Posted on 07/17/2005 9:18:10 PM PDT by The South Texan
I am thinking about writing a letter to my local fish wrap because editor was crying about the Rove nonsense and the fact that Judith Miller was a hero to all for standing up for the press and their "First Amendment Rights" and protection of confidential sources. The jest of my letter is going to focus on why we shouldn't feel sorry for Ms. Miller and the rest of the press because they (the liberal press) are the first ones to applaud when the First Amendment protections to free speech during federal elections was attacked (McCain/Feingold) and when a court strikes a blow against the free exercise of religion as we've seen the past few years. Then you have the constant bashing of the Second Amendment by the liberal press and there has been little outrage from them on the recent attack on private property rights. In sum, maybe the American people will feel a little more sympathy towards Miller's cause if the media would feel some for the rest of us that average Joes and Jane’s out here in flyover country.
My question before I write this letter is this: Is there any statute in Federal law that states that journalists have confidentiality agreement with a source that is protected sort of like an Attorney-Client privilege that is established in the legal system?
Sorry for the vanity. I just have to write this letter. I am so sick of editors and columnists writing stuff about their rights be violated when at the same time they are willing to watch the rest of us lose ours thanks to overzealous liberals in the judiciary, congress, legislators, city governments and the press across the fruited plain.
There is no confidentiality regarding sources when a crime has been committed.
They tried that claim all the way to the Supreme Court and failed everytime. There is no protection when a criminal investigation is involved
No, I don't think there is ANY law that protects source confidentiality. That's why she's in jail, right?
I'd just make the point that she's in jail because she's covering up a possible crime. Just like you'd be in jail for contempt for telling a grand jury, "Yeah I know who robbed the bank, but I ain't talking."
I believe there is no Federal shield law (protecting lawyers confidentiality). However, various states do have shield laws protecting reporters confidentiality to a various degrees. The Plame case is Federal.
Here is a decent short summary of "Reporter's Privileges"...
http://www.rcfp.org/cgi-local/privilege/item.cgi?i=intro
I meant "reporters" confidentiality, not "lawyers" in my first sentence.
I don't know what part of South Texas you live in, but there's an editor at the Corpus Christi paper - one Libby Averyt - who went to jail over this same thing some years back. She apparently parleyed that adventure into a posh position at the paper, since she was just a reporter when that happened.
I saw the coverage given in today's issue. One column written by her and another one written by David Broder, who is involved in this mess. I am so sick of the liberal media I could hurl.
The question is why Miller couldn't receive a waiver from Plame + Wilson as she got from Rove + Libby et. al.
Attorney / Client confidentiality is protected under your Fifth Amendment right against self incrimination.
Doctor / Patient confidentiality is protected under your Fourth Amendment right to privacy.
But ... nowhere in the Bill of Rights or the Constitution is there anything protecting the so called Reporter / Source confidentiality.
Big Media would like you to believe it's in the First Amendment (when it suits them). It's not. Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of the press, but that freedom does not mean a freedom from accountability. The press is accountable to the truth, and must remain accountable to the truth. The fiction of Reporter / Source confidentiality (especially in cases where criminal behavior is involved or alleged) is just a sleazy attempt to free reporters from their accountability to the truth. If they don't have to reveal their sources, they could make up any "source" they want, and pass off any fiction they desire.
And if that argument based on the principles of truth and honesty isn't enough, the fiction of Reporter / Source confidentiality directly violates your Sixth Amendment right to be confronted with the witnesses against you and to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in your favor. Of course, Big Media has worked long and hard to disassemble the Bill of Rights, and only believes they are obligated to comply with the parts of the First Amendment they enjoy, and only then while it suits them. We need to disabuse them of this agenda, and soon. Jailing Miller is a good start.
Karl rove has a Sixth Amendment right to have Judith Miller compelled to act as a witness in his favor. He has a right to have her compelled to name her source. Obviously, the compulsion of prison time is insufficient. The court should have levied an exponentially increasing fine on both her and her media masters. Corporations are not punished by the temporary imprisonment of their lackeys. They are only compelled through their profit margin.
Typo? "Gist" is a main point. "Jest" is a joke. ;-)
Could minor Ambassador Joe Wilson himself have been the source in blowing his own Wife's cover?
It is distinctly possible, (though it may be unlikely that Joe Wilson himself directly was NY Times Judith Miller's source), since Joe Wilson himself evidently routinely bragged openly to strangers about her CIA employment, prior to such "cover" being "blown" in the press.
Here's an example of Joe's apparently routine and open bragging about Valerie being a "CIA agent," which became known directly to me over a year ago:
He certainly bragged about it per a famous and highly reliable source's (named below) account of his own face-to-face encounter with Amb. Joe Wilson prior to Valerie Plame's "outing" as a CIA agent/employee.
Based upon a personal conversation (we were in a small group eating; it was NOT an "off the record") I had with eminent historian Victor Davis Hanson (we were at a luncheon table together during a trip to Europe), it appeared entirely possible that Joe Wilson himself was the (or one source, if not the original one) possible source in revealing his own wife's status as a CIA agent or employee.
Victor Davis Hanson (Wilson presumably knew Victor Davis Hanson wrote regularly for NRO (National Review Online), had done OpEds for the Wall street Journal, and other publications, and had his own Website with a widespread following) said he (VDH) & Joe Wilson were both in the same "Green Room" before a televised debate-discussion on Iraq, etc. and Joe first warned the TV make-up person not to get powder on his $14,000 Rolex watch, then he bragged to Victor about several things (possessions and trips to Aspen, etc.), like his expensive car (I think it was a Mercedes), and then bragged about his beautiful wife who, Joe Wilson said (braggingly) was a CIA operative.
I asked Victor Davis Hanson Why he didn't write up this account.(?) He replied that Joe Wilson would probably simply deny it, since only he (VDH) & Joe Wilson were in the Green Room together before the broadcast.
However, it is now easy to surmise that Joe Wilson is a crass, materialistic, self-promoting, vain, egotistical, bragaddocio-opportunist, so this account is perfectly consistent with Valerie Plame's TWO photo shoots in Vanity Fair.
A highly relevant corroborating account is David Corn's at the Nation, who wrote about Valerie Plame the day after he met with Joe Wilson.
She's in jail, not prison. I wonder this: if at the end of her 120 days in jail for civil contempt, she is brought before the Grand Jury again, and asked the same questions, and she refuses to answer, would the judge charge her with criminal contempt, as he has said, and then order her to serve that 180 days in PRISON?
You see, prison is a whole 'nuther world from jail. I've visited both a number of times on assignments and they are day and night different. Miller might think she can handle jail for a 180 day sentence, but if they put her in prison, maybe she'll see things differently.
Ask the editor if you can run a drug test on him. If he is right, Judith Miller is in jail to keep from exposing Karl Rove as her choice.
There is zero chance for that!
Apparently, Judith Miller went to jail to protect one or more of the following choices: (take your choice)
1. Karl Rove
2. Dick Cheney
3. Colin Powell
4. Haliburton
5. Tom Delay
6. GW
7. Laura Bush and her twin daughters
8. Bush's Doggie
9. _____________ (Fill in the blank with any Republican!)
10. All of the above
11. None of the above. Miller is protecting her real sources, Plame/Wilson and Plame's last CIA boss, Foley.
Po-tay-to. Po-tah-to.
Either way, incarceration is not a sufficient motivation to compel her to divulge her source. She is being well compensated for her inconvenience by her Big Media masters. Moreover, she will use her time behind bars to her advantage; it is definitely raising her star among her socialist Big Media brethren.
Even if she gets sent to full-on federal shower rape prison, her Big Media masters will simply up her compensation for her additional inconvenience.
As long as she is backed by a wealthy media corporation, incarceration is not a sufficient compulsion to to reveal her source. The only way to hit large corporations is through their pocketbook. Someone here mentioned simple $1000 fine that doubles every day she withholds her source's identity. After 30 days, that would grow to over a trillion dollars. No corporation is wealthy enough to bankroll that.
Okey dokey, if you think so.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.