Beltway Culture, Checks on Journalists and Secrecy Obligations

by Glenn Greenwald

I'm ambivalent about whether even to acknowledge this obviously disturbed, Cheneyite rant from Joe Klein [1]. On the one hand, I don't want to be dragged down into what is, for him, quite clearly a deeply emotional and personal matter (having its roots in things like this [2], this [3] and this [4]); I don't think very many people care about petty feuds and engaging them isn't the purpose of what I do here. Moreover, Klein's commenters [1] (as usual) have done a thorough and masterful job of demolishing what he wrote, as have [5] several [6] others [7]. On the other hand, when someone like Klein -- first in a secret club composed of several hundred journalists, editors, bloggers and other peers and colleagues [8], and then using a megaphone like Time -- repeatedly calls you a military-hating, unpatriotic, ignorant, Limbaugh-like, "mean-spirited, dishonorable, graceless, bully" who doesn't care if America Stays Safe, and that then is "reported" [9] in various places [10], it's probably prudent to say something. So I'll just make a couple of general points illustrated by all of this that I think are worth making:

(1) Establishment journalists have a very significant impact on the world. They enthusiastically believe that to be true when it comes time to building their egos and establishing their own importance, but they instantly and emphatically deny it when it comes time to holding them accountable for what they do (don't you have anything better to do than criticize the media?). Their influence, thankfully, has eroded and continues to erode by the minute, but it's still substantial. That's why entire industries exist, and vast resources are expended by the powerful and wealthy, to manage, manipulate and control what they say.