How Actual Journalism Works

Joe, he's asked you to make one comment on an issue of great relevance to the ongoing debate over Iraq. I fail to see how that qualifies as either "really silly" or a "crusade."

If you had just left out the really silly and crusade stuff this would have been an excellent reply and is exactly what most of the commenters are looking for here. Talk to them and they will listen. When you accuse Terrapinion of silliness you sort of uh are doing the same thing, you know?

"Third, look at the record. Tell me where I've been misled by my sources."

FISA and government surveillance issues, multiple times.

What do I win?

"How Actual Journalism Works" is supposed to be reporting information that is both verified and verifiable.

You rely on anonymous sources even when there is no need. Your piece on the Anbar Awakening came out weeks after the NYT did the same story, and the NYT used almost all named sources while your sources were almost all anonymous.

Or look at the analysis on Obama you did a month or two ago, based on something another journalist wrote, based on an anonymous source reporting on what Obama and Edwards had talked about, based not on firsthand information but on a chain of other anonymous sources.

Any one of those anonymous sources could have been embellishing -- we as the readers have no idea and no way to verify. We not only have to trust you, someone who has proven he is willing to lie to readers, but also trust every unnamed source in your chain.

active duty military, diplomatic and others; retired military and think-tank people; politicians, diplomats and military sources from the region.

All of these people have agendas, and when as a rule allow them to speak anonymously you are giving them a platform for deception. As you did on FISA legislation when you uncritically repeated what you had been told, despite it being verifiably false.

It's not silly at all, given how tight-lipped them mainstream media has been about the whole subject. I appreciate your explanation, Joe, but please drop your condescension to the question itself.

While Joe Klein is on this acknowledging-the-commoners kick, perhaps he'd care to answer my running tally of his lies, misleading statements, etc. left here:

time-blog.com/swampland/2008/04/better_than_bush.html

I have to beat this horse a little more:

"Third, look at the record."

Let's do that:

1. "Speaker Nancy Pelosi quashed the House Intelligence Committee's bipartisan effort and supported a Democratic bill that — Limbaugh is salivating — would require the surveillance of every foreign-terrorist target's calls to be approved by the FISA court, an institution founded to protect the rights of U.S. citizens only. In the lethal shorthand of political advertising, it would give terrorists the same legal protections as Americans."

Absolutely false. Nearly everything in the above paragraph is a lie.

2. "I have neither the time nor legal background to figure out who's right." Klein's excuse for passing on lies about pending legislation from a source that never should have been granted anonymity. (I believe the source was a Republican Senator, repeating Republican talking points.)

3. Klein and his sources have claimed multiple times that NSA data-mining began after 9/11 -- there is no reason to believe that is true and multiple reasons to believe that is false.

That's on one issue, and hardly an exhaustive list on that one issue.

By the way I think recently Klein has been doing good reporting on Iraq, and I credited him for as much on my blog. (Which is normally highly critical of him)

But as a whole his journalism leaves much to be desired, and his reliance on gossip and anonymity is the exact opposite of how good journalism is supposed to operate.

Margalis: "Klein and his sources have claimed multiple times that NSA data-mining began after 9/11 -- there is no reason to believe that is true and multiple reasons to believe that is false." Please, this is quite the story -- one that even the NY Times has seen unfit to print on the front page. What precisely would be your sources? You can't in one sentence accuse someone of putting too much faith in questionable sources, and then in the next make wild unsourced accusations.

really thanks for this inside look

As others have said, a potentially strong and engaging post marred by the petulant arrogance born of a thin skin.

Also....

Third, look at the record. Tell me where I've been misled by my sources.

Never did address Hoekstra-gate, did you? I guess because you can't admit you stepped in it pretty bad, and you don't admit mistakes.

"Second, I always rely on at least two separate sources when I'm writing about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan." (Emphasis added)

How many sources do you require for your other reporting? Evidently Hoekstra didn't require separate sourcing...

...Adding, given your writing history just since you joined Swampland, your total lack of self-awareness is astounding.

How Actual Journalism Works posted by Joe Klein

Sounds like an Onion article...

I have a number of problems with Klein's journalistic ethics, in general. And the Pentagon-propaganda story is certainly embarassing to the journalists who were played for fools.

But Klein seems to completely miss the point that, at root, this story isn't about the journalists. It's about the Pentagon. Good journalists shouldn't be trying to argue that they weren't misled -- despite the existence of a broad conspiracy to mislead journalists and the public. Good journalists should be outraged that the integrity of their stories can now be questioned. Good journalists should be running back to their sources and demanding assurances that they aren't paid shills.

Good journalists don't get huffy and demand that their readers deduce "where [they]'ve been misled by [their, often anonymous] sources." Now, that is silly.

"This is a really tough decision. War may well be the right decision at this point. In fact, I think it--it's--it-it probably is. Because sooner or later, this guy has to be taken out. Saddam has -- Saddam Hussein has to be taken out... The message has to be sent because if it isn't sent now, if we don't do this now, it empowers every would-be Saddam out there and every would-be terrorist out there."

- Joe Klein, "Meet The Press", Feb. 2003

"Please, this is quite the story -- one that even the NY Times has seen unfit to print on the front page. What precisely would be your sources?"

No, I don't fully source every blog comment.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/12/AR2007101202485.html

http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2007/10/qwest-ceo-not-a.html

This stuff gets tricky to talk about because "data-mining", "TSP", "the program" and "one of many programs" are used willy-nilly all over the place. When Klein refers to "data-mining, as he did in this piece (http://www.time-blog.com/swampland/2008/01/on_fisa_reform.html) he appears to be referring to a broad umbrella of programs. When he writes:

"the country seemed under the threat of imminent attack in the months after 9/11, when these data-mining requests were made, and that such searches will now become legal under the new law."

It's not really clear what he is talking about; "data-mining requests" and "searches" (which are not the same thing) will now become legal? I'll remind readers that Klein admitted himself he doesn't know what the pending legislation actually says, and to my knowledge data-mining of call data was never legalized.

Note that I didn't say data-mining began before 9/11, I said that "there is no reason to believe that is true and multiple reasons to believe that is false" wrt the claim that it began after 9/11. Especially when you use "data-mining" as Klein does as a broad term.

There is so much secrecy around these programs, to the point where it's never clear what program anyone is even referring to, that it's silly for anyone to presume they know the exact timeline.

Thanks for responding to comments, Joe.

As others have pointed out, there was no need to go all >a href="http://www.firejoemorgan.com/2008/04/few-words-on-internet.html">Buzz Bissinger on Terrapin, though.

The Greenwald column you reference is here. I think that he was too harsh in tone given your article, which actually is a pretty balanced three paragraphs.

Still, his larger point is relevant: why grant anonymity to sources "in order to say something that Tony Snow would happily say, and does say, every day from the White House Press Briefing Room?" Also, there's no way for the reader to evaluate the credibility of the claims when the sources are listed as "A senior U.S. military official" and "several other sources."

Jim, Foolish Literalist, and others, say what needs to be said.

I'm not gonna reiterate the stuff above that I agree with, beyond saying that it's good Joe's responded to terrapinion's request.

What I do wanna say is that apparently how television journalism "really works" is the unvarnished and unrebutted presentation of government propaganda.

And that it is not surprising that the exposure of this propaganda campaign in which the legacy media has been complicit calls into question every other "journalist's" sources. Joe may not have used the sources CNN and MSNBC did, but his work is now as much much in question as anyone else's--as everyone else's.

We now know that people were lying on the record, in person on the teevee, pushing the administration line. This is not going to enhance our faith in Michael Gordon's next off the record story about how things are going great in Iraq, still.

And, yes, Joe, it calls your sources into question too.

Sources generally remain anonymous when they feel the need to shield themselves against retaliation from their superiors. It seems to me that a Swampland reader (or any news reader for that matter) possessing a high enough level of access to vet a source would be more productive if he were to just skip the source and verify the information itself. Doesn't that sound like a much more productive and fruitful approach? Plus, the latter route can be taken even when the journalist decides to keep the source anonymous.

So then what is the big deal behind anonymous sources? Even if Joe Klein named that source, would it make much of a difference?

When the source is identified, it might give you a nice fuzzy feeling inside, but that sure doesn't render upon the divulged information a higher degree of accuracy and quality than if the source remained anonymous. Equivalently, if you know the information is bogus, knowing the source doesn't make it more so.

Nathan,

The problem we've seen with anonymous sourcing in the Bush administration is that it is decidedly not used to protect people from retaliation. It is used to give the imprimatur of the publication to the news material, to give it greater weight than if it were a sourced Pete Hoekstra speaking.

Hoekstra lied to Joe, and when Joe passed on those lies, he owned them. If he had refused anonymity to Hoekstra, and required him to go on the record with those lies, then they would have been HIS lies, not Joe's.

Judy Miller is the poster child for this. She stenographed material from shoddy, administration sources that was flat wrong. Th anonymity was used by the administration so that Dick Cheney could go on the teevee and say "even the [liberal] NYTimes says that Saddam is a threat."

IAC, that's not terrapinion's question. His or her question is whether Joe has been using the propaganda sockpuppets as sources. He says no, he hasn't. That's a good thing to know. And he should not be surprised that the question has arisen.

Oh, and by the way, for swampers who care, I'm guesting for atrios for a week or so.

Among others.

I accept that anonymous sources have multiple motives for remaining anonymous, but none of us should be giving greater credence to information from anonymous sources than that which we would give to information from identified sources. It should be the other way around. The fact that some of us in this country believed the propaganda preceding the Iraq war means that we failed to utilize our critical thought process and ask questions. Instead, most of the public, and indeed most of the media, fell right in line like simpletons.

The point I was trying to make is thus: facts and opinions can be verified without knowing their origins. You can read other stories, check other media, or even do first-hand research (rarely possible); but in the end, it is up to the individual to decide whether to believe what they read and hear.

For their part, the journalist should have a vested self-interest in presenting the most accurate information to their readers, because if the readers are continually led astray, they'll find another journalist. After the stories about administration officials actively peddling false information, I would hope that every journalist, including Joe Klein, is checking their sources thrice over.

You made the big time, Jay! Congrats

Yeah. Pretty weird to get the keys in my inbox.

Joe: thanks for the effort. Unfortunately the profession as a whole is somewhere down there with Congress and the White House. Engaging with you directly should be seen in the larger context. Your MSM and punditeriat colleagues are now part of the governing system. You are not seen as an independent source of information and opinion. The record shows the extent to which you and yours have been manipulated, and the high stenography content in much reporting. It has just become that: reporting.

In the final analysis the profession of journalism has only one currency: integrity. Now that it is celebrity driven and compromised. But that does not mean all is lost. There are still journalists who take their craft seriously. Sadly they are few in number.

Tell me where I've been misled by my sources.

On the FISA story, where you carried Pete Hoekstra's water. That's just one example.

It's pretty clear that you care a lot about your reputation. Can't you see that no one can take you seriously until you address how your managed to botch the FISA story so badly?

And how about answering this: do you still use Pete Hoekstra as a source?

I sympathize. However, look at that idiotic article by your colleague Michael Scherer --"& steps for McCain to Beat Obama" or whatever.
Not much real journalism there. Just more buy-in into the Rovian system --brand a person this, --say that, etc.

It may sometimes work, but it's all based upon convincing your audience to act against their own best interests.

Not a hint of that in the article.

My point, such as it is, is not even one national journalist in 3 does real journalism. You will have forgive people for forgetting that it's possible.

While a few people continue to practice an honorable craft, in general this profession is very, very broken.

Okay, here's an example of where you were completely wrong about Iraq (Link)

How ironic that the good news from Iraq the Bush Administration has been touting is almost entirely due to the excellent nation-building efforts of the U.S. military.

Excellent nation building? That sounds an awful lot like something someone like one of the tv generals fed you.

I understand there isn't much respect for logic and philosophy any longer, but for what it is worth, anonymous sources are considered a logical fallacy. It is a version of the appeal to authority fallacy, only worse.

I always understood journalism to be a profession dedicated to the truth, in theory. We now have an entire news network dedicated to spreading propaganda on behalf of one end of the political spectrum. Even CNN doesn't hire journalists any longer. They hire former party hacks and pretend they are journalists. Given the performance of the MSM in the lead up to the Iraq war it is a wonder that anyone believes anything they report. One could tell Bush was lying by simply analyzing the structure of his arguments, which were irrational for the most part. The media in other parts of the world figured it out. In fact, it was government sponsored media outlets like the BBC and CBC who saw through the smokescreen of disinformation, as opposed to private sector media.

In defense of Joe...

Yes, Joe has been wrong on some of the things he has written (dare we go back and read all of the posts written here and keep a scorecard?? seriously folks, you are not infallible) but I think it is important to note that Joe is an Opinion Columnist. He talks to people, he reads, he thinks and then he forms ana opinion. Is it important if his sources are anonymous? FOr an opinion piece absolutely not, in fact it is probably better because it doesnt tie the source to Joe's opinion. That source will still be available the next time Joe needs him/her because the source isn't responsible for what Joe has written, not responsible to his superiors nor his conscience. Had Joe added the words Opinion columnists to his title he would have been better off. As fo Joe's way of seeming arrogant by calling terapinion silly, well, show me a journalist who doesn't have an inflated ego and I will show you an out of work journalist...I say this with the full understanding that my oldest son is of the same profession and has the same vanity. Again, cut sosme people a little slack, allow me my psychosis and I will allow you yours...
in summation, is joe always write? No. Does his column often add to my understanding, either through well thought out, well researched info or by just making me think my own differing opinion through thereby making it stronger? Yes. So please keep on keeping on Joe...the rest of you have another cup of coffee this fine morning and try and go to your happy place. :)

If you had just left out the really silly and crusade stuff this would have been an excellent reply and is exactly what most of the commenters are looking for here.

This is exactly right. Given the kinds of things that have happened over the past several years, a lot of them involving the manipulation of the press, can you blame us for being curious?

I was going to comment last night but thought the better of it. I'm glad I waited.

The sad fact is, that as beholden to anonymous sources and susceptible to pro-military spin as Joe is, there's a serious shortage of people willing to even go as far out a limb as he has concerning problems on the ground in Iraq.

And of course the core assumption, that at 4.8% of the world's population, the US is nevertheless solely responsible to control all conflict in the world, is an article of faith here at Time, and NO ONE is allowed to cross that particular line.

http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1739053,00.html?imw=Y

Joe you've done an able job defending yourself. But I do think this is a good discussion to have. Without being too presumptuous, it helps you and it helps all of us.

The process you described does sound rigorous and kudos to you for that. It's better, given recent events which the Pentagon perpetrated on all of us, that we get this out here.

I partially agree and disagree with your assessment of your own coverage. You were absolutely excellent on the recent Hakim v.s. the Sadr family dispute that has erupted in Southern Iraq. You brought up the fact that the Iraqi government was in effect siding with Hakim (and through him the Iranians) at least 12 hours before any other news service even began to realize that. While many of us here knew it, in terms of news media you were right on top of if not first on that story.

With regard to the surge, I respectfully disagree. Count me as one of those who think you (initially) bought the Petraeus kool-aid lock, stock and barrel on this one. You seem to have learned (a continuous process for us all, I'm afraid) from this and to have delved even more deeply into what is going on over there.

Anyway too long of a post. But the point is discussions like this are good for all of us.

"Commenter Terrapinion is on a really silly crusade..."

Uh, no. It's NOT a silly crusade, it's a really good question, and it's absolutely the predictable and obvious result of the media's failure to do its job, especially where the Iraq War is concerned. Don't shoot the messenger, Joe. You and your colleagues created the situation where we can no longer trust what we read and hear. I've long said the failure of the media to acknowledge its own responsibility in bringing this nation to war will have longterm consequences, and Terrapinion's question is just one manifestation of that.

Grow up, Joe. Gone are the days when you could blithely repeat Administration talking points and not get called on it.

Hi jay. I noticed you at atrios' place this morning. Glad he trusted you with the keys.

Have you gone down to the hardware store yet to make a secret copy? :-)

On the thread, spot on. I hope Joe reads it, and finally responds to his FISA travesty. And I hope (in my dreams) that he'll respond by burning his lying source (Hoekstra) and pledge to burn any source who intentionally lies to him in the future.

Joe, that's great news that your Pentagon sourcing is stronger than what we get on the talking heads shows. I'm not surprised. But why so defensive? Wasn't Terraopinion smart to ask you about this? Isn't that the kind of discerning reader that you want to have? It's great that you answered the question but I'd expect you to be happy that somebody even asked you. I've always found that it's no fun to write for disengaged readers.

Joe, it's not silly at all to question your sources. That doesn't mean that we think you are lying; it's just that we've been given plenty of reasons to be skeptical of 'official Pentagon sources' or allegedly independent military sources.

That's to say nothing of the deserved skepticism of the DC journalist/stenographer class.

Wouldn't you rather have a readership that is skeptical rather than credulous?

it is not surprising that the exposure of this propaganda campaign in which the legacy media has been complicit calls into question every other "journalist's" sources. Joe may not have used the sources CNN and MSNBC did, but his work is now as much much in question as anyone else's--as everyone else's.

We now know that people were lying on the record, in person on the teevee, pushing the administration line. This is not going to enhance our faith in Michael Gordon's next off the record story about how things are going great in Iraq, still.

And, yes, Joe, it calls your sources into question too.

THANK YOU JAY. You get it.

You do realize, however, that you have become at least an honorary DFH by guest-blogging for The Great Pale Blue Satan? ;-)

One of us! One of us!

I f'd up my closing tag; everything above "THANK YOU JAY" should have been italicized.

I think it is important to note that Joe is an Opinion Columnist. He talks to people, he reads, he thinks and then he forms ana opinion. Is it important if his sources are anonymous? FOr an opinion piece absolutely not

I completely disagree. First, to paraphrase Pat Moynihan, Joe Klein is entitled to his opinion, but he is not entitled to his own facts. If the Pentagon is disseminating phony data, and that is what Klein (or any journo) is basing his opinions on, then I want to know that.

Second, Klein holds himself out to be a reporter and the title of the post is "How Actual Journalism Works".

Lastly, the division between straight news and opinion has been destroyed in the past 15 years or so. This has mainly been due to cable news organizations expressly directing "talking head" anchors to voice their opinions on stories that they cover -- in stark contrast to journalistic ethical guidelines. I was going to say that CNN Headline News was the last bastion of relatively straight news on a cable channel...but they added Glen Beck of all people.

While print journalists have done a much better job of withstanding the creeping editorializing in news reporting, I certainly haven't seen any serious criticism of their TV colleagues. You certainly won't see Klein taking Chris Matthews or Tim "off the record" Russert to task about "how actual journalism works" any time soon. And I seriously wonder whether an educated 18-year old picking up a copy of Time would think that Klein was offering reporting or an opinion...or would even think to ask the question.

Re: "silly."

The way this works is as follows: journalists withhold (some) information from us in order to serve the greater good of giving "inside" information to us. That's what confidential sources are, a bargain struck along those lines.

But... Since we cannot judge for ourselves whether they made a good deal on our behalf (that would require us to know the names they are keeping secret) we have two choices: 1.) to trust their judgment "blindly," in the sense that we are meant never to know who Joe's military sources are so we're in the dark as we trust him, or 2.) to mistrust based on... well, based on the withholding of information, which means mistrusting blindly.

If we pick 1.) the journalist has no problem. If we choose 2.) we will inevitably say and suspect things that aren't true. After all, we have to speculate, take a guess, peer inside an opaque box and try to figure out what's in it. The savvy journalist looks at our ignorant scratchings in blog posts and comment threads, laughs at how clueless and conspiratorial we are being, and forgets that this cluelessness and the conspiratorial hunches are, at least in part, a result of his own withholding behavior.

And that's why we sound "silly" to Joe. He leaves us uninformed about his sources and then convicts us for knowing so little about them. In this sense "silly" is akin to cute: isn't is cute how clueless readers try to find out who my sources are?

Now there is a complication, which Joe brings up when he says: "Look at the record. Tell me where I've been misled by my sources."

It's kind of a third alternative, along the lines of trust-but-verify. He means we should give him the benefit of the doubt, assume he has good sources who aren't crooked or inept, and then watch to see if the reporting based on those sources develops any problems. If not, then he made us a good deal, and we were right to trust him. That's not blind trust or automatic mistrust; it's a version of "trust but verify." I say a "version" because we can only verify indirectly that Joe's sourcing is sound if we use method 3.)

The suggestion is not unreasonable. However, it means that when there is a problem with reporting based on Joe's condidential sources, he has to be extra sensitive to it, and extra responsive to questions that are raised.

After all, in such moments the keystone in his architecture of trust is close to cracking. If we're supposed to trust (all the time) but verify (indirectly, and when we can) then the "proof" of that system comes when Joe screws up and trusts the wrong source. What happens then?

Anyone who remembers this story from Joe Klein and the swift, devastating criticism is got for passing along wrong facts from a partisan hack, or the comically inept response from Time magazine, which retreated to its he said, she said bunker just to stop the embarrassment, admitting as little error as possible-- anyone who recalls that episode has very good reason to decline Joe's recommendation, "trust my sourcing but verify the reporting."

When he was misled by a source and consequently misinformed us he did not realize what a serious matter it was for the system of trust I have been describing. He and his magazine behaved like a jerks.

Jay Rosen (www.pressthink.org)

gabba gabba hey.

Jay Ackroyd: Hoekstra lied to Joe, and when Joe passed on those lies, he owned them.

Slightly off topic, but Hoekstra may not have been lying. He could have actually believed what he was saying. Maybe David Addington had been whispering into his ear or something. It reminds me of Rick Perlstein's take on conservative "not so" stories that get repeated and passed around:

http://www.ourfuture.org/blog-entry/notso

It may be lying. But it may be a product of the wingnut rumor mill. Perlstein had his commenters came up with other examples of this sort of thing:

http://www.ourfuture.org/blog-entry/axis-um-um-where-do-we-go-frum-here

The list is pretty long.

but Hoekstra may not have been lying. He could have actually believed what he was saying

Can you say "reckless disregard for the truth?"

I knew you could.

Whatever Joe's entitled attitudes, this is an amazing and necessary discussion.

Thank you Joe, thank you Jay Ackroyd, thank you Prof. Rosen, and thank you commenters.

This is quite a read.

I've always found Joe's posts on Iraq to be pretty well researched. It's when he covers the campaign that he slips into tired narratives, and I've said before I wished he'd bring that up to the level of his Iraq reporting.

My biggest problem has been with his hero-worship of Petraeus, whom he seemed to suggest was beyond criticism. Now we've seen much of what he said was, at the very least, disingenuous. The surge has brought down violence, but as bloggers pointed out repeatedly, without ever even trying to achieve the stated purpose of that "breathing room", politicial reconciliation. It was always about punting Bush's mess to the next President, and he's succeeded. And we told you so.

Jay Rosen:

What I look for is indirect evidence to inform me as to how a journalist or media institution deals with ethical issues.

For instance, I want a reporter to provide as accurate a description of an anonymous source's position as is possible without blowing the identity of the source. Therefore, I will look to see how a journalist reacted to Judy Miller's deliberately misleading identification of Scooter Libby as a "former congressional Hill staffer". If they don't care, that tells me something.

I want a journalist to not intentionally deceive me. I will look to see how a journalist reacted to Bob Woodward lying for months that the Plame scandal was no big deal, when he knew for a fact that it was, and was a witness to the leaks.

I want a journalist to object to government propaganda. How did a journalist react to the government paying Armstrong Williams for favorable editorials? What about the Iraq propaganda? Forget about Klein's sources, does any of this bother him?

I want a journalist whose first obligation is to the public. Not to his sources, important though that may be. Not to getting access. To the public. I'm number one. So, I look to see what a journalist's reaction was to Tim Russert's testimony that he treats conversations with administration officials as automatically off the record unless the official agrees otherwise. Is that Klein's rule? Is that Time's rule? Does that concern them?

I think those are reasonable cues, space. But I would add: how they behave when their reporting is challenged, and how well they listen to what is said in reaction.

Journalists--not all, but most--are terrible at one essential skill you need on the Net with its lower signal-to-noise ratio, and that is to listen past the crazies and the anonymous bashers to the intelligence in a lot of the comments, even the hostile ones.

I left one thing out in my comment above. The word "actual" in the headline, "How actual journalism works" is a nice and telling little dig at the clueless commenters: actual as opposed to the fevered speculation you irresponsible people engage in when we decline to tell you who we're working with.

Terrapinion asked:

I am requesting that he engage us in a short discussion about how he views the information being fed to him in light of the recent verification of a program that many of us have suspected for a very long time. I realize that one must trust somebody in order to form an opinion so lets talk about how that trust is established.

Thank you, Terrapinion, for raising such an important issue. We know that reporters have fallen for these tactics, so the question arises of how to tell when a pundit goes wobbly.

Thank you, Joe Klein, for actually answering the question after providing your typical remark. Because you knew it was not a silly question, you provided an informative response. The part of your response that was not condecending and snide was the beginning of a discussion that we need to have.

If a statement is true it can be verified by more than one person. Joe claims that he gets at least 2 sources for what he writes, so to some degree he must adhere to the verification principle. How do you verify what an anonymous source claims, when you can't even verify the truth or falsity of what others claim they said?

Any statement from an anonymous source ought to be considered false.

Another thing on sources lying.

They lie and manipulate all the time, and the journalists adjust for that. On the Plame leaks to Matt Cooper, he explained, quoted in a New Yorker article, that he thought Rove was being malicious and possibly mendacious. That's why he didn't write a story. And that's why Novak did.....

That, to me, is the worst aspect of this. Cooper wanted access to Rove so badly that he adopted the Timmeh default off the record standard, even though Rove lied to and tried to manipulate him routinely.

And you know why he called Rove? To negotiate a quote on a welfare article he was writing.

Any statement from an anonymous source ought to be considered false.

We have to be careful with that, because if we went that far, then we'd have to throw out quite a bit of Ron Suskind's One Percent Doctrine, and we never even would have heard his gem about the "reality based community." So there are definitely grounds for anonymous sourcing. The ethics of using them, though, should be better defined and adhered to.

An "anonymous" source is a source you do not know the name of. Very few journalists rely on them. A "confidential" source is a source the journalist knows the name of, but withholds it from us at the source's request.

Part of the problem we are discussing is what happens when the news value of the withheld name is greater than the news value of what the source provided.

Journalists don't want to think about those situations and they don't much like it when we do.

Jay R--

On the need to overcome the low signal to noise ratio, that doesn't fly so well here. For some reason, while repetitive, comments here are neither terribly uncivil or poorly constructed, nor is there an overwhelming number of them. It's not like the torrent that lil debbie got during the Froomkin flap.

Like Terrapoinion's question--a fair one, expressed a little strongly, but civilly, raising a real issue about the trustworthiness of old-fashioned media.

I wonder if the reason for Joe's general disregard for the value of this feedback loop is due to his having adopted talk radio as a mental model for blogs and commentary.

If one has been sick at home, and watched the call-in show on C-Span for an hour, the scope of the average caller comes into sharp relief.

Perhaps this mis-characterization might be an understandable rationale for his "how dare these unwashed plebes question my methods" attitude.

"Perhaps this mis-characterization might be an understandable rationale for his "how dare these unwashed plebes question my methods" attitude."

Yeah, that's a charitable explanation.

The uncharitable one is that he's just a thin-skinned prima donna who won't deign to acknowledge the civility and intelligence of his commenters (I'll exclude myself from that lot).

But we all already knew that.

understandable rationale for his "how dare these unwashed plebes question my methods" attitude.

Sorry. We're talking about Joe Klein here. His disdain for the unwashed plebes is legendary in both its breadth and its duration.

KT on the other hand, I think experiences genuine frustration. Journalism is indeed hard work and those of us on the other side often do fail to appreciate what's involved.

Wow, I'm sorry I missed this discussion. Basically Joe Klein thinks crazy Pete Hoekstra is a legitimate source, and he gets really angry if you point out why the man is not a legitimate source. From the fruit of that poison tree nothing good comes, and until that relationship changes Joe Klein nor any of his sources can be trusted.

I'm pleased to see Joe engage in this discussion. I suppose his exasperated, dismissive tone is par for the course with him, but it's still encouraging to see him engage us in a meaningful sense.

Baby steps.....

Couple things:
Joe probably found Terrapinion's persistence (pasting the same question in multiple unrelated threads) as silly, not the question itself.

Second, Hoekstra/FISA isn't relevant to what Joe writes in the post. This post is his criteria for dealing with with "military and intelligence sources" when he's "writing about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan." I think people could agree that Joe is more balanced and informed about those issues than he is on domestic issues, where he frequently seems to just wing it (to his discredit). People can make justified criticisms of the FISA debacle, but they don't disprove this particular post.

The real problem from my standpoint is summarized in Klein's last paragraph

A year ago, I reported that real progress had been made in al-Anbar province--but that our intelligence community was extremely pessimistic about the Shi'ites and Sunnis getting their act together to actually govern the country. ...I warned against getting involved in the intra-Shi'ite battle between the Hakim and Sadr families. ..I've emphasized my fear..that the U.S. is trying to establish long-term bases in Iraq. I've also reported that we need more troops in Afghanistan, that we should consider cross-border special operations against the terrorist camps in Pakistan and that we should not pause in our Iraq troop withdrawals. All of these opinions were derived after extensive and ongoing conversations with a wide variety of sources--active duty military, diplomatic and others; retired military and think-tank people; politicians, diplomats and military sources from the region. I also try to visit the region as often as I can...and I read a lot.

Mr. Klein's articles never provide me with data. He may have two sources that say that the Anbar awakening is going well, but that isn't data. It doesn't allow us to judge whether it really is going well or not, whether any gains are likely to hold, or whether it will allow American troops to return home.

Herein lies the problem for Mr. Klein's profession. If his job is merely to repeat what he is told by other individuals while providing no new data himself, then he provides little value. Any informed citizen can get access to the information that Mr. Klein provides. Moreover his interpretations are no more novel than any other citizen's. On the other hand Mr. Klein could spend some time thinking about what sort of data might be useful in measuring the progress of the Iraq War (if that is the topic of interest), collect it, and use it to inform his questioning of his sources. Then he would provide real value for the consumer's of Time's products.

Disagree with that, patriot. The kind of trust Joe asks for when he uses confidential sources for his Iraq reporting isn't story specific; it's personal: trust me, Joe Klein, and my years of experience as a reporter. We can't trust his sources based on the specifics because we don't know who they are. We have to trust him, Joe the pro.

And so the way Joe the pro reacts when his reporting is bad, and bad because he relied on bad sources, is extremely relevant to whether we should trust him in other situations. For this reason Klein made a major error in the FISA story; he continues to think it a minor screw-up. Now he's too invested to back down, which is sad.

FISA was a major screw up. I don't honestly know how Joe feels about that. But I think he probably knows it and regrets it. Joe just doesn't seem to apologize well. Look at this post. He answered a great question from Terrapinion with some valuable insight. But he felt the need to belittle Terrapinion in the process. Joe has one hell of an ego. That's a shame, but it doesn't make him a bad journalist.

I think Joe has done a very good job on the war. He's been mostly right. If you're always right, you're probably just being overcatious. It's good to hear that he gets confirmation. I believe him. I don't know why he doesn't feel the need to do so for non-war stories, but at least I'm forewarned.

So here's how I will treat Joe going forward. I will trust him with reservations. I know he won't admit his mistakes though, so I'll look to Swampland for others to uncover them. If I have the chance to uncover one myself, I will.

Jay Rosen offers helpful insight into people's rightful questioning of whether any sockpuppetry was involved in Joe's reporting. The FISA screw up and Joe's subsequent handling of it does not help Joe in these matter of trust with his readership.

Here, in this piece, Joe engages with the readers, which is a good thing, but he prefaces it with the usual, "How dare you effing question me, you plebe" attitude, and that's a bad thing.

Joe, at some point, you have to separate the Pro Joe, from Ego Joe. KT does this really well, do you might want to ask her for some guidance.

Once again, here is the same problem--people think blogging is easy. It isn't. It isn't just speaking out loud to an empty room. It's standing on a chair and giving a small speech about your opinion. People are going to ask questions, and not every question is, "Hey, is Joe a big ass or just a little one?", so stop acting like an insecure defensive asshat and just listen.

Why on EARTH would you be surprised, Joe, that a reader would question a reporter who has written about Iraq about whether or not he was involved in the biggest propaganda project in the modern era? Why would that make you defensive?

If you want to be pissed, Joe, you should be pissed at the people who conspired to, in the end, call in to question the credibility of ALL journalists who wrote about Iraq with any sort of "the ponies really ARE under all of this s**t somewhere" viewpoint. They threw you ALL over a cliff, and did so happily, and undermined you livelihood.

We're not the one's who broke the journalists rice bowls. They are.

Joe: If you study the way the DOD used retired Generals and some journalists as useful conduits for their slant on the way the Iraq war was going you will see why there is a lot of scepticism around the blogs.( From the Document Dump). Reading the denials, the obfuscations and even Brian Williams' personal endorsement of the generals who briefed him only reinforced my view that few journalists can avoid being contaminated by the message machine of the Bush Admin. And Brian telling us that in his view..etc etc. The conceit!

That is the context, Joe.

Joe, I still waiting for an answer to my question:

Do you have a different standard for sourcing on "writing about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan" than your 'reporting' on other topics? If yes, what is it? Why?

That's what you've implied in your post and it raises serious questions that deserve a response.

Which came first:

The chickenfoot, or the chickenshiite?

International Answer:

NOBODY CARES.

Seemingly, a sneak preview of Obama's Big Problem: How to package appeasement as popular.

The basic problem for Klein and the other Kos klowns remains: Will their RETREAT AT ALL COSTS karma lead to November DNC election victory, if not military?

Granted, they're more inkleined to go for the former than the latter, but we IS talking about the press and their Mother Jones suckled leftist dweebs here, for which, in most American living rooms of merit, you won't find a single wasted word or moment of deep peaceful sleep.

All of western journalism is based on a fine, multi-layered network of trust. I like to think of it in economic terms:

Credibility is the theoretical currency of journalism.

When a newspaper or a magazine hires a journalist, they are exchanging credibility. The newspaper receives part of the reputation of the journalist, while the journalist's work and reputation is now partially backed by the authority of the organization.

When a journalist chooses to grant anonymity to a source, they are essentially lending that source some of their credibility. Their expectation is that the loan will pay off by enhancing the reputation of the journalist, demonstrating their access, judgement, and ability to communicate accurate and relevant facts to the consumer. The consumer is left to rely on the reputation and credibility of the journalist to judge the accuracy of the facts.

Passing incorrect, irrelevant, or purely partisan information to a journalist as part of a confidential transaction has an impact similar to that of a bad loan. The reporter should look at that source as a future credibility risk, and the consumers should question the judgement of both the reporter and the supporting news organization.

In a way, to extend the metaphor, what we've been seeing in the journalistic world is similar to what we've seen in the lending world. Journalists and media organizations have been too willing to extend credibility to sources that are bad risks. The sources have had dubious motivations or demonstrably poor reputations, but in the interest of inflating their own credibility, reporters have been more interested in quantity than quality. Likewise, official sources have figured out the best ways to game the system, both in terms of manipulating access and inflating their own credibility (e.g. by circular reinforcement).

My main point is this: anonymous sources are excellent and important in many ways, but we're seeing a credibility bubble. It would be a shame if we lost the fundamentals of the system due to the (admittedly vast) current abuses.

""Any statement from an anonymous source ought to be considered false."

We have to be careful with that, because if we went that far, then we'd have to throw out quite a bit of Ron Suskind's One Percent Doctrine, and we never even would have heard his gem about the "reality based community." "

Fortunately the rules of logic are not dependent on whose ox is being gored. However, I suppose one could simply put whatever they say in parenthesis, and simply not assign any truth or falsehood to what they say.

Regarding Jay Rosen's comment

The kind of trust Joe asks for when he uses confidential sources for his Iraq reporting isn't story specific; it's personal: trust me, Joe Klein, and my years of experience as a reporter. We can't trust his sources based on the specifics because we don't know who they are. We have to trust him, Joe the pro.

The biggest problem that I have is that what Mr. Klein (and many other reporters) typically obtain from their sources is non-verifiable spin. If a reporter uses sources to obtain numbers, to get verification that a particular meeting occurred, to confirm that an individual uttered a particular statement, then the sources might have some value. The sources may also have value if they can lead the reporter to ask specific questions or to find particular sets of data. There is no value to multiple sources stating that things "look good in the Anbar province." That statement has no value unless the reporter can demonstrate why the reader should believe it.

Journalism fails when a reporter tries to present the truth rather than presenting verifiable information that will lead the reader to the truth. Mr. Klein and other modern reporters too often attempt the former.

I like the "bad loan" analysis, jwbates.

There's a tension between "verifiable" and "exclusive," rk.

Discrediting a source in order to discredit his information is also a logical fallacy. If you find it difficult to argue a point when the source of your opponents information is withheld, then you have no means of logically arguing your point even if the source was revealed.

I understand that some sources are more credible than others, but most of us should be able to realize that first hand information and adequately sourced information is infinitely more valuable than equivalent information from an anonymous or confidential person. Hence the emphasis on sourcing that sites like wikipedia and online journals (or even print journals) impose on their contributors.

And I agree with rk. If a journalist doesn't report any verifiable data, he might as well have just reported his opinion on the subject; because a statement passed as fact but without the facts is of little value to me.

Joe Klein admits himself that his conclusions are essentially his opinion:

All of these opinions were derived after extensive and ongoing conversations with a wide variety of sources...

What the reader should take from that is thus: his conclusions may be educated opinions but they are still opinions and should not be treated as fact. If he chooses to not reveal his sources then those opinions become his rather than opinions of someone else -- someone perhaps with a little more expertise or credibility.

Joe Klein - Thank you for responding to my comment. For the record, the only really silly crusade of which I am aware involved three-headed knights from a place called 'Ni!'. But, since you've labelled it a crusade, I will luxuriate in the holy land of your answer.

And it was a good answer (aside from the unnecessary slap at the beginning). In fact, it is an answer that I hope can be part of an on-going discussion of the current and changing media environment. I realize that you take your credibility very seriously (as should we all) but you also have to admit that government programs like the White House Iraq Group, the Pentagon Psyops Program, and FOXNews have shaken the credibility of your entire profession. It puzzles me that you do not seem to view these things as worthy of launching your own crusade to rescue your craft from such obvious violations.

But as far as your answer goes I am very satisfied. I am thrilled that none of your sources have been damaged by appearing on The List of On-The-Take Generals. I am also thrilled to see that the Two Source Rule still exists outside the pages of journalism textbooks. Your third part was not really relevant to the discussion I was trying to encourage so I will let others talk about it. For my part, I would like to hear your thoughts on this administration's ability to manipulate journalists and reporters and drive a narrative of their own creation. Let's get meta!

C'mon Joe! I know you've got a really big brain. Let's see you start throwing around references to Chomsky's Manufacturing Consent and allusions to the Straussian Noble Lie. We can take it!

Anyways, serves me right for neglecting my commenting duties and trying to go out and lead a productive Terrapin Life on the day when my question actually gets answered! Where are my priorities?!?

How Actual Lefty Journalism Works

1. Take a Belgian position beyond Bethesda

2. Find like-minded Happy Hour lemmings at Trader Vic's in Springfield

3. Xerox latest issue of Rolling Stone, except for the byline, rolling toward Reston

4. Blame the Pentagon for your parentless, Godless, sexless upbringing, after skimming Skins tickets for the home opener

5. Remind yourself that creative writing alone will never replace the brake lining on your one owner 2002 Beemer, but junior college rednecks need useless make-work too

6. Insist to your friends that Chris Matthews, warts and all, remains somewhat more patriotic than Michelle Obama, even after election season

7. When guessing what Kieffer Obermyer will say next about Bush before the DNC's Saturday Night Live séance, always strike a light moral tone somewhere between Howard Scream's drunk kid and the local abortion clinic's appointment secretary

8. Assume your projection of ency and class hate IS covered by the Geneva Convention, if not the United Newtons charter itself

9. When in doubt about NOLA or Burma, blame Cheney

10. Above all, bash the troops, morning, noon, and nap Time. You can't depend on Castro and Chavez and Carter to do Fonda and Hayden and Hoffman's work for Comrade Barack. That would not be daily involved.

= ANONYMOUSE ACCOMPLISHED =

As others have pointed out, there is no need to grant anonymity to people who merely parrot administration talking points. Hoekstra is obviously one example, but again I'd point to Joe's coverage of the Anbar Awakening. The NYT did essentially the exact same story using named sources, while Joe used nearly all anonymous sources.

Why does a source need to be anonymous just to say "things here seem to be getting better."?

If someone names a source I can google them, I can read about them on sourcewatch, I can call them on the phone if I so desire. If someone is identified only as a "senior administration official" it's meaningless. They might be fibbing or the reporter may be fibbing. (Or they might just be mistaken, or misquoted)

Again, "real journalism" is supposed to be about verification. Reporters verifying the facts and readers being able to do the same. With Joe you get neither. He doesn't verify what his sources say and he makes it impossible for you to verify either.

The way anonymity is being granted today is essentially a license to mislead.

Prof Rosen:
You atate

There's a tension between "verifiable" and "exclusive,"

If I understand that correctly I would agree. But that tension is part of the "breaks" for anyone involved in the information transfer business. There's no reward for coming in second. But in the absence of verifiable information, Gresham's Law rules the journalism world. One purpose of editors is to distinguish valuable information from dross; they all too often fail.

See Greenwald's reply here: http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2008/05/14/journalists/index.html

Thankfully, by virtue of what Joe Klein calls "actual journalism" (what Newsweek's Richard Wolffe describes as the "fantastic job" our political press does), Klein was able to assure the world that all of the concerns about Guantanamo were "total rubbish" -- nothing more than a "dimwitted and loathesome orgy of recriminations" from "feckless" and "flaccid Europeans." As he intrepidly reported, the U.S. was "abiding by the spirit of the Geneva Conventions" at Guantanamo and the detainees were "not being treated badly at all." That's "How Actual Journalism Works" (of course, as emaydon points out, this is the easiest and most obvious answer to Joe Klein's request).

* * * * *

Joe Klein wanted to dress up the Guantanamo detainees as ballerinas and force them to wear pink tutus. Tom Friedman said that the reason the invasion of Iraq was "unquestionably worth doing" was because it was critical that we "take out our big sticks" and tell Muslims: "Suck. On. This." We have an extremely healthy and Serious Pundit class, particularly its leading war cheerleaders, and I think we should all be proud of our political discourse.

Joe, in case you hadn't noticed, earlier in this comment thread Jay Rosen holed you beneath the waterline. Now Glenn Greenwald has sunk your ship .
Your credibility on this issue is now somewhere between zero and squat, and no amount of huffing and puffing and pompous sniffy pronouncements is going to change that. Time for you to start issuing a few mea culpas.

Joe, does the phrase "The Camp X-Ray Yankophobe fiesta" ring a bell? Do you remember assuring us that all the fuss over Gitmo was just a "dimwitted and loathesome orgy of recriminations" from "feckless" and "flaccid Europeans"?

Tell you what, Joe. Rather than lecturing us about "real journalism", here's an opportunity for you to actually practice real journalism. Read these documents obtained from our very own Defense Dept. - http://www.aclu.org/safefree/torture/35271res20080514.html - and then reread your article from February 2002 assuring all of us that there was nothing to worry about at Gitmo, about how we were observing the "spirit" of the Geneva Conventions and there was really nothing to worry about.

Do that, Joe, and then we can have a further discussion of "real journalism."

It appears that Joe really cares about getting the story right when it comes to reporting how military events are unfolding in the Middle East. As a result, he has done significantly better than his broadcast counterparts at actually getting that story right. (This may be damning with the faintest possible praise; his recent Swampland contributions on the topic deserve stouter praise than that.)

It also appears that Joe really doesn't care much about whether the Bill of Rights or the balance of powers survive the decade. Hence his fairly consistent and wholly abominable credulity over all right wing, pro-police-state talking points on the matter. It's odd, when you consider that there's nothing to sustain freedom of the press except the same beleaguered Bill of Rights, that he should seem so blase and lazy about it.

My guess? In that indifference, he simply mirrors the Beltway CW. He swims in the same opinion pool as Reid and Hoyer, also ostensible liberals. And the Constitution's every more distressed, ever feebler cries for help just haven't carried through that jello-thick medium, any more than simple common sense about Iraq, and the tramp of millions of protesting feet, carried through it in the fall of 2002. As Philip Zimbardo would say, the problem is more situational and systemic than it is dispositional.

Mr. Klein:

I just linked here from Glenn Greenwald today. I have always tried to give you the benefit of the doubt but ugghh, stories like this just makes my soul throw up:

http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2008/05/14/journalists/index.html

The simple fact is, the adminisitration has coopted the media for domestic propaganda, not just once or twice, but over and over again. And it's not just TV journalism (Judith Miller anyone?).

At some point journalists with integrity will need to reckon with this fact. Klein may be perfectly right about his Iraq coverage (although he was totally wrong about FISA and Guantanamo), but the ongoing scandal of fake government news has tarnished the profession as a whole. I watch CNN now like it's Pravda; assume it's all lies unless I know otherwise.

You have 0 credibility and you are also a proven liar with no journalistic competence whatsoever.

1) You lied about being the Primary Colors author.

2) You slandered and libeled a real journalist for correctly identifying you by lying some more.

3) You were too stupid to understand the FISA bill and you were 100% wrong and admitted you were too stupid to understand.

We can take all your lies, incompetence, and hackery, and it still isn't as bad as all the right wing jizz dripping down your chin every time you interview a republican.

You can fool people that don't know all these things about you, but to those that do you have no credible reputation as anything but an incompetent hack and you never will.

You can take that to your tombstone you worthless assclown.

Joe Klein you disgusting piece of human garbage. you're going to jail just like the rest of bush's junta. you bought and paid for phony. all you've ever been is a biased republican piece of filth and you deserve nothing but insults... why would I debate with an ignorant fool such as yourself.

so you blindly take the word of lairs and criminals in uniform and expect some kind of praise? expect to be considered a "real" journalist? get a clue. of course a criminal is going to deny that they're engaged in torture. big surprise. "just following orders" isn't good enough either. They're criminals and MUST PAY for what's been done.

Yeah, Greenwald pretty much demolishes Klein here with the Gitmo story.

Wow, how surprising. Joe Klein's "superior" sources somehow ended up feeding him the same talking points that were going out to the networks via the military analyst illegal covert propaganda program. What a shock!

Joe, if your sources are so great, and so much better than the military analysts used by the networks, how come you end up with identical talking points?

It seems to me that you just aren't paying close enough attention to know when you are getting spun. You apparently have zero ability to track your own nonsense over time, and have to rely on people like Greenwald to do it for you.

The likely truth is that Joe is hoping that nobody bothers to track down his own nonsense over time. Fortunately we have Glenn Greenwald, giving Joe Klein and most of the rest of the MSM a lesson in investigative journalism.
Joe's goose is beyond cooked on this issue - it is cremated.

I wish Mr. Klein would explain his bizarre habit of ignoring his own past when he makes these kinds of self-righteous claims.

He does this repeatedly. Is it a poor memory? Is it intentional despite how easy the internets make researching a writer's history?

By the way, I actually thought the quoted material in Glenn Greenwald's column was satire at first. How in the world do you write such naive,jingoist crapola without sourcing it??

Donkey rider, heal thyself: "And there is an old American saying which I think I've just invented: Before you get up on your high horse, be sure you are not riding an ass."

Let's have another one of your creative explanations, Joe.

Some of the words/phrases Joe Klein uses here are more than a little revealing...

First of all, the vast majority of my military and intelligence sources have never been on television.

So at least some of them have.

Most are active duty military.

So at least some of them aren't.

Theoretically, even a general who has been hired by one of the networks--and is fed by the Pentagon--might be reliable to back up another source's story. That's happened once or twice.

"Once or twice?" So... no chance of any more? Want to give us specifics?

And in the context of the paragraph, Joe's talking about his sources, but note his use of "Theoretically" to make it read more like a handwave hypothetical.

"Oh sure, it could theoretically hypothetically happen, and maybe it did once or mumble mumble twice or mumble no, no more than twice..."

I don't remember ever using a TV general as a primary source.

He doesn't remember? Why not just say "I don't recall"? After all, it's one syllable less, and all the cool kids are doing it.

Note the use of "TV general" as well. Not all of the message force multiplier "analysts" were generals. I couldn't find an extensive list of their names/ranks organised anywhere, but the New York Times story led with six names and photos (Col. Ken Allard, Maj. Gen. Bob Scales, Gen. Wayne Downing, Gen. Montgomery Meigs, Lt. Gen. Tom McInerney, and Maj. Gen. Don Sheppard), only two of which had the title "General".

Hey Joe - I wasn't able to find an extensive list of all the MFM "analysts" in half an hour of searching. But as you like to remind us, you're an actual journalist, and I'm sure you could get the complete list from a totally reliable source somewhere.

How about you list all of those names (and ranks) and make a categorical statement that you've never used any one of those men (they're all men, aren't they?) as a confidential source for any of your stories.