Posted on 10/15/2005 9:43:08 PM PDT by NormsRevenge
FULLERTON, Calif. - Judith Miller, the New York Times reporter who was jailed for protecting a confidential source, presented an award Saturday to perhaps the most famous confidential source the man known as "Deep Throat."
The award presented by the California First Amendment Coalition was accepted by the grandson of former FBI Associate Director W. Mark Felt because the 92-year-old could not make the trip.
Miller lauded Felt as a courageous man who helped Washington Post reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein uncover the secrets of the Watergate scandal that led to the resignation of President Nixon.
"Without Mark Felt there would have been none of the revelations that showed what began as a third-rate burglary was really a story of corruption and malfeasance," Miller said. Woodward and Bernstein refused to identify "Deep Throat" until after Felt revealed it himself this year.
In remarks dealing with her own case, Miller said that she still would be behind bars if her source, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, had not personally contacted her in prison and given her permission to testify.
"I am free today only because of a federal prosecutor's agreement to limit his questions to me and because my once confidential source wrote me a letter and called me in jail to say he really, really wanted me to testify," Miller said.
Her lawyer Floyd Abrams, the keynote speaker at the conference at California State University, Fullerton, said Libby had earlier signed a waiver form but Abrams and Miller had suspicions that such forms could be challenged as being coerced.
A journalist should decide to break a confidence only when "the journalist is satisfied that this is a deeply personal decision by the source," Abrams said.
The New York Times on Saturday posted a story on its Web site detailing the accounts of what happened in the case of covert CIA officer Valerie Plame and how it led to Miller spending 85 days behind bars.
Miller never wrote a story about Plame, but she was jailed for civil contempt of court for refusing to testify before the grand jury investigating the Bush administration's disclosure of Plame's identity.
A newspaper column by Robert Novak that identified Plame on July 14, 2003, triggered a criminal investigation that could still result in charges against government officials.
In her remarks Saturday, Miller urged the adoption of a federal shield law to provide reporters protection from being forced to reveal confidential sources.
"I hope that other journalists will not have to make the choice that I did," she said.
Felt's grandson, Nick Jones, said he sees his grandfather as a figure comparable to Batman, "One of those crimefighters that come and go in the night."
"It's not about what he is underneath, but what he did," Jones said.
New York Times reporter Judith Miller, center, accompanied by New York Times Publisher Arthur Sulzberger, Jr., rear left, as she leaves the courthouse in Washington in this Sept. 30, 2005 file photo. Miller testified before a grand jury Friday, ending her silence in the investigation into whether White House officials leaked the name of a covert CIA operative, Valerie Plame. Notes by the New York Times' Judith Miller that were turned over in a criminal investigation contain the name of a covert CIA officer, but the reporter has told prosecutors she cannot recall who disclosed the name, the newspaper reported Saturday. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak, File)
(Denny Crane: "I like nature. Don't talk to me about the environment".)
Felt broke numerous laws and was kept from jail by Nixon.
She's the NYT's big shot reporter on WMD's and she's the big shot NYT reporter with a reputation that she's the one who has a knack for developing contacts, YET she doesn't know Valire "WMD Expert" Plame and she gets the name "Valrire FLAME" from Libby.
No, a courageous man would have stood up in public and shouted about any wrongdoing or perceived wrongdoings that he knew about.
A COWARD, an assassin or an opportunist resorts to code names, hiding in shadows and leaking information (truth or lies) to reporters and scandal mongers.
Sounds just like what Rush has been talking about...... the liberal media is giving awards, lavish praises and high fives to each other for the 99% false reports they put out to the public regarding Katrina.
Nominations among themselves for themselves for Pulitzers to follow, of course.
Leni
Nah... I feel unlucky about googling, "Felt Exposed as Deep Throat."
" Miller never wrote a story about Plame,"
It would have been kind of hard for Miller to have written about someone named Plame, because she thought the woman in question was named Valerie Flame or Victoria Wilson.
Miller seems to be as confused as the 92 yr old Deep Throat.
I don't think she'll be getting any Deep Thinker awards.
Fidel's Executioner
"One Thousand Killed in 5 days of Fierce Street Fighting," proclaimed a New York Times headline on Jan 4, 1959 about the battle. "Commander Che Guevara appealed to Batista troops for a truce to clear the streets of casualties" the articles continued. "Guevara turned the tide in this bloody battle and whipped a Batista force of 3,000 men."
"Those of us who were there can only laugh at this stuff," say participants on both sides who live in exile today. [5] In fact, the Battle of Santa Clara--despite what those early versions of Jayson Blair reported -- was a puerile skirmish. Che Guevara's own diary mentions that his column suffered exactly one casualty (a soldier known as El Vaquerito) in this ferocious "battle." Other accounts put the grand total of rebel losses as from three to five men. Most of Batista's soldiers saw no reason to fight for a crooked, unpopular regime that was clearly doomed. So they didn't fire a shot, even those on the famous "armored train," that Guevara supposedly attacked and captured.
Imagine waking up in the morning and seeing *that* on the pillow next to you.
"Miller Gives Out Deep Throat Reward."
Another case of fame gone wild. Judith will write a book and die. History would care after the worms have her.
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