Source: http://www.aim.org/media_monitor/A3275_0_2_0_C/
July 1, 1999
The Woodward technique is to get information in confidence and break his pledge not to report it in a way that reveals the source, or to simply make up stories.
Bob Woodward, who became famous for his Watergate reporting, has made millions writing books that make news because of the startling insider stories that Woodward seems to have a knack for digging up. His most recent Book, Shadow: Five Presidents and the Legacy of Watergate, includes what appear to be transcripts of confidential conversations that President Clinton had with Bob Bennett, his lawyer in the Paula Jones case. He tells what they said as they strolled alone on the White House grounds, discussing the rumors connecting Clinton sexually with various women.
Woodward writes: "‘If you’re caught...in the White House,’ Bennett said, ‘I’m not good enough to help you.’ ‘This is a prison,’ Clinton responded. ‘I purposefully have no drapes on the windows.’ As for women, ‘I’m retired,’ the president declared, repeating himself emphatically, ‘I’m retired.’" Woodward then goes into a longer conversation in which he describes Bennett’s efforts to find out if there was any basis for the questions Paula Jones’s lawyers had asked Clinton about his relationship with Monica Lewinsky. There is nothing substantive in this exchange that one could not infer from the published record, but the way Woodward presents it creates the impression that he had a tape of the conversation.
On Meet the Press on June 20, Tim Russert asked Woodward how he obtains this kind of information. Woodward responded, "There are all kinds of avenues and sources where you can get information, documents, notes and figure out, and significantly no one has challenged any of those conversations." The "figure out" is a significant slip. Instead of completing that sentence, saying "and figure out what was said," Woodward changed course, saying the accuracy of what he had written had not been challenged.
We know at least two ways in which Woodward does this. One is to make up stories. In his 1987 book, Veil, Woodward claimed he had interviewed William J. Casey, the CIA director, after Casey had brain surgery and could not speak intelligibly. Woodward didn’t know that, and he made up an interview in which Casey is supposed to have spoken 19 intelligible words. It was clear that this was a falsification not only because of Casey’s condition, but because his hospital room was guarded and Woodward was never admitted to it.
Another Woodward technique is to get information in confidence and break his pledge not to report it in a way that reveals the source. His new book includes statements Hillary Clinton made to Jane Sherburne, a former assistant White House counsel. Sherburne, who is identified in the book as the source, has said in a deposition taken by Judicial Watch that she gave Woodward details of these private conversations on the condition that they not be quoted directly.
Sherburne said Woodward had called just before his book was published to tell her that he had included her one-on-one conversations with Hillary in the book because he had been able to confirm them with other sources. Will Woodward’s employer and peers forgive this betrayal of Sherburne and breach of journalistic ethics as they did his lie about Bill Casey?
Reed Irvine is the former Chairman of Accuracy In Media and Cliff Kincaid is the Editor of the AIM Report.
No comments:
Post a Comment