Gene Lyons
Wednesday, October 26, 2005
With everybody in Washington anticipating dramatic, possibly melodramatic, developments in the Valerie Plame CIA leaks investigation, it's worth noticing what it reveals about the appalling state of American political journalism.
As one with first-hand experience of the odd blend of arrogance, high-handedness and sheer professional incompetence in high places at The New York Times, very little in that newspaper's coverage of self-dramatizing reporter Judith Miller surprises me.
Shocking yes, surprising no.
In one very limited sense, the Times' eight-year infatuation with Whitewater was even odder than its naive boosterism about Iraq's mythical WMDs. No state secrets were involved. Any skeptical reporter with a working brain could deconstruct the coverage. Correct the errors and fill in the blanks, and the Whitewater 'scandal'--as even Kenneth Starr eventually had to conclude--basically vanished. Having written two books on the subject (one with Joe Conason), I'll spare you a rehash."