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Observations of NYT Miller Story

by susanhu
Sat Oct 15th, 2005 at 08:32:11 PM EST

These are a few of my impressions of the NYT's article.

But Mr. Sulzberger and the paper's executive editor, Bill Keller, knew few details about Ms. Miller's conversations with her confidential source other than his name. They did not review Ms. Miller's notes. Mr. Keller said he learned about the "Valerie Flame" notation only this month. Mr. Sulzberger was told about it by Times reporters on Thursday.

As I've said for some time in posts and comments here, I've had a "gut" hunch that Judith Miller lied or withheld key information from the NYT, which hampered her editors and publishers' realistic appraisal of her case and how they represented her case to the paper's readers.

Once Ms. Miller was jailed, her lawyers were in open conflict about whether she should stay there. She had refused to reopen communications with Mr. Libby for a year, saying she did not want to pressure a source into waiving confidentiality.

Judith Miller's attorneys -- Floyd Abrams, the First Amendment specialist also representing the NYT, and Bob Bennett, a criminal attorney, both spoke on September 30, independently of each other and on different talk shows, about their communications with Joseph Tate, Scooter Libby's attorney. Neither Abrams or Bennett ever referred to the other in interviews that day.

Their lack of referral to each other, and seeming independent work on contacts with Tate, lead me to believe that the two men were competing for the limelight or did not get along. Such discord on a legal team can adversely affect clients, in this case both Ms. Miller and the NYT.

But in the end, saying "I owed it to myself" after two months of jail, she had her lawyer reach out to Mr. Libby. This time, hearing directly from her source, she accepted his permission and was set free.

Wrong. Just plain wrong. Judith Miller's attorneys weren't the ones successful in reaching out to Joseph Tate. It was Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald's September letter to Tate that got the ball rolling, reported the A.P.'s Peter Yost yesterday. (Yost: "It was Fitzgerald's letter to Libby's lawyer in September that helped resolve the impasse over Miller, resulting in her testimony.")

"W.M.D. - I got it totally wrong," she said. "The analysts, the experts and the journalists who covered them - we were all wrong. If your sources are wrong, you are wrong. I did the best job that I could."

Judith Miller perpetuated easily disproved lies that have led to the deaths of almost 2,000 American soldiers, the injuries of tens of thousands, and the injuries and deaths of hundreds of thousands of Iraqs. She has NO excuse. She did the worst job possible for a highly influential newspaper that affects how news is subsequently reported around the world.

More BELOW:

Ms. Miller said her notes leave open the possibility that Mr. Libby told her Mr. Wilson's wife might work at the agency.

This is complete bullshit. And I hope the NYT reporters told her so.

The notebook Ms. Miller used that day includes the reference to "Valerie Flame." But she said the name did not appear in the same portion of her notebook as the interview notes from Mr. Libby.

I can't imagine any self-respecting reporter buying this crap, or being willing to write this crap.

The notebook Ms. Miller used that day includes the reference to "Valerie Flame." [...]
Ms. Miller returned to the subject on July 12 in a phone call with Mr. Libby. Another variant on Valerie Wilson's name - "Victoria Wilson" - appears in the notes of that call.

Who's kidding who here. Judith Miller purposely wrote the names down slightly "off" in a juvenile attempt to obscure what she was being told -- or, dare I suggest, to cover up the fact that it was she who was telling this to Libby, so she pretended, in her notes, that she was taking down the information.

Update [2005-10-15 22:23:39 by susanhu]: I'm stopping here .. I'm on the third page of the eight-page article. Over and out. More later, or I'm hoping that Jerry and Boo write their usual briliant stuff.

Observations of NYT Miller Story | 23 comments (23 topical, 0 editorial, 0 hidden)

The real story (4.00 / 5)

as far as I'm concerned is how it happened that the Times allowed such unsubstantiated crap to be published - often on the front page. Her former editor said,

Like a lot of investigative reporters, Judy benefits from having an editor who's very interested and involved in what she's doing.

I take that to be a very guarded and polite way of saying - if you don't watch her like a hawk and continually challenge her, she's she'll write God knows what. As she did.

After he left, it seems no one was overseeing her writing - they just printed it without question or any demand that she provide credible evidence or sources for what she was writing. Is this how a newspaper with any self-respect - one who believes in the journalistic principles they were purporting to uphold by defending her - is supposed to operate?

Contrast this to the picture we get of Woodward and Bernstein being constantly frustrated because the WaPo demanded more evidence for their claims in their Watergate articles.

I get the picture that Judy was being treated like a columnist, who can write any damn thing they want to under the guise of "opinion," rather than as a reporter covering the news - conveying information to their readers - who is expected to verify her facts. No one at the NYT seemed to care - at the editor or publisher level, anyway, if what she was writing was true or not.

We are all different, but all in the same boat. --Alice

by Janet Strange (jstrange1925athotmaildotcom) on Sat Oct 15th, 2005 at 09:30:00 PM EST

So . . . (4.00 / 5)

My take on the article - disjointed, evades the real point. Too much about the back and forth of negotiations between Libby's and her lawyers, tantalizing hints about who gave who Valerie Wilson's name, and too little about the proper relationship between editor and reporter, standards that the paper sets for credibility and verification of the information it is publishing in straight news stories for its reporters.

Maybe this isn't the appropriate article to address these questions - but will the NYT ever do that? Their mea culpa on their WMD reporting was a wimpy and infuriating non-apology "apology." (You know, the ones that go, "I'm sorry, but . . . " followed by nothing but making excuses. And they never mentioned Miller by name in their non-apology. They can't say they were defending high journalistic principles by failing to hold her responsible for her crappy "reporting." They should have fired faster than they fired Jason Blair.

We are all different, but all in the same boat. --Alice

by Janet Strange (jstrange1925athotmaildotcom) on Sat Oct 15th, 2005 at 09:50:01 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Great take on things (4.00 / 4)

one thing that comes to mind in reading your post is this: Woodward and Bernstein were exposing the administration, but Judy was coming to her editor with sources from the VP's office, the WMD sections at state, energy, CIA and Pentagon. And the editor knew that no one would complain if he ran their version of events. Plus, there was rarely anyone in a position to know for sure, that could rebut the calims of Bolton, Hadley, Libby and so on.

I think that is explains a lot of why the NY Times printed it and the WP was hard on W & B.

by BooMan on Sat Oct 15th, 2005 at 10:07:23 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Great take on things (4.00 / 3)

But now Woodward prints his sources from the VP's office, the WMD sections at state, energy, CIA and Pentagon. Sigh.

Hey, Boo .. i haven't finished dissecting the story. Jerry says he's working on something. Maybe you'll have something too! I hope so cuz I'm tired, I have to get my cat inside (Althea -- she's playing "I'm a feral cat too!" at the moment), and I wanna veg and finish the Vanity Fair article on Cheney.

Hickok: "You know the sound of thunder. Can you imagine that sound if I ask you to? Ma'am, listen to the thunder."

by susanhu (susanhuatearthlinkdotnet) on Sat Oct 15th, 2005 at 10:11:01 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Take a break (none / 1)

the Vanity Fair article on Cheney is lots of fun and you'll find it a very enjoyble and relaxing luxurious diversion...I'm sure.

I haven't even read the Judy articles. I was too busy watching 'Sideways' for the first time. That was a nice diversion.

Now...to Judy.

Judy.

by BooMan on Sat Oct 15th, 2005 at 10:14:17 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Take a break (none / 1)

Susan exits stage left and it's

Sideways

Sideways!

(Actually, i watched the first 20 minutes when Darcy brought over the Netflix DVD and popped it in my 'puter, but I can't get into watching a movie on my computer screen ... i need to recline with my five pillows, my comforter, my hot tea, my foot-warmers (those being cats)

Judy, Judy, Judy. Why do I giggle every time I see Atrios type that.

Hickok: "You know the sound of thunder. Can you imagine that sound if I ask you to? Ma'am, listen to the thunder."

by susanhu (susanhuatearthlinkdotnet) on Sat Oct 15th, 2005 at 10:41:21 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Take a break (none / 1)

You just need a video card with an output jack. Then you can run a cable from your computer to your TV, and do exactly that.

(You might even have the output jack in the pc already)

Eat 4 Today: Just today I'm not going to take seconds & not eating between meals

by katiebird (katieremovebird@everestkc.net) on Sun Oct 16th, 2005 at 12:23:33 AM EST
[ Parent ]

So you're saying (4.00 / 2)

Nixon and his henchgoons would have attacked the WP, so they were trying to make themselves "safer" by making sure their facts were unassailable, but the NYT had nothing to fear from BushCo?

Makes sense, if the only goal of a newspaper is to protect itself, and it's lost all sense of its duty to inform the citizens of a democracy. Oh wait . . .

We are all different, but all in the same boat. --Alice

by Janet Strange (jstrange1925athotmaildotcom) on Sat Oct 15th, 2005 at 11:31:46 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Yeah (none / 1)

that seems to be the most innocent explanation available. It's easier to print the lies of the administration (as long as they are largely unchallenged) than it is to print the ugly truth about them (when it is vigorously challenged).

by BooMan on Sun Oct 16th, 2005 at 10:28:14 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Observations of NYT Miller Story (4.00 / 3)

Good comments, Susanhu, except for your last one.

More likely, she jotted that on a different page surreptitiously, not wanting Libby to see what she was writing (maybe he had told her they were speaking off the record), and either had mis-heard or mis-wrote. Oh, I don't know.

Other than that, I think you are completely on the money. At least, I suspect that you are.

by Aaron Barlow on Sat Oct 15th, 2005 at 09:50:52 PM EST

Re: Observations of NYT Miller Story (4.00 / 2)

Yes. That's a very good possibility. As Atrios would say (and often does), "Judy, Judy, Judy."

Hickok: "You know the sound of thunder. Can you imagine that sound if I ask you to? Ma'am, listen to the thunder."

by susanhu (susanhuatearthlinkdotnet) on Sat Oct 15th, 2005 at 09:56:59 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Observations of NYT Miller Story (4.00 / 2)

There will be lots of great and insightful commentary here on this crappy but predictable saga of betrayal, and I'm frankly straining my overworked brain cells just to keep up with all the angles.

So, to indulge in some levity to ease the strain, I want to say that I hope that someone nails Miller right square in the face with a pie when she appears to collect her award at that upcoming "First Amendment Ceremony" thingy. And I hope it's a schmaltz pie, (schmaltz is congealed chicken fat but with whipped cream on it it looks just like lemon meringue).

And of course I hope "Crooks and Liars" gets the video.

Denial is our most dangerous adversary.

by sbj on Sat Oct 15th, 2005 at 10:21:18 PM EST

Please, please, please (4.00 / 2)

Let someone smack Judy with a pie, even a lemon custard one. Or better, the audience should boo her off the stage. Or even better, the award committee rescinds the honor.

by sjct on Sun Oct 16th, 2005 at 07:50:55 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Apologies If This IS "Hijacking" (4.00 / 4)

I want to say something that I hope is not too far off the intended thread.

I admit to having read with little interest the NYT article and JM's "confessions." Why? Because, while the focus of the media has been on the "outing" of Valerie Plame, that is not the most important crime in my opinion. (Yes, I also believe that the Administration has worked very hard to keep the focus there.)

I hope that Patrick Fitzgerald has not taken two years of GJ investigation only to find out who let slip VP's name. I hope he has found out who forged the Niger yellow cake letter.

Who is behind the conspiracy to forge it?
Who is behind the coverup of that conspiracy?
Who has perjured themselves as result of it?

I hope it involves the WHIGgies; I suspect it involves Cheney and Bush. If my suspicions are confirmed by the much-anticipated indictments, then we have inescapable grounds for several impeachments, not to mention criminal trials.

Curtains.

They burn our children in their wars and grow rich beyond the dreams of avarice

by Limelite on Sat Oct 15th, 2005 at 10:29:32 PM EST

Very good questions (4.00 / 3)

I think a lot of our frustration is that we hope that the outing of Valerie Wilson is like the "third-rate burglary" at the Watergate that unraveled much more than campaign dirty tricks. On the face of it, outing a CIA agent is more heinous than burglarizing a political opponent's offices. In a way, it's almost a shame that this does start with a more serious crime because it makes an excuse for keeping the focus there.

But the question is - will there be any real investigative reporters who are willing to start investigating WHIG, the forged letter and much, much more. As has been pointed out, a search at the NYT's archives for "White House Iraq Group" turns up nada, zip. Evidently, they've never mentioned it. You know, since they were instrumental in selling the American people on a disastrous war, you might think the "paper of record" (those days now past) would at least mention them.

Susan reports rings around those NYT "reporters."

We are all different, but all in the same boat. --Alice

by Janet Strange (jstrange1925athotmaildotcom) on Sat Oct 15th, 2005 at 11:05:30 PM EST
[ Parent ]

I take it back (4.00 / 3)

Frank Rich's column for Sunday's paper:

"Lawyers familiar with the investigation believe that at least part of the outcome likely hangs on the inner workings of what has been dubbed the White House Iraq Group."
Very little has been written about the White House Iraq Group, or WHIG. Its inception in August 2002, seven months before the invasion of Iraq, was never announced. Only much later would a newspaper article or two mention it in passing, reporting that it had been set up by Andrew Card, the White House chief of staff. Its eight members included Mr. Rove, Mr. Libby, Condoleezza Rice and the spinmeisters Karen Hughes and Mary Matalin. Its mission: to market a war in Iraq.

[Emphasis mine]

I haven't even finished reading it and I'm saying "About damn time!" Of course, the question still remains, why is this found only in an op-ed, and not been actually reported on?

A Times Select column ( of course) but MSOC has given y'all the password . . . ;-)

I'm going to go finish reading it.

We are all different, but all in the same boat. --Alice

by Janet Strange (jstrange1925athotmaildotcom) on Sat Oct 15th, 2005 at 11:20:53 PM EST
[ Parent ]

More Frank Rich (4.00 / 3)

As we learn in "Bush's Brain," bad things (usually character assassination) often happen to Bush foes, whether Ann Richards or John McCain. On such occasions, Mr. Bush stays compassionately above the fray while the ruthless Mr. Rove operates below the radar, always separated by "a layer of operatives" from any ill behavior that might implicate him. "There is no crime, just a victim," Mr. Moore and Mr. Slater write of this repeated pattern.
This modus operandi was foolproof, shielding the president as well as Mr. Rove from culpability, as long as it was about winning an election. The attack on Mr. Wilson, by contrast, has left them and the Cheney-Libby tag team vulnerable because it's about something far bigger: protecting the lies that took the country into what the Reagan administration National Security Agency director, Lt. Gen. William Odom, recently called "the greatest strategic disaster in United States history."
Whether or not Mr. Fitzgerald uncovers an indictable crime, there is once again a victim, but that victim is not Mr. or Mrs. Wilson; it's the nation. It is surely a joke of history that even as the White House sells this weekend's constitutional referendum as yet another "victory" for democracy in Iraq, we still don't know the whole story of how our own democracy was hijacked on the way to war.

[Bolding - me again.]

We are all different, but all in the same boat. --Alice

by Janet Strange (jstrange1925athotmaildotcom) on Sat Oct 15th, 2005 at 11:27:38 PM EST
[ Parent ]

I have suspected they keep focus there because (none / 1)

doesn't the applicable law against outing CIA agents contain some text about if it would compromise national security or some such.

So in the case of a discarded operative, would lawyers not argue that the law was not violated, that the agency had no further use for Ms. Plame, and therefore were free to out her if they wished?

I thought the yellow cake documents were signed by the former foreign minister of Niger, I can't remember if he signed them posthumously, or if he is still alive, I haven't seen him on Larry King, which is pretty suspicious.

one man's conspiracy is another man's business plan
Blog updated as needed

by DuctapeFatwa (DuctapeFatwa@yahoo.com) on Sat Oct 15th, 2005 at 10:39:09 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: I have suspected they keep focus there because (4.00 / 3)

Here's just one quote, sure it's the Washington Times and "an official" isn't IDed. But the FBI is/was in charge of the investigation.

An official said the documents included a letter about the purchase of some 500 tons of uranium ore, supposedly signed by Niger's president, Mamadou Tandja. The signature was found to have been faked.

No mention of his appearance on Larry King. ;>)

But there's also this interview conducted by Ian Masters with Vincent Cannistaro, the former CIA head of counterterrorism operations and intelligence director at the National Security Council under Ronald Reagan, which aired on the Los Angeles public radio KPFK on April 3, 2005.

--from which. . .

A former counterterrorism chief claims that the now discredited documents that showed Iraq trying to purchase uranium were fabricated right here in the United States.

Do we know who produced those documents? Because there's some suspicion ...
I think I do, but I'd rather not speak about it right now, because I don't think it's a proven case ...
If I said "Michael Ledeen" ?
You'd be very close . . .

The WHIG membership never included Ledeen (ha ha), but these are the members who were brought together and who

in response to the Yellowcake forgery issue, the White House Iraq Group devised this strategy*. . .to combat critics:
"There is a strategy now, devised by White House communications director Dan Bartlett, Mary Matalin, a former aide to Vice President Cheney, and former Bush aide Karen Hughes.

*You can read the little said about that strategy here.

But then Ledeen has his various Italian connections:

Ledeen has a colorful track record, which has produced substantial grist for the conspiracy mill: He was allegedly tied to the Italian P2 Masonic Lodge, a violent right wing group that was involved in a number of terrorists attacks in Italy in the 1970s the 1980s; in the late 1970s, while P2 was doing its dirty work, Ledeen was working as a consultant to Italian intelligence on terrorism issues; as a consultant to the National Security Council in the 1980s. . .
. . .and
University of Rome, Italy: Visiting Professor of History (1975-1977)

And it was

The Niger documents, for example, which apparently were produced in the United States, yet were funneled through the Italians.

Gee, doesn't that invite one to speculate that Ledeen is a spy, or would that be counter-spy, or would that be mole?

They burn our children in their wars and grow rich beyond the dreams of avarice

by Limelite on Sat Oct 15th, 2005 at 11:42:38 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Correction (4.00 / 2)

Ledeen has a colorful track record, which has produced substantial grist for the conspiracy mill: He was allegedly tied to the Italian P2 Masonic Lodge, a violent right wing group that was involved in a number of terrorists attacks in Italy in the 1970s the 1980s; in the late 1970s, while P2 was doing its dirty work, Ledeen was working as a consultant to Italian intelligence on terrorism issues; as a consultant to the National Security Council in the 1980s. . .
. . .and
University of Rome, Italy: Visiting Professor of History (1975-1977) Source

They burn our children in their wars and grow rich beyond the dreams of avarice

by Limelite on Sun Oct 16th, 2005 at 12:39:43 AM EST
[ Parent ]

It's All About the Anguish (none / 1)

And as for the real story, as I bumblingly posted on a Kos thread, the entire media are saying:

Image Hosted by ImageShack.us

Don't mention the war.

We are called to speak for the weak, for the voiceless, for victims of our nation and for those it calls enemy.... --ML King, "Beyond Vietnam"

by Gooserock on Sun Oct 16th, 2005 at 10:36:33 AM EST

Re: Observations of NYT Miller Story (none / 1)

Susan -- what was your take on the "Valerie Flame" notation. Do you think Judy is fudging or do you take it at face value. Personally, I think there is definitely a second source. I wonder who it will prove to be? ;P

by katerina on Sun Oct 16th, 2005 at 02:46:14 PM EST

Re: Observations of NYT Miller Story (none / 1)

Can you say Bolton?...I knew you could. I still haven't heard an explanation Re: his 'visit' to judy, judy, judy during her incarceration...I love a good mystery...:{)

Peace

the revolution will not be televised...

by dada on Sun Oct 16th, 2005 at 03:12:29 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Observations of NYT Miller Story | 23 comments (23 topical, 0 editorial, 0 hidden)

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