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I agree, but I also see the situation as more nuanced than Greenwald. Columnists and staff writers working for the same paper can have divergent opinions, and

I agree, but I also see the situation as more nuanced than Greenwald. Columnists and staff writers working for the same paper can have divergent opinions, and in the case of WaPost, this editorial was not written by the same group of people responsible for breaking the leaks. With some caveats, journalistic autonomy within a paper is a good thing--it helps push back against top-down bias from editors and owners (although, as others have pointed out, maybe WaPost isn't a good example). So there is a tension between Greenwald's monolithic indictment of WaPost and the ideal of journalistic integrity, where an individual journalist can freely publish an informed opinion without outside influence, including from the paper hierarchy. But this still doesn't excuse the Washington Post. Publicly disagreeing with a colleague is categorically different from protecting a colleague's source. Usually this means protecting anonymity, but in the case of Snowden it's about protecting his safety and well-being: things indirectly threatened by calling for his prosecution if he returns to US soil. Protecting a source should be considered transitive and inherited by the parent publication, taking precedence over the above-mentioned journalistic autonomy. While maybe not an ethical universal, WaPost being one of four publications to receive the leaks, then publishing them extensively, then winning a Pulitzer for having done so does not make for an exculpatory edge case.

wallace_f 10y ago
>there is a tension between Greenwald's monolithic indictment of WaPost and the ideal of journalistic integrity, where an individual journalist can freely publish an informed opinion without outside influence, including from the paper hierarchy. You think so? I disagree - I don't see such a problem with Greenwald's indictment of the post. The editorial column was written by the Post's editorial board--not an individual journalist as you wrote.
timv 10y ago
> Publicly disagreeing with a colleague is categorically different from protecting a colleague's source The infuriating part is that they're not admitting to the fact that they're publicly disagreeing. Sure, it's obvious if you know the facts - their paper published the details of PRISM. If publishing those details was wrong, then the editors who chose to run that story were wrong. But they never say that. If this editorial said "Snowden should be charged, and those journalists from this paper who chose to publish the details of programs such as PRISM should be fired and be investigated by the relevant authorities" then it would at least be honest (and also a horrible betrayal of both the paper's source and its staff) But they won't admit that when they claim Snowden caused ' “tremendous damage” to national security', that they need to level that same charge at their own colleagues. If Snowden acted against the national interest in providing documents to journalists, then an even stronger claim can be brought against the journalists who published those stories to the public. That The Post chooses to ignore that is pure cowardice.

wallace_f 10y ago

>there is a tension between Greenwald's monolithic indictment of WaPost and the ideal of journalistic integrity, where an individual journalist can freely publish an informed opinion without outside influence, including from the paper hierarchy. You think so? I disagree - I don't see such a problem with Greenwald's indictment of the post. The editorial column was written by the Post's editorial board--not an individual journalist as you wrote.

timv 10y ago

> Publicly disagreeing with a colleague is categorically different from protecting a colleague's source The infuriating part is that they're not admitting to the fact that they're publicly disagreeing. Sure, it's obvious if you know the facts - their paper published the details of PRISM. If publishing those details was wrong, then the editors who chose to run that story were wrong. But they never say that. If this editorial said "Snowden should be charged, and those journalists from this paper who chose to publish the details of programs such as PRISM should be fired and be investigated by the relevant authorities" then it would at least be honest (and also a horrible betrayal of both the paper's source and its staff) But they won't admit that when they claim Snowden caused ' “tremendous damage” to national security', that they need to level that same charge at their own colleagues. If Snowden acted against the national interest in providing documents to journalists, then an even stronger claim can be brought against the journalists who published those stories to the public. That The Post chooses to ignore that is pure cowardice.