Editorial: The Spirit Is Willing But The Press Is Weak

It was all so deja vu last week in so many ways.

You had a reporter whom the administration talked to . . . about Valerie Plame. The reporter wouldn't name the source (to the public). The editor of the paper made excuses and offered justifications. Even though the editor had been left out of the loop.

But before you could say "Miller Time!" (can't touch this!), it was "Woody Time!"

Or it would have been.

If the same critics of Judith Miller had any guts.

So we had a deja vu within a deja vu and tripped on back to 1967, to the William Castle film The Spirit Is Willing with the theme cueing up:

The spirit is willing
Your kisses are chilling
The spirit is willing
But the PRESS is weak.

Yeah, okay, we substituted "PRESS" for "flesh."

But what else is it but press?

Yes, The New York Times seriously addressed the story. Out of concern for the integrity of the paper (snicker, snicker) or just to say, "Hey we're not only the ones pimpin'!", they addressed it with some strong reporting.

And the watchdogs. As Aimee Mann might sang, "And the watchdogs just want to sleep in the sun all day." ("'J' for Jules" words and music by Aimee Mann, on the album Everything's Different Now by 'Til Tuesday.)

CJR Daily boasts of real-time media criticsm and includes "daily" in their title (or "The Audit" -- can anyone make sense of their latest extreme make over?) but they've yet to weigh in on Bob Woodward who knew in June of 2003 that the adminstration was leaking on Valerie Plame.

Woody's got a host of reasons depending on the time of day. (And will be on Larry King Monday to tell nothing at all -- apparently Mother Superior Walters was busy.)

Might a real-time media criticism offering watchdog need to weigh in at some point?

We would say "Cat didn't have their tongue on Judith Miller." But Kat outlined how, apparently, the cat did have their tongue on Judith Miller.

Judging by the zeal of their commentary on Miller at the end of the summer, it's hard to imagine that they were silent for so long.

Apparently the pattern now repeates with Woody.

Is "real-time" media criticism only for the likes of Jayson Blair? Do you get a pass for being a "name"?

If that's the case, hand the reigns over to Arianna Huffington who's not afraid to call it like she sees it.

As was pointed out repeatedly at The Common Ills, the problem with The New York Times did not begin and end with Judith Miller. But damned if the dog pile didn't act like it did.

Do most people even grasp that the story most often cited, for good reason, had two writers? Judith Miller and Michael Gordon.

As we pointed out in the spring, as Sally Field, Miller was unbelievable. (We did note that possibly as the Sally Field character in Absence of Malice, she was believable -- the bumbling reporter eager to swallow anything she was fed.) Did Michael Gordon get a pass because he avoided Charlie Rose? Or was it a case of bash the bitch? Or a case of a lot of people piling on without getting the basic information?

Who knows. Miller's gone. Gordon's not even news. Doesn't change a thing at the paper. (Especially if the rumors are true that Miller refused an offer to be kicked upstairs, demanding instead to return to reporting and restore her 'good' name -- that only after that refusal did both sides come to an agreement to part ways. It sounds like a crazy rumor but it's making the rounds and considering everything else that goes on at The Times, we'd argue it's plausible.)

While some have been reluctant to criticize Woody, other voices (including Robert Parry and ones within this community) spent last week explaining how a line can be drawn from the highs of Watergate to the lows of today's journalism and, guess what, Woody can be seen as a common denominator.

Rebecca noted that Seymour Hersh, a contemporary of Woody's during Watergate, has continued to break stories. News stories. Not gossip about who said what to whom in which room of the White House. As C.I. noted Thursday, "Judith Miller could only exist in a forum that rewarded Bob Woodward. Is that hard to fathom?"

No, it really isn't.

It's the issue of trading journalistic independence for access that Amy and David Goodman outline so well in their book Exception to the Rulers. It's a topic Amy Goodman, Robert Parry, Danny Schechter, Norman Solomon and a host of others have noted for many years now.

It only seems "new" apparently to some silent watchdogs.

If these are our watchdogs, thank God for the internet. The net drove the Downing Street Memos and it appears it will have to drive the Bob Woodward story as well.

The five of us currently in journalism classes heard classroom debates on this for most of the week, was it a case of being scared to criticize Bob Woodward or was it a case of Woody's "issues" hitting too close to home?

Some felt Woody's sacred cow status (to the point that he's supposed to be the embodiment of modern day journalism) intimidated some. Others felt certain watchdogs are quite comfortable critiquing errors in a piece but not questioning a system itself.

One of us is saying "in fairness" (we'll bet you can guess whom) that CJR Daily retooled their site at the end of the week and that could explain some of the delay in real-time criticism. If that is indeed the reason for the silence, we're sure we'll see a strong hitting editorial come Monday.

If not, maybe they better drop the slogan and leave the real-time media criticism to Arianna Huffington?

[This editorial was written by The Third Estate Sunday Review's Dona, Jess, Ty, Ava and Jim,Rebecca of Sex and Politics and Screeds and Attitude,C.I. of The Common Ills and The Third Estate Sunday Review,Kat of Kat's Korner (of The Common Ills),Mike of Mikey Likes It!,Elaine of Like Maria Said Paz, Betty Thomas Friedman Is a Great Man, Wally of The Daily Jot and Cedric of Cedric's Big Mix.]