Posted on 06/28/2005 9:46:09 PM PDT by neverdem
Washington
LEGEND has it when Henry David Thoreau went to jail to protest an unjust law, his friend, the philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson, visited him and asked, "Henry, what are you doing in here?" The great nature writer replied, "What are you doing out there?"
The Supreme Court has just flinched from its responsibility to stop the unjust jailing of two journalists - not charged with any wrongdoing - by a runaway prosecutor who will go to any lengths to use the government's contempt power to force them to betray their confidential sources.
The case was about the "outing" of an agent - supposedly covert, but working openly at C.I.A. headquarters - in Robert Novak's column two years ago by unnamed administration officials angry at her husband's prewar Iraq criticism.
To show its purity, the Bush Justice Department appointed a special counsel to find any violation of the 1982 Intelligence Identities Protection Act. That law prohibits anyone from knowingly revealing the name of a covert agent that the C.I.A. is taking "affirmative measures" to conceal. The revelation must be, like that of the 70's turncoat Philip Agee - "in the course of a pattern" intending to harm United States intelligence.
Evidently no such serious crime took place. After spending two years and thousands of F.B.I. agent-hours and millions of dollars that could better have been directed against terrorism and identity theft, the prosecutor, Patrick Fitzgerald, admits his investigation has been stalled since last October. We have seen no indictment under the identities protection act.
What evidence of serious crime does he have that makes the testimony of Judith Miller of The New York Times and Matthew Cooper of Time magazine so urgent? We don't know - eight pages of his contempt demand are secret - but some legal minds think...
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
The essay, Self-Reliance is a brilliant piece of American writing. You have to judge these guys in the context of their time...
Miller and Cooper apparently received unauthorized leaks concerning other classified national security information. This was revealed in the course of the Plame investigation, so the grand jury pursued these other leaks, as well.
Fitzgerald, understandably, would like to identify and prosecute the leaker(s).
" Has she ever done anything but criticize and blame America first."
Actually, Judith Miller was instrumental in publishing early stories on WMD. She helped swell public support when it counted.
I'm not that obsessed with story. I posted it mainly because it's Safire's first column since he retired in January.
Thank you!
You noticed that too. :-)
What's worse (for her) is that she's going to be forced to listen to the Rush Limbaugh Show 3 hours a day until she gives up the source.
Same here. Though I do think it's probably/maybe a mistake to through her in the clink for a whole lot of reasons.
through = throw
So says William Safire, writing under the byline of the New York times.....what rich irony.
FOTFL!
Judith Miller and her "WMD" stories....
During what years?
During what administration?
Defending Bush now on WMD*s?
I don*t know myself - seems like the NYT has gotten quiet "Saddam*s WMDs in Iraq!"
Anyone got any info on this?
After all, their title of the "fourth branch of government" is self-bestowed.
Precisely. Their own lofty opinions of themselves are in excess of what their sorry selves deserve.
THAT is a great link. I missed that posting. Thanks.
Thanks for the story and link.
"Ambassadors are high-profile people, and it's ridiculous to believe that the wife of an ambassador is immune from public scrutiny. The blame for her public outing rests squarely on her and her lunatic husband, Joseph Wilson."
Very true.
It seems that Time Magazine and its lawyer Ted Olsen (the same as the former Solicitor General?) is ready to offer up the leaker. Perhaps the leaker(s) was as good of as source as Dan Rather gets or perhaps the leaker was more after Bush than Wilson. Who knows what agenda is going on here but there is some reason that two reporters are willing to consider jail rather than give up a name and I doubt it has anything to do with protecting "sources." There is more to this, I'm betting. Does anyone have any bright ideas on this?
"3. Mr. Novak should finally write the column he owes readers and colleagues perhaps explaining how his two sources - who may have truthfully revealed themselves to investigators - managed to get the prosecutor off his back."
I don't really get this either. I think these other two reports also had this "story" and therefore presumably know the source of this "leak". However, I really,really, really don't understand why they are on the hook and Novak is not. He published the info, they knew it but didn't publish it. It's all very strange and seems a mite unfair to them.
There's an angle to this story that hasn't been covered very much. One of the two reporters facing jail terms (I believe it was Miller) originally defended herself by claiming that she never spoke to anyone directly -- she had obtained the information about her article from Novak's article. Her story fell apart when it became clear that her article had included some specific pieces of information that hadn't been in his original piece.
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