Best of the Web Today - January 23, 2006
By JAMES TARANTO
Adversaries First, Journalists Second
The Valerie Plame kerfuffle has been bad for American journalism, and the indictment of Scooter Libby in matters tangential to the kerfuffle may make things worse. Libby's lawyers "told a federal judge Friday they want to subpoena journalists and news organizations for documents they may have related to the leak of a CIA operative's name," the Associated Press reports:
In a joint filing with prosecutors, lawyers for I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, 55, warned U.S. District Judge Reggie B. Walton that a trial likely will be delayed because of their strategy to seek more subpoenas of reporters' notes and other records. . . .
Lucy Dalglish, executive director of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, said the defense's strategy is no surprise but still alarming.
"Every key witness in this case is going to be a reporter," Dalglish said. "It's an absolutely ugly situation, . . . putting reporters in a very, very bad position, . . . and it should send a chill up the spine of American citizens across the country."
Newsday's Timothy Phelps, in an article for Columbia Journalism Review, notes that whereas the reporters who testified for the prosecution did so "mostly under agreements restricting their testimony to very specific issues," Libby's lawyers "are not bound by such agreements." If called by the defense, the reporters' case for immunity from testifying--which the courts have rejected anyhow--is even weaker than it was when dealing with the prosecution. After all, Libby has a fundamental constitutional right to a fair trial.
Phelps's piece is important because it is the most comprehensive acknowledgment we've seen from a news reporter of what we've been arguing for years, that journalists have done their own profession grave damage by flogging this phony scandal:
We cannot distinguish between sources we like and those we do not. Some [journalists] complained that [Judith] Miller's sources weren't "whistleblowers"; they were wrongdoers who ratted out Valerie Plame. And did it perhaps matter that they were Republicans, the dreaded neocons no less?
I asked Floyd Abrams, who represented Miller, the Times, and, initially, Time magazine, why the atmosphere is so different now than during the Anita Hill investigation, in which he also fought. Abrams has a dog in this fight, of course, but he is still the dean of the First Amendment lawyers. "Some journalists think the wrong people are getting protection," he said. "That's the most dangerous thing of all. Worse than the changes in the law, worse than grand juries going after journalists, is the image of some journalists making such decisions based on a political rather than a journalistic basis. Certainly a lot of the criticism of Judy Miller within the journalistic community is at its core political. There is an extraordinary animus. It's very hard for me to believe that animus would exist if she were protecting different people in a different administration with different views of the war in Iraq."
Abrams's legal strategy has been justly criticized, but he is exactly right in identifying how political motives have perverted the practice of journalism and made it harder for reporters to protect their sources.
It's astonishing to think that a substantial number of journalists cheered on the appointment of a special prosecutor to investigate government officials for allegedly giving accurate information to reporters. Since the days of Vietnam and Watergate, newsmen have proclaimed an ideal of "adversarial journalism." In this case, too many of them were adversaries first, journalists second--but for that, real journalists will pay the price.
Back Seat Driver
On CNN's "Late Edition," yesterday, Wolf Blitzer highlighted a rare moment of agreement between Karl Rove and Sen. Chuck Schumer:
Rove: The United States faces a ruthless enemy. And we need a commander in chief and a Congress who understand the nature of the threat and the gravity of the moment America finds itself in. President Bush and the Republican Party do. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for many Democrats.
Blitzer: Karl Rove, the White House deputy chief of staff, the president's top political adviser, speaking out earlier in the week. . . . "Unfortunately," Karl Rove says, "the same cannot be said for many Democrats" in this war on terrorism. I suspect he's referring in part to you.
Schumer: Well, who knows--but, you know, it's--no one is going to take a back seat to Democrats on fighting a tough war on terror. But what Karl Rove is doing is trying to divert attention.
Actually, if anything, Schumer goes even further than Rove did. Rove just said many Democrats take a back seat to Republicans. According to Schumer, no one is going to take a back seat to Democrats! Hey Michael Moore, Ward Churchill, Cindy Sheehan--move over! There's plenty of room back here for all of us!
Windsurfing Back in Time
Those who are nostalgic for the 2004 presidential campaign got a treat if they turned in to "This Week With George Stephanopoulos" yesterday. (Granted, that's a big if.) There was John Kerry*, explaining his position on the "scandal" over the Bush administration's allegedly spying on al Qaeda. Here's ABC's account:
Sen. John F. Kerry is calling President Bush's warrantless wiretaps "a clear violation of the law." . . .
Although Kerry did not go as far as to agree with former Vice President Al Gore's belief that the wiretaps may constitute an "impeachable offense," Kerry called for a special counsel and independent investigation.
So he's against spying on al Qaeda. But wait! Here's Reuters, reporting on the same appearance:
Kerry, who endorsed former Vice President Al Gore's call for an independent investigation of the Bush program, said on ABC's "This Week" that some Republicans like Bush adviser Karl Rove are trying to equate Democratic opposition to warrantless spying as weakness.
"What he's (Rove) trying to pretend is somehow Democrats don't want to eavesdrop appropriately to protect the country. That's a lie," Kerry said. "We're prepared to eavesdrop wherever and whenever necessary in order to make America safer."
So he's for spying! Er, hang on a second! Here's the Washington Times:
Kerry yesterday called the National Security Agency's program to eavesdrop on terror suspects illegal, but he said he will continue to support its funding.
OK, so he's on both sides of the question whether America should spy on al Qaeda, but he's definitely in favor of funding spying on al Qaeda. Or is he? Remember that after opposing the Iraq war after favoring it, he voted for the $87 billion before voting against it. So it's possible that Stephanopoulos didn't actually succeed in pinning down Kerry's position.
* The haughty, French-looking Massachusetts Democrat . . .
Coming Un-Moored
The Angry Left has been in a dither over a comment MSNBC host Chris Matthews made on "Hardball" last Thursday. Referring to the latest Osama bin Laden audiotape, Matthews said the terrorist "sounds like an over-the-top Michael Moore here, if not a Michael Moore." Matthews talks quickly and so that his comments don't always make perfect sense, but he seems to be comparing bin Laden's statements to those of Michael Moore.
This led John Kerry**, or someone else using the same name, to defend the porcine propagandist on DailyKos.com, the premier Angry Left Web site:
There's something that doesn't sit right with me when, on the day Osama Bin Laden resurfaced in a disturbing audio tape, cable television ends up in a game of name calling as a war protester is compared to Osama Bin Laden.
That's reason to be outraged.
But blogger Mark Coffey notes that the last time bin Laden released a tape--just days before Kerry suffered the most crushing defeat of any presidential candidate this century--Moore himself was boasting that bin Laden sounded just like him:
There he was, OBL, all tan and rested and on videotape (hey, did you get the feeling that he had a bootleg of my movie? Are there DVD players in those caves in Afghanistan?)
Today Moore's site features a series of Photoshopped images depicting Matthews and bin Laden as "American Lovers." This is supposed to be funny, though we're not sure how we know that.
** . . . who by the way served in Vietnam.
Moonbatting Back in Time
This Usenet posting, from one Moussaoui C. Abdenacer, will seem unremarkable, but bear with us (quoting verbatim):
George Bush's whole administration has all the earmarks of a well prepared nazi-type regime! They are working on it tooth and claw! The only thing they need now is an internal terrorist threat, or civil disorder growing from anti-war protests to justify declaring a National Emergency with its protests to justify declaring a National Emergency with its legally sanctioned suspension of Constitutionally protected rights. Concentration camps for hard-core anti-war activists will be supported by the stupidity silent majority with their brainless, moronic, imbecilic, blind and bigoted moral retardation. Hence idiotic flag-waving becomes a substitute for rational analysis, and Jerry Falwell Bible Thumping a means of conditioning the rah rah war crowd to perceive anti-war protestors as low-life scum and traitors who need to be locked up or shot by loyal, awesomely patriotic volunteers like Marino Sicki of Arch-hate-a, Calif. who has publicly proclaimed his desire to kill protestors.
So I have a feeling that by this Spring civil unrest and economic turmoil will exacerbate domestic problems sufficiently to permit administrative type detention policies to be implemented by the Tyrant Bush with the complete support of all war-loving red, white, and blue American zombies. This demented hard-hat mental disease was prevalent during the Vietnam war era and those that don't learn from history eventually get a rude awakening. The economy is going to be so bad: the whole situation is going to be so bad; more oppressive measures will be imposed. They're already establishing special camps for those deemed a threat to national determination of your subversive potential rather than on any overt acts you may have committed.
OK wait, one more and then we'll get to the point. This is from Rick Burgess:
Impeach George Bush! Call your Congressperson and demand it!
How much more blatant and obvious does the information have to be? We've got a President who very obviously came into power under very corrupt circumstances. . . . This is not just another Republican administration run amuck! Impeach George Bush Now!
What's interesting is the dates on which these ravings were posted: Abdenacer's was on Feb. 17, 1991, and Burgess's on April 19, 1991. Yes, they were talking about the first President Bush. Well, plus ça change, though who would've predicted that Al Gore, who voted in favor of the Gulf War, would turn into one of these guys?
Stuck in the 60s
Is it still possible that Sam Alito will break 60 votes? Time magazine suggests the answer is yes:
far from winning over moderate Republicans, Democrats seem to be losing their own centrists. Democratic leadership aides say they expect Senators Ben Nelson of Nebraska and Bill Nelson of Florida to vote for Alito, joined by Kent Conrad and Byron Dorgan of North Dakota. Blanche Lincoln of Nebraska [actually Arkansas] is on the fence, and the betting is that anywhere from 5 to 10 Democrats will abandon ship and vote with the Republicans.
According to our tally, only Ben Nelson has actually said he intends to vote for Alito. Among the officially undecided Democrats, in addition to those Time mentions, are Mark Pryor of Arkansas, Mary Landrieu of Louisiana and Tim Johnson of South Dakota. So don't rule out the possibility that Alito will surpass 60 votes, which will be easier for the Angry Left to take than no filibuster but fewer than 60 ayes.
Boy Wonder
A Baltimore Sun article about abortion law in Maryland contains this curious passage:
Maryland has some 38 crisis pregnancy centers, where counselors try to persuade pregnant women to have their babies. Many centers are in rural areas that don't have clinics that provide abortions. At least two offer free sonograms, an attempt to emphasize to pregnant women the reality of their fetuses. "It makes a powerful difference when they can see [the fetus]," says Pamela Palumbo, executive director of the Bowie Crofton Pregnancy Center, which sees about 1,000 women a year.
Notice that in the quote, the words "the fetus" are in brackets. This is a journalistic convention; it means Palumbo didn't actually say those words, but the reporter has put them in to clarify the meaning. We can't imagine what Palumbo might actually have said.
A Newsweek article, meanwhile, has an ever more puzzling reference:
Thirty years ago feminists argued that classic "boy" behaviors were a result of socialization, but these days scientists believe they are an expression of male brain chemistry. Sometime in the first trimester, a boy fetus begins producing male sex hormones that bathe his brain in testosterone for the rest of his gestation.
What in the heck is a "boy fetus"? Isn't that like referring to a "girl tumor" or a "man cyst"? And since a fetus is part of a woman's body, isn't "boy fetus" a contradiction in terms? It seems the antichoice extremists are trying to confuse people again.
As a Disembodied Spirit, I Am Dead and Yet Unborn
"Lack of Body Is a Concern"--headline, Deseret Morning News (Salt Lake City), Jan. 23
They Finally Saw 'From Russia With Love'
"Russians Say British Have Been Spying"--headline, Associated Press, Jan. 23
Who's Driving?
"Seahawks Ride Defense Into Super Bowl"--headline, Associated Press, Jan. 23
"Seattle Rides Hasselback, Alexander"--headline, Chicago Tribune, Jan. 23
"Seahawks Ride MVP to First Super Bowl"--headline, Daily Bulletin (Ontario, Calif.), Jan. 23
"Seahawks Ride Momentum to Second Straight Win"--headline, Seahawks Online, undated
"Steelers Ride Broncos to SBXL"--headline, Edmonton (Alberta) Sun, Jan. 23
"Steelers Ride Big Ben, Turnovers to Super Bowl"--headline, MSNBC.com, Jan. 23
"Steelers Fans Ready to Ride the Bus to Detroit"--headline, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, Jan. 23
No Wonder They Finished 5-11
"Bills Give Victims More Right to Use Force"--headline, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Jan. 23
Bottom Story of the Day
"Whale Makes Splash"--headline, Columbia (Mo.) Daily Tribune, Jan. 21
Taking a Stand for Journalistic Ethics
This "Editor's Note" (second correction) appeared in Saturday's New York Times:
An article on Wednesday about infidelity exposed by a chatty parrot described the way the parrot, owned by a man living with his girlfriend in Leeds, England, kept screeching the name of the woman's secret lover. When the parrot said "I love you, Gary," in what sounded like the woman's voice, her boyfriend (whose name is not Gary) broke up with her.
Although the article reported that the information had been obtained from reports in The Daily Telegraph and other British newspapers, The Times could not verify the former couple's accounts because the information was given to the British press by a freelance journalist who charged for the account. The Times does not pay for information. The Times should have disclosed fully to readers why we relied on other news reports. Or, perhaps it would have been prudent, given that condition, for The Times to have resisted parroting the episode at all.
The Times might have lost its way in the Valerie Plame kerfuffle, but at least it hasn't lost all concern for journalistic ethics. |
