Infuriating
The New York Times now admits it was wrong to expose the government's secret, anti-terror banking-data surveillance program. It was wrong because the program was perfectly legal, and there is still no evidence that it was ever abused. The Times' ombudsman is is also pretty frank about the political motivations for breaking the story.
Many of us already knew all this, of course, but it was this part that I found especially infuriating.
What kept me from seeing these matters more clearly earlier in what admittedly was a close call? I fear I allowed the vicious criticism of The Times by the Bush administration to trigger my instinctive affinity for the underdog and enduring faith in a free press....
In other words, the Times is perfectly free to savage Bush day-in and day-out in its editorial pages, but God forbid that the president ever utter a word of criticism by way of response. If he does, the Gray Lady will respond by undermining our national security and anti-terror programs by willfully publishing classified information.
Unbelievable. We lost a valuable terror-fighting tool because of the political pettiness of a think-skinned newspaper that got its feelings hurt. And to think that some of my New York friends still don't understand why I hate that goddamn newspaper.
Comments
That WAS a pretty shitty thing for the Times to do, I admit. But realistically, I do not think that terrorists are dumb enough to move money around in banks such that it can be traced to their activities.
Posted by: Tracy Miller | October 23, 2006 12:25 PM
The NY Times was one of the few institutions with enough power to stand up to Chimp's illegal spying, trashing the constitution, and other criminal behavior. Anyone else would be crushed, outed, kidnapped and detained indefinitely, waterboarded, beaten with rubber hoses in the new Chimp Neocon Amerika.
If you weren't wailing while the pornographic Starr Report was published with taxpayer money ($60 million wasted), then you're looking kinda hypocritical to whine about the NYT.
Posted by: Bailey Hankins | October 23, 2006 03:20 PM
I just stopped by to say hi!
Posted by: Rachel | October 24, 2006 09:38 AM
Hi yourself. :-)
Posted by: BNJ | October 24, 2006 11:03 AM