McCarthy: The Los Angeles Times's Strange Notion of Journalistic Ethics
Media | Fri, Oct 31, 2008 at 10:52:01 am PDT
Another article by Andrew C. McCarthy on the outrageous journalistic malpractice of the Los Angeles Times: The Los Angeles Times’s Strange Notion of Journalistic Ethics.
Even if you accept for argument’s sake the bunk about honoring the “source’s” supposed wishes, the newspaper wouldn’t need to release the tape in order to give us a more comprehensive account of what happened that evening. So it’s not that the Times is simply withholding the tape. The Times is trying to suppress the story. Not the story as Wallsten spun it back in April. The full story.
The full story couldn’t be more relevant. Barack Obama says he is a staunch supporter of Israel. The importance of the Khalidi festivities isn’t simply that Obama lavished praise on a man who was an Arafat apologist — although that is troubling in itself. What also matters is that many speakers (no doubt including Obama’s good friend Khalidi himself) said extremely provocative things about Israel and American policy.
While that went on, Obama apparently sat there in tacit acceptance, if not approval. He didn’t get up to leave. He wasn’t roused to a defense of his country. He didn’t deliver a spirited condemnation of Islamic terror. He just sat there. And when it came his turn to speak, he spoke ... glowingly ... about Khalidi. He was clearly comfortable around the agitators and, equally crucial, they were clearly comfortable spewing their bile in front of him — confident that they were certainly not giving offense.
Why would the Times think it’s not newsworthy to tell us in detail what Obama sat through and chose not to refute? He says he supports Israel, but shouldn’t we get a peek at what he actually does when Israel is under attack? After all, he wants to be in charge and soon the attacks may be more than just verbal.
All of that could be made known by the publication of a transcript, without breaching any purported promise to the purported source.
But, the Times sputters, we’ve already done that news story back in April. The material facts have already been publicized thanks to our crack reporting.
Really?
