More Art, Less Worldly Lamentation

New York Times editorials (see Judith Miller Goes to Jail) are comparing Judith Miller, their jailed reporter, to American heroes like Rosa Parks, Daniel Ellsberg, Martin Luther King, defiers of Senator Joe McCarthy -- citizens who committed civil disobedience in the name of truth and justice. But Miller was apparently preparing to assist foes of truth and justice, by helping the Bush administration retaliate against former ambassador Joseph Wilson for his attempt, before the invasion of Iraq, to warn Americans that their government was lying to them to gain their support for war.

The same editorial refers to the need to protect the confidentiality of sources who fight "government wrongdoing" by helping reporters expose it. The editorial neglects to explain that in this perverse case, the source Miller has been protecting appears to be an agent who was committing wrongdoing (with the assistance of the press) on behalf of the government.

Recent revelations indicate the source Miller has gone to jail to protect is probably top Bush political advisor Karl Rove -- the same operative who began the war on terror the day after September 11 by phoning reporters and feeding them lies about threats against Air Force One deemed credible because they showed knowledge of classified U.S. information. Rove's motive? To mitigate political embarrassment over Bush's absence from the capital on September 11. (See After September 11 (Part 2).)

Miller herself was among the journalists abetting Bush's pro-war WMD falsehoods. She was the reporter criticized by the Times ombudsman (though he was too delicate to name her), in his May, 2004 review of pre-war news coverage, for protecting sources who had presented false WMD stories which the Times had accepted and published. "A reporter who protects a source not just from exposure but from unfriendly reporting by colleagues is severely compromised," wrote the ombudsman. (See Journalistic violations contribute to national disaster.)

These are absurd times. Bush's "war on terror" has greatly escalated the quantity of future terrorism that will have to be endured by the U.S. and the rest of the world, by:

1. creating, in Iraq, a training ground for terrorists;

2. effectively handing vast quantities of high-grade munitions to terrorists, through the U.S. military's unbelievable negligence in failing to guard Iraqi munitions depots;

3. diminishing America's moral stature.

Similarly, the Times has sabotaged the fight it's been purportedly waging for press freedom by taking on nutty causes and defending civil disobedience in cases where obeying the law is what the public interest demands. (See also First Amendment Desecrated by New York Times.) Topping off the absurdity is the Times's utterly weird insistence that they are not placing themselves above the law by rejecting a judge's order to testify, but "bow[ing] to the authority of the court" by accepting a jail sentence.

Much more on the bizarre Valerie Plame affair at http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Valerie_Plame.