| Submit your comments on this article |
| Home Front: WoT |
| Is there a Murtha connection to the NYT leak story? |
| 2006-06-28 |
| by Stephen Spruiell, National Review Media Blog Yesterday on The Situation Room, NYT editor Bill Keller told CNN's Wolf Blitzer (video): KELLER: To the best of my knowledge, three people outside of the administration were asked by the administration to call us. I spoke to one of them. One of them spoke to our Washington bureau chief. One of them spoke to Jill Abramson, our managing editor. All of them spoke, they thought, in confidence, and I don't think I will breach the confidence of what they said, although I will say that not all of them urged us not to publish. This exchanged raised several questions. First, did the administration ask Murtha to speak to the New York Times about this program? I can't imagine that they would. I mean, there's bipartisanship and all, and sometimes practicality forces you to work with people you don't like, but . . . Murtha? Second, Keller said of the three outside officials, "not all of them urged us not to publish." We know Hamilton and Kean urged the NYT not to publish. Did Murtha not urge the NYT not to publish details of a classified program? I'd be pleasantly surprised if Murtha did the right thing and urged them not to publish. The phrasing of Blitzer's question makes it difficult to guess. He asked, who were the three people "that asked you not to report this information." Keller told him it was Kean, Hamilton and Murtha. I called Murtha's office today and got this response from his communications director: "It's a classified program and he's not going to talk about it." She refused to comment beyond that. My suspicion is that Murtha, if he had anything to do with this at all, would have supported the NYT in publishing. Hell, I wouldn't put it past him to have been one of the leakers. Did Murtha speak to an NYT editor about the program and fail to urge the paper to refrain from publishing the details of a sensitive intelligence-gathering operation? Keller's not talking. Murtha's not talking. How will we ever find out? We probably never will. As Andy McCarthy wrote yesterday, the press reserves a secrecy for itself that it finds unacceptable in our efforts to kill and capture terrorists. |
| Posted by:Mike |
| #5 Murtha has Schumer disease, an uncontrollable urge to throw himself in front of tv cameras. |
| Posted by: Random Thoughts 2006-06-28 14:07 |
| #4 Logically (in his reality) Murtha should be for the NYT action. All his actions are directed toward his personal ambition to be House Majority Leader. He thinks humbling the trunks will bring about a donk victory in November. Not saying it's true or logical to the rational and reality based, just the Kool-Aid he drinks. |
| Posted by: Nimble Spemble 2006-06-28 12:21 |
| #3 Maybe Murtha blabbed to the NYT, then got nervous and asked them to not publishing it at the last minute? |
| Posted by: Jesing Ebbease3087 2006-06-28 12:18 |
| #2 Logically, Murtha should be against the NYT action. This is because Murtha is against military action against terrorists and if military action is verboten then all you have left is the intel, financial agreements and legal actions. Of course, Murtha is not required to recognize this or any other logical arguement. |
| Posted by: mhw 2006-06-28 10:12 |
| #1 That rat Murtha has something to do with this? You can bet any reasons he has for talking to them are nefarious and self-serving. |
| Posted by: bigjim-ky 2006-06-28 10:07 |