Journalists in the hot seat

by David Grand
February 24, 2005

Since the founding of this country, the relationship between the media and the government has at best been strained, and at worst adversarial; e.g., Washington, upon learning that a draft copy of a resolution had been found lying unclaimed on the floor of the hall in which the Constitutional Convention of 1787 was being held, delivered a speech so scolding that nobody ever claimed the fallen paper; to wit: "I must entreat, gentlemen," he said, "to be more careful, lest our transactions get into the News Papers and disturb the public repose by premature speculations." (In consequence, what was recorded and went on behind those closed doors was unknown to the public for sixty years.)

The relationship climaxed in 1971, when the New York Times published the so-called Pentagon Papers that gave Americans a look behind the scenes at government planning and policies that led to the U.S. role in the Vietnam War. The Nixon White House tried to prevent its publication; but the Supreme Court ruled in favor of the Times. And reporters were viewed in a heroic light, following Washington Post reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein uncovering a scandal that led to Nixon's resignation in 1974.       

But in recent times, there's been a backlash against the media, both from the public's and judicial perspectives. For instance, a recent survey showed respondents ranked reporters 16th out of 21 professions for ethical standards (only one above car salesmen and two below funeral directors). And in a survey by the Knight Foundation, more than 30 percent of high school students believed that the government should be allowed to tell journalists what to print or put on the air. (Apparently, none of their teachers bothered to tell 'em that's fine in totalitarian countries, where the function of the press is to promote the aims of the government.)       

There's no better example of that growing trend than when a three-judge panel in New York ruled that reporters Judith Miller of the New York Times and Matthew Cooper of Time magazine were in contempt of court for refusing to name their confidential sources to a grand jury investigating the leak from the White House of a CIA operative's identity in 2003. "That's a travesty," said columnist Michael Kinsley. "For the leak wasn't merely connected to the crime, it was the crime ('outing' an intelligence agent); and that the law is aimed at leakers, not recipients of leaks, so the journalist is immune."      

And had they resided in any of the 31 states that have enacted the so-called shield law giving journalists the right to refuse to disclose the identities of confidential sources, they wouldn't be now faced with the prospect of going to prison. (A federal shield law is pending in congress.)      

My, but isn't it peculiar that columnist Robert Novak, who first reported in a column that he'd been told by two (unnamed) senior administration officials that Valerie Plame, the wife of former diplomat Joseph Wilson was a covert, CIA operative on weapons of mass destruction, apparently hasn't received a subpoena to testify before that same, secret grand jury? Or if he has and did testify, what was his response when asked to name his confidential sources? And if he refused to, wouldn't he also be found in contempt of court and be heading for the "big house" if doesn't fess up?       

I think the answer is, as was depicted in a political cartoon last Saturday in another paper, showing the U.S. Attorney asleep at his desk with a blackboard to his right laying out the plan for finding out who leaked the name of that CIA agent: "(1) Let news reporters do the investigation; (2) Threaten reporters with jail unless they reveal sources; (3) Except Novak (he's our guy).