Will the Media Pay for Its Pulitzers?
May 14, 2006 – 10:23 am by Jeff1999Over the last few months we’ve been seeing an increasing number of leaks of classified information to the media. The media takes this information and makes it publicly known, regardless of the fact that it may very well be assisting terrorist activities. Now let’s just assume that the media is within their “rights” to release classified information (which is debatable to say the least), does that mean that they are immune from the consequences of their actions? I may be within my rights to call my boss a jerk, but you can bet I’ll have to face the music for saying it.
For awhile now the experts have been telling us that it is only a matter of time before the U.S. suffers another terrorist attack. When the time comes when we’re again picking up tiny pieces of people to be processed at DNA labs, we’ll again be demanding answers, and yes, assigning blame.
No doubt we’ll be focusing our rage on the attackers and those who directly supported them. But if those individuals and entities who made the terrorists’ jobs that much easier by releasing, say, information about which telephone carrier was not being monitored, think that they’ll be off the hook, they better think again.
I’m no expert in class action tort litigation, but going up against the collective resources of thousands of the most motivated litigants imaginable is no easy task. And convincing themselves of the righteousness of their position within the protective cocoon of self-reifying editorials and Sunday morning talk shows is one thing. Convincing a jury (in a multibillion dollar lawsuit, where they are the only traceable parties with attachable assets) of the supremacy of their “right” to release information which they knew, or ought to have known, could assist the terrorists in carrying out their plot to kill thousands, is a whole different ballgame.
And to think - the terrorists wouldn’t have a chance at victory without the complicity of our own media. The irony is that the free press would be the first to go in an Islamic republic, but I suppose it’s the cut-off-your-nose-to-spite-your-face political reporting that we’ve found ever since a Republican landed in the White House.