Editor’s note: Michael Ackley’s columns may include satire and parody based on current events, and thus mix fact with fiction. He assumes informed readers will be able to tell which is which
Earlier we asked if the Bush administration was requiring too much trust in its judgment on matters of national security. Now we must ask if we should place greater trust in the judgment of the New York Times.
In pursuit of this question, we met with Howard “Scoop” Bashford, the newspaper’s “sub-deputy managing editor for leak’s of classified national security information.”
We tried for executive editor Bill Keller himself, but Bashford explained that his boss was experiencing some physical difficulties.
“They’re secret,” he declared when we asked what those difficulties might be. “But he’ll be back in public as soon as he extracts his head from his … Oops. I’ve said too much. That’s off the record, OK?”
We said we’d take the matter under advisement. Moving to the matter at hand, we asked, “Can you explain Mr. Keller’s letter to Times readers about the newspaper’s decision to ‘declassify’ the government’s method of tracking terrorist bank transactions?”
“Sure,” he said. “His letter provided three main reasons: 1) Our reporters didn’t find anything illegal about monitoring the international banking database, but some people thought it could be abused; 2) the people can’t judge the program if they don’t know about it; and 3) JFK might have called off the Bay of Pigs invasion if the Times had revealed the plan.”
“Bay of Pigs?” we mused. “Are you suggesting Kennedy reneged on his promise of air support because the Times downplayed the story?”
“I don’t know,” said Bashford. “I was just a kid.”
“Moving along,” we said, “what was Mr. Keller trying to say to ‘conservative bloggers and TV or radio pundits’ when he wrote, ‘I could ask … why they are drawing so much attention to the story themselves by yelling about it on the airwaves and the Internet’?”
“Well, he couldn’t just say ‘nyah, nyah, nyah,’ could he?” Bashford answered.
“Good point,” we said. “Now, Mr. Keller wrote that the newspaper needed a ‘”compelling reason” to hold a story.’ What would be a compelling reason?”
“If lives were at stake, that would be a compelling reason,” Bashford said. “Oh. Wait. Strike that. I’ll have to get back to you on that.”
“What did he mean when he wrote that ‘we hesitate to pre-empt the role of legislators and courts …?” we asked.
“That was a very unfortunate typographical error,” said the Times man. “It should have said, ‘We don’t hesitate to pre-empt the role of legislators and the courts.'”
“Can you explain what he meant by the following?” we asked, quoting: “‘A secondary argument … was that publication would lead terrorists to change tactics. But that argument was made in a half-hearted way.'”
Bashford replied, “Some government folks said, ‘This will help terrorists. Please don’t disclose it.’ If they had been wholehearted, they would have said ‘please, please.‘”
“Let us move on to another point,” we said. “Mr. Keller seemed to recognize we are at war when he wrote, ‘The responsibility of it weighs most heavily on us when an issue involves national security, and especially national security in times of war.’
“What do you think would have happened to him if he had revealed information like this back in World War II?”
“We don’t have that kind of war today,” said Bashford. “Anyway, you seem to be ignoring the most important point.”
“Which is?” we asked.
“Which is that Mr. Keller felt a heavy responsibility,” said Bashford. “It was a difficult decision. He agonized over it.”
“Well,” we said, “he’ll feel better when he gets his head out of his …”
“Shush! Shush! Shush!” Bashford interrupted. “You must keep that a secret. Please, please!”
“We’ll agonize over it,” we said.
Related special offer:
“Journalistic Fraud: How the New York Times Distorts the News and Why it can no Longer be Trusted”
