PressEthic

Now that the romanticized “Deep Throat” has been replaced by “Scooter Libby,” has the era of anonymous sources come to an end? It’s easy to see how anonymity could be used as a tool of manipulation and deception. After all, you could say anything if you knew you wouldn’t have to answer for the consequences later. And reporters, likewise, can say that someone said anything, as long as they don’t have to name names. Yet, you see anonymous sources quoted everywhere, everyday. So maybe there is a bright side to the Judith Miller case: it forces both reporters and sources to take pause and closely consider what they write or quote or say under the cloak of anonymity.

In last Thursday’s New York Times, Katharine Q. Seelye and Adam Liptak wrote an article titled, “Novel Strategy Pits Journalists Against Source.” They say:

In pressing his indictment of I. Lewis Libby Jr., the special prosecutor is pitting three prominent journalists against their former source, a strategy that experts in law and journalism say has rarely been used or tested.

It is all but unheard of for reporters to turn publicly on their sources or for prosecutors to succeed in conscripting members of a profession that prizes its independence.

But, I say, who is the watchdog of the watchdog? Isn’t it fair that the courts should take that role?

Seelye and Liptak later identify the central threat that this trial represents to the media, saying:

"This is exactly the thing," said Jane Kirtley, a professor of media ethics and law at the University of Minnesota, "that journalists fear most - that they will become an investigative arm of the government and be forced to testify against the sources they've cultivated." While the special prosecutor, Patrick J. Fitzgerald, is all but certain to call at least some of the reporters as witnesses, whether they will be judged credible is an open question.

There’s no doubt that this trial will set a dangerous precedent and deliver a serious blow to journalism in general, but the legal case is fairly simple. The reporters were allegedly part of an illegal act, and so they will go to court. Journalists are not above the law, even if we'd like to think journalism -- the idealized relentless search for truth and drive to inform -- is a noble enough cause.