Washington Post editorial (9/16/16)
For the third time in a year, the Washington Post has promoted the prosecution of Washington Post sources.
Last September, the Post controversially published “No Pardon for Edward Snowden” (9/16/16), an editorial calling for prosecution of the whistleblower who helped the paper win a Pulitzer Prize in 2014.
In the past weeks, two Post columnists have joined the Post editorial board in calling for Post sources to be jailed—this time in regard to the Post’s major scoop (5/16/17) about President Donald Trump leaking classified intelligence to Russian diplomats.
First up was former head of the CIA, pro-torture pundit and frequent Trump critic Mike Morell, whose op-ed piece (5/17/17) took aim at the Post’s sources for this story—anonymous “current and former US officials”—arguing that “the leakers did commit a crime, and they should be held accountable.”
Washington Post‘s Marc Thiessen (5/22/17)
Post columnist, pro-torture theologian and former Bush official Marc Thiessen (5/22/17) joined him the following week in “Leakers Who Revealed Israel as Intelligence Source Did Far More Damage Than Trump”:
The decision of these anonymous leakers to share code-word intelligence with the media is a crime that did far more damage than Trump’s apparently inadvertent disclosures to the Russians.
The Post may argue the editorial side is independent of the news side, and that the opinions expressed there—including those of the editorialists, whose writings are tagged as “The Post‘s View”—have no bearing on its newsgathering practices. But this assumes that the Post draws its opinion writers out of a hat rather than deliberately deciding to give a platform to a specific range of ideological perspectives.
With the exception of one Katrina vanden Heuvel column (9/20/16) from last September that advocated a pardon for Snowden, the Post hasn’t featured any opinion pieces countering these calls for the prosecution of the paper’s sources. Post-election, the Post has branded itself the vanguard against Trump—and indeed, its reporting side has often lived up to this billing. But the editorial side of the paper has repeatedly thrown its reporters’ sources under the bus.
Why should a source leak to the Post when its editorial board toes the national security state line to such a rigorous degree? If “democracy dies in darkness”—as the Post’s new tagline claims—what happens to democracy when any attempt at exposing the inner workings of the government leads to multiple felony counts?
But the calls for prison time for whistleblowers are part of a broader problem with the Washington Post opinion section—the prevalence of pro-government, pro-national security state voices over all others.
In one 24-hour period this month, for example, the Post ran op-eds by the former head of CIA, the former head of NSA, a former vice president and an ex-CIA agent. While the Post will sometimes allow outside voices, its opinion section is disproportionately and overwhelmingly populated by current and former boosters of US national security orthodoxy. The same goes for their editorial board, which, in addition to calling for the prosecution of Washington Post sources, runs interference for US allies and is a lockstep advocate for all of its wars.
Whistleblowers are already under attack on multiple fronts—from lengthy jail sentences to “cruel and inhuman” pre-trial punishment to the draconian Espionage Act. The question the Post should ask itself is: In addition to all of this, do whistleblowers really need the paper that publishes their revelations using its opinion pages to call for their imprisonment?
Messages can be sent to the Washington Post at letters@washpost.com, or via Twitter @washingtonpost. Please remember that respectful communication is the most effective.
Freud would have a field day with this.
Freud would have an entire separate career with this …
Apparently they have no sense of irony, either. The headline appears right under the logo, “Democracy Dies in Darkness.”
Indeed….
Think about the question always asked about the Germans about the runup to WWWII …
… “How could they let this happen?” …
… this is a perfect – and much less violent – example …
Democracy has been Dark or Dead in this country for a long time. Fair just keeps writing the multiple epitaphs.
I lack the acumen for this, but were I to try to write a FAIR-styled article on FAIR itself, digging up the threads of order that tie whatever chaos together, looking for patterns in the darkness to draw parallels and conclusions, I think my end-cap would be that much of the content here would ultimately prefer for America to finally become an actual Democracy. Rather than this constitutional republic garbage masking a handful of rich pricks fucking everything up for everybody else like it was going out of style.
Well, fucking everything up fo everybody else IS going out of style. The people are organizing in opposition at an increasing rate. It’s just a matter of time before they reach critical mass and come to overwhelming consensus. At that point, it will be all over for the rich prick fuck-ups.
We shall eat cake!
Isn’t an op ed different from an editorial? I’m unclear that publishing an op ed means they agree. I know the NYT often publishes op eds from people with differing views – I assume most papers do as well. There might be other indicators to prove the point, but why use op-eds as evidence?
LOL, well my goodness. Then there is that quote: ” The truth shall set you free.” where did that come from. LOL # 2 from the he bible. John 8: 32 ——–per the ever wonderful gooogle.
Hmmm, so much for being a :Christian nation if people in power want to arrest the People for wanting , needing and expecting the TRUTH. Without WHISTLEBLOWERS, there can be NO democratic Republic. Denounce the putocracy ——–and , yes please for an America, that COUL D BE —-keep Whistling, because the TRUTH really will set America free….
LOL, well my goodness. Then there is that quote: ” The truth shall set you free.” where did that come from. LOL # 2 from the bible. John 8: 32 ——–per the ever wonderful google.
Hmmm, so much for being a :Christian nation if people in power want to arrest the People for wanting , needing and expecting the TRUTH. Without WHISTLEBLOWERS, there can be NO democratic Republic. Denounce the putocracy ——–and , yes please for an America, that COUL D BE —-keep Whistling, because the TRUTH really will set America free….
Either we have freedom of speech, which is the right to broadcast a warning about the rich and to organize in mutual defense against the rich, or we have freedom of the press, which is the freedom to silence all who differ openly against the rich.
If Democracy dies in darkness then journalistic standards die at the Washington Post. No one should ever give those hypocrites a scoop.