those friends were and who was on the five on five team and when you're able to find out things about what he had for breakfast via twitter or social, people think that means transparency also across the board. because i couldn't find out these things before about the president, now i should be able to find out about the drone program, i should be able to find out about anything anybody can tweet about. if we paid attention to twitter a little bit more, i think they would have found out they were invading bin laden . so people are thinking just because now we get this sort of new and sometimes unfetterred access because somebody has got a smartphone on them that now i should get access to any question i ever wanted to because now it's just so easy.

>> and i think actually in those clips we did show, that was the white house doing the noble work of holding the administration's feet to the fire. now, it took --

>> the press corps.

>> the press corps holding the feet to the fire. and as someone who -- i've spent six months investigating who the president has played basketball with as well as spent another six months investigating what the drone program is, there's two sets of information there. one is for the political elite washington class that's very fascinated with the palace intrigue that wants the information that only a finite number of people have. there are only a certain number of senior advisers to the president that have this information. that's what you need access to. and they're also into the gossipy things. and then you have these larger, big deed democracy questions about --

>> what is our government doing, who is it killing.

>> and those are things that i think are much more important.

>> absolutely.

>> and to bring it around i think to the first -- the first discussion, and i think the point you made, ana marie, is that in some ways the perverse tee is the fact that i don't get the names of tiger woods that become the story that force access much more than it's no one is acknowledging the drone program, right? robert, what i'm hearing from you and i think this makes sense, is that ultimately it is kind of political outcry that is the pressure that drives things, right? when you said, look, you can't just shut everybody out because people will get angry and that becomes the story, it does seem to me that these decisions really are based on political calculations. that's natural, it's a political office . that if people are angry and up in arms about not knowing about the drone program or that's creating political programs, you're going to see more about it, and if not, not.

>> yes. i think political pressure certainly. i want to maybe bifurcate this a bit and i don't want to compare the drone program to the notion that if you didn't see tiger woods somehow that causes you now to -- again --

>> that's my point.

>> but there's a white house briefing room for a reason. and let's be clear. in no other entity that i can think of in this country does somebody walk out there virtually every day and answer questions about different topics. and we do that not because we have to, but because that's how a democracy works. it only works if we're providing information on what the president and the administration are doing and how that affects people and it only works if the press corps asks questions of the administration which may lead to more transparency on things like the drone program.

>> msnbc contributor robert gibbs , former obama press secretary. that was a lot of fun this morning. i'd love to have you back at the table next time you're in new york.

>> chris, thanks for having me.

>>> anna marie cox and oscar joyner, really great to have you here. thanks. come back.

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