Democracy has a vital stake in journalists hiding sources — Good essay that everyone should read.
The government keeps plenty of legitimate secrets, from the identities of covert agents to the capabilities of spy satellites.
Unfortunately, a succession of Democratic and Republican administrations have also put “top secret” stamps on their most embarrassing blunders.
That history is particularly relevant today, as New York Times reporter Judy Miller spends her first Sunday in jail for refusing to reveal her sources to a special prosecutor.
Let me declare my bias at the outset: I was Miller’s editor at The Times until 2002 and wrote the book “Germs” with her and Times reporter Bill Broad. And I believe her fight is relevant to every reporter who is trying to uncover the truth about local, state or federal government.
In a decade of covering the nation’s intelligence agencies as a Washington-based reporter for The Times, I saw countless examples in which government secrecy was invoked to conceal questionable conduct or gross incompetence.
I used to agree, but now I’m not so sure. Possibly the prosecutor knows the names of Novak’s two sources, and according to Novak all Rove said was “Oh you know about that.” So now the prosecutor, tasked with investigating the leaking of identities of CIA agents, has to know if Rove actually knew these guys were covert agents and waws engaged in political payback. To do so,he needs to know what Rove said to the other reporters as well, and whether there were any other leaks. I’m guessing Rove doesn’t have this level of security clearance so he would then have to find out how he got a hold of this info and who gave it to him. While the media is needed to be a government watchdog, that doesn’t entitle them to withhold information in a major crime like this. I also don’t remember media talking like this when the government went after a reporter who had analyzed some chemical samples from TWA 800 after it crashed.
I agree to the point represented; however how can you determine in what case confidentiality should apply, and when a politician is skirting laws for his own ends? Stricter laws about what classifications could be the answer, but then who makes that decision, when the President (Bush, Clinton, anyone) is corrupt?
An article for your perusal as well:
http://www.newsamericanow.com/2005/07/claim_newsweek.html
Like Winnie the Pooh says, “Don’t underestimate the value of doing nothing, of just going along, listening to all the things you can’t hear, and not bothering.” I guess they can’t give you a life sentence for silence. There are only two times when I drink beer, when I’m alone and when I’m with someone else. That’s my policy. “A foolish man tells a woman to stop talking, but a wise man tells her that her mouth is extremely beautiful when her lips are closed.”
“Domestic policy can only defeat us; foreign policy can kill us” President John F. Kennedy
Jim, I think they can. This is a grand jury not a criminal trial, and I think the reporters stay in jail for as long as the judge wants.
Look at this crap:
She said something I thought pretty moving in court today. She said a lot of things. Here’s one of them. “The freest and fairest societies are those with the free press publishing information the government doesn’t want to reveal.”
Now, this is trite on one level, but it’s also deeply, deeply true. And this—Bill Keller of “The New York Times” is absolutely right. This is chilling. This is the press publishing something the government doesn’t want published and the government putting—using all its force in the most horrible manifestation to put the reporters in jail. It’s disgusting.
I agree, it is disgusting.
The revelation of Mark Felt as “Deep Throat” couldn’t have come at a better time – to contrast when protecting confidential sources does serve the public interest, versus the current “martyrdom” – where it does not.
This will be my third comment on this post, so I am obviously at the “beating a dead horse” level of obsession – and will now “step away from the keyboard” for a bit. 🙂
A good read, which I also referenced in John’s earlier post regarding the “Sing Stoolie, Sing!” animation, is Rosa Brooks’ column in the LA Times on July 6th.
a quote:
And if the knowledge that they can’t always hide behind anonymity has a “chilling effect” on political hacks who are eager to manipulate the media in furtherance of their vested interests, that’s OK with me.