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Questions About Miller and The Times

By TChris, Section Valerie Plame Leak Case
Posted on Thu Oct 13, 2005 at 11:11:10 PM EST
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by TChris

NY Times readers deserve honest answers to questions that Public Editor Byron Calame wants to ask:

"While a multitude of issues need to be addressed," Calame wrote, "I certainly will expect The Times’s explanation to address these fundamental questions that I first posed to the key players at the paper in July: Was Ms. Miller’s contact with the source she is protecting initiated and conducted in genuine pursuit of a news article for Times readers? Why didn’t she write an article? What kinds of notes are there and who has them? Why wasn’t she exploring a voluntary waiver from the source?

Calame says he's posed these questions to "key players" at the paper since July, without response.

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    Questions About Miller and The Times | 6 comments (6 topical)
    Re: Questions About Miller and The Times (none / 0) (#1)
    by scarshapedstar on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:04:59 PM EST
    As Glenn Reynolds might say, What liberal media? Heh. Indeed.

    Re: Questions About Miller and The Times (none / 0) (#2)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:04:59 PM EST
    It seems that Calame is actually providing support to Arianna Huffington's claims this summer that there was a lots of internal dissension in the Times over just these issues.

    Re: Questions About Miller and The Times (none / 0) (#3)
    by Dusty on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:04:59 PM EST
    I have heard rumblings that Miller was basically a rightwing plant at the NY Times..so what kinda story would you expect really..

    Re: Questions About Miller and The Times (none / 0) (#4)
    by squeaky on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:05:00 PM EST
    Juan Cole has an illuminating article in Salon today tracing Miller's decline into neocon hell. I thought she was always a rightwing propagandist but Cole paints another story.
    All of which raises the question: Should Miller herself be understood as a neocon? The evidence suggests that she is not. Rather it was a combination of hawkish convictions about Saddam, ambition, arrogance pumped up by her pre-9/11 work on WMD and jihadis, lax editorial oversight, and her long-standing tendency to get too close to her sources, that led her to become a credulous mouthpiece for those who sought to justify war with Iraq.... Miller was not always a dupe of far-right-wing hawks. After the Gulf War, she responded on CNN to a 1993 speech by Saddam Hussein in which he claimed that Iraq was stronger and wiser since the 1991 war. On Jan. 8, 1993, Miller told anchor Donna Kelley, "I don't think that the allied forces at this stage face any real threat from Saddam Hussein.
    Salon

    Re: Questions About Miller and The Times (none / 0) (#5)
    by squeaky on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:05:00 PM EST
    Douglas Jehl has also pressed the issue to no avail back in July. He was removed from his internal NYT investigation after the article linked below. He revealed more than Keller, Sulzberger and Freeman were comfortable with and they sacked him as internal investigator..
    In e-mail messages this week, Bill Keller, the executive editor of The New York Times, and George Freeman, an assistant general counsel of the newspaper, declined to address written questions about whether Ms. Miller was assigned to report about Mr. Wilson's trip, whether she tried to write a story about it, or whether she ever told editors or colleagues at the newspaper that she had obtained information about the role played by Ms. Wilson.
    and this gem of a correction that needs to be re-corrected. Was Jehl trying to tell us something back in july. The Editors quashed his 'mistake'. Perhaps they all knew much more than we are led to believe.
    The article also misstated the month in 2003 that the special prosecutor in the case said that another reporter, Judith Miller of The New York Times, talked to a specified government official. It was July, not June.
    (emphasis mine) NYT Jay Rosen chimes in:
    The investigation Jehl was undertaking apparently got stopped in July; now it has to re-start itself. One assumes this is what Landman and his reporters are doing. One hopes they understand how much of the newspaper's reputation is in their hands.
    And
    One of the trickier parts of the "vigorous reporting effort" is that Keller is a major participant in the story he has ordered, and (apparently) placed all his chips upon. Which is why Steve Lovelady of CJR Daily said Keller should recuse himself from the editing of it.
    linked text

    Re: Questions About Miller and The Times (none / 0) (#6)
    by squeaky on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 01:05:01 PM EST
    Rumors abound that Judy will resign:
    At least two reporters say they’ve heard that Miller plans to resign after the paper runs their examination, which most expect Sunday. According to the Huffington Post, Miller has inked a $1.2 million deal for a tell-all expose.
    Raw Story via atrios

    Questions About Miller and The Times | 6 comments (6 topical)