NYT's fiasco in the CIA leak case

...and lessons for the media from the sorry story

The CIA was unable to spot any WMD, and this failure pitted the White House against it. Joseph Wilson, former US Ambassador to two African countries nailed the White House lie that Iraq was seeking Uranium in Africa for its WMD project. Wilson, whose wife Valerie Plame was with the CIA, later wrote a story in the New York Times, exposing the Bush White House's desperate hunt for imaginary WMDs. Soon, another newspaper report appeared, where it was mentioned that CIA secret operative Valerie Plame was Wilson's better half. The idea, it seemed, was to discredit Wilson, since the CIA itself had failed in its "task" of getting any WMD evidence.

Now, outing a CIA operative is a federal offence in the US. Who leaked Valerie Plame's identity and was there a motive behind it? For his grand jury prosecution, special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald subpoenaed several journalists from Washington Post, Time, ABC News etc in a determined bud to ferret out the truth. Most of them deposed, except Matt Cooper of Time and Judith Miller of NYT. Both of them cited journalistic privileges in protecting their sources. At the last moment, Time's Cooper relented, and saved a potential jail term, since he got a waiver from his source for revealing the name. The name was Karl Rove, right hand man to George Bush.

However, Miller and NYT refused to testify, saying a journalist could not reveal her source. All through the case, NYT stood strongly behind Miller, tom-tomming press freedom and journalistic privileges. However, after 85 days in jail, Miller climbed down, citing an earlier general waiver issued by White House officials as sufficient reason for revealing her source. NYT published pictures and stories of her release from prison as a cathartic vindication of its stance. In her testimony before the grand jury, Miller identified the person who had blown Valerie Plame's cover. The source was Lewis (Scooter) Libby, chief of staff of vice-president Dick Cheney.

But readers and the management had increasingly started wondering whether NYT was doing the right thing by protecting an employee who was still not transparent. Unlike what Miller perhaps hoped for, when she returned from prison, there was no hero's welcome for upholding press freedom. Rather than being seen as going to jail for protecting press freedom, Miller was seen as shielding devious administration officials from the hands of law.

On October 16, NYT in a front page article backtracked on its established stand that Miller was the victim and that she was hounded by a vindictive Fitzgerald and that press freedom was at stake. It has to be stated in this context that earlier too, Miller was in the eye of a storm for pushing the White House line on WMDs, putting out fictitious stories planted by Capitol Hill sources and capricious Iraqi defectors like Ahmed Chalabi. The 6,200-word article detailed NYT's misguided defence of Miller and the WMD charade, essentially saying Mea Culpa.

Daggers were drawn when NYT executive editor Bill Keller shot off a memo to his staff, the paper's public editor Byron Calame and Judy Miller, outlining the faults in NYT's defence of Miller. The Bill Keller memo said that Miller had misled her bureau chief, ticked her off for her "involvement" with Scooter Libby and wondered why she gathered information from senior White House officials without the intention of writing any report based on such data. The Bill Keller memo admitted to errors on NYT's part and on his own part in judging the seriousness of the case. In his weekly column, the Public Editor too had raised similar questions.

An infuriated Miller shot back, writing to both editors that she had never misled anyone, that she had gone to jail to defend press freedom, and that she had, in fact, volunteered to write from the data she had gleaned from White House.

There was more to come: NYT's celebrated columnist Maureen Dowd penned a stinging article on Judith Miller and her errant ways in NYT. Investigative reporting, Dowd said, was not stenography, referring to Miller's discredited WMD reports. Such reporters, Dowd said, should have been kept on a tight leash. The war of words is still raging on.

The Valerie Plame case has important lessons for the media, both Indian and international. Here goes:

One, if you are a journalist dazzled by the power of your political or corporate source, the end may come faster than you think.

Two, laws on press freedom are not exactly the same as what we in the media want them to be. This was underlined when the US Supreme Court refused to hear appeals from Time and NYT journalists, who wanted to avoid testifying citing journalistic provilege.

Third, arrogance and defiance will not help you out of a prison term, if the courts feel that you are obstructing justice in pursuit of press freedom.

Fourth, if you are a media proprietor, keep it in mind that the reporter may not always be right. There may be hidden agendas you are unaware of. Before you think of throwing the weight of the organisation behind him/her, be dead sure that you know what you are doing. NYT's editors and publishers jumped to Judith Miller's defence, only to look like fools in the end.

And the fifth - and the most important point - if you have made a mistake, own up to it. NYT and Newsweek did not feel ashamed to admit to errors of policy and judgment. Saying that you goofed helps restore the connection with the reader/viewer, something an ostrich approach cannot. And if the readers start looking elsewhere for more honest media, it will soon be time for the editors to look for fresh pastures.

BY OUR MEDIA EDITOR