Jacob Weisberg, at Slate, seems to buy the right-wing meme and
mistake the point of a free press.
The first question editors need to ask might be framed in this way: Is there a good case that the practice or actions we want to disclose are wrong--in terms of law, procedure, or morality? ... Is the alleged harm genuine?
This is what the press does and they are dead wrong...
Weisberg seems accept, uncritically, the idea that the press is in the business of NOT TO REPORTING news.
And judging from what others have said, he might be right. He, and his compatriots in the 'free press' by slavishly ceeding to the slightest pressure are moving us closer and closer to having a fourth branch that acts as an official publicity office publishing only those stories given the okay by lines of self-interested bureaucrats.
The right wing talks about coddling criminals and the ethos of personal responsibility; here I see a press too hell-bent willing to do the government's job. Maybe it's just me, but I see the proper breakdown like this:
The government acts and when it wants it's actions secret, it keeps them away from the press.
The press investigates government action, finds truth, and publishes it.
Now maybe I'm crazy, but I just don't think the press should have to do the government's job.*
So, administration: if you don't like what is reported, either stop doing it, or don't talk to the press about it. But don't whine that someone else won't whitewash your mess.
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* I'm not even all that thrilled about the troop movements test. Don't want those in the news, don't share them with the press. But there, and maybe only there I am not disgusted that newspapers exert some discretion at the request of government. Otherwise I think the relationship SHOULD be adversarial and any request to quash a story should damn near automatically put it on the front page.