Looping the Hen

I love that pic thats great.

Ok... as conservative as I'm getting in my old age, my liberal tendencies have to shine through here when it comes to protection of first amendment rights. Do I agree that absolutely a line has to be drawn in the protection of national security? Absolutely... the NY Times picture you included in your post demonstrates that. I see, however, three problems with the majority of the reactionary conservatives decrying the 4th estate's report of these terrorist stopping tools: First, the NY Times picture and "article", while sensational, is just that. To equate the stories that have been published in our time with having the same effect as the "one if by land" story is like comparing apples with orangutans.

Second, while I agree that this generally liberal press (as compared with the ideology of this administration) will opt more often than not with printing a story than surpressing it in the supposed name of National Security, however the conservative approach assumes that the press has not (during this administration's reign) surpressed a story in the name of national security. And, yes, while I can't point to concrete examples in the last 6 months of where they have done so, but asking for proof would be akin to proving the negative. Empiracally, though, the media has suppressed stories in recent past for national security purposes -- such as knowledge of NSA wiretapping and troop movements in the Gulf.

Third, and most importantly, the views expressed in the links adopt an extremely slippery slope approach toward news reporting. It assumes that the benefit to the people from withholding the story will always outweigh that from running the story if lives can potentially be saved. On its face this may seem logical, but to what extreme do we take it? Ok, fine, so what if we suppress the story about wiretapping and recording suspected terrorist transmissions from overseas (based on the President's record of zealous attempts to fight terrorists even in the face of privacy or other rights, however, the story should not come as a surprise to anyone), where do we stop from here? What if the President has a bad weekend in the Mideast while discussing international peace efforts with Jordan and Syria and pisses off a number of Muslim nations? Should the press surpress this information because terrorists can then turn to these nations to attempt to garner additional help from these countries in their fight against the US? Or hypothetically the Supreme Court hands down a verdict that the CIA/FBI/NSA is violating the right to privacy in their use of infrared or radio frequencies to search ship cargo holds containing international goods without permission of the shipowner? Suppress that too? Or how about the press reporting that airports still have a number of holes to fill in their checkpoints in order to make airline travel more secure? Stop that one as well? All of these potentially pose a threat to our national security as they set forth loopholes that terrorists can possibly explot, but the question remains where to draw the line?

Unfortunately, I don't know the answer, but I do know that it isn't allowing the government to direct what can and cannot be printed. Muslim countries already have that you see, its called state run press. To all you naysayers, I say criticize the press all you want, but I believe that reporting on problems like this causes private industry and the government to search for solutions to the problems the press is reporting on (and I dare say more quickly than if the issues weren't presented to the public). True, maybe the government and private sector is doing so to prevent egg from ending up on their collective faces, but in the end, if that makes the airlines I fly on more safe and secure, or the borders subject to more scrutiny, or cargo aboard sea or air vessels subject to more screenings, or other loopholes being closed, then by all means, I double dog dare you to tell me the media's reporting of the weaknesses to our security cannot (and has not and will not) make our country safer in the long run.

G-Max

Yeah! What he said!

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