A strange and sad tale is developing regarding Bob Woodward and his inexplicable decision to behave like John Fund on Plamegate. Via
atrios,
RJ Eskow writes a devastating piece at the Huffington Post:
Bob Woodward showed last night why he is the role model for a generation of morally compromised 'journalists.' He aggressively promoted his patrons' interests and, Judy-like, selectively cited government secrets. His entire career as the author of dubious political fanfic led to this moment, and it was a revealing one.
On Larry King Thursday he put in a fiercely partisan performance on behalf of the Administration that's provided content for his last two best-sellers, taking on any panelist who deviated from GOP spin (transcript).
He cited highly classified information, which raises a number of disturbing questions - including who gave it to him and why. He also said, "I'm trying to do a book on the Bush second term. " Bob, it shows.
. . . Woodward began his performance Thursday by backstopping the Administration on the Harriet Miers nomination, and not-so-subtly echoing conservative contempt for federal judges. He then parroted spin as fact from the get-go when the Libby case came up, saying:
First of all this began not as somebody launching a smear campaign ... I'm quite confident we're going to find out that it started as a kind of gossip, as chatter and that somebody learned (Plame) had worked at the CIA and helped him get this job ...
Gee, it was just "gossip," even though a) we now know it was Cheney who told Libby, and b) Josh Marshall has rightly pointed out that Libby had to know she was in the secret "operations" part of the CIA. Woodward went on:
... There's a lot of innocent actions in all of this but ... this is a junkyard dog prosecutor ...
Oh, that's all it is! Patrick Fitzgerald is Javert in a baseball jersey. But does the legendary hero of Watergate think perjury is wrong?
Of course this was Thursday night and Woodward perhaps thought he was getting ahead of the curve. By Friday night, Woodward looked incredibly compromised and well . . . stupid.
Eskow posits it is part of a tradeoff for access but that explanation seems unconvincing to me. Bob Woodward does not need to shill like THAT to get access. I mean, honestly, Woodward has done tremendous damage to his reputation with that performance. Even Larry King probably noticed.
So what could it be? What is driving Bob Woodward to destroy his legendary reputation?