Speaking of journamalism
by digby
Last week I noted that the New York Times has belatedly changed their policy and is now calling torture by it’s true name — torture. But FAIR has some interesting insights into the statement by the editor that are worth contemplating:
Much of his reasoning is questionable. For starters, the shift seems motivated in part by decisions made by other government officials– a Senate report highly critical of the CIA’s torture practices and the Justice Department’s decision not to prosecute those responsible for torture. This is journalistically dubious, since it is essentially arguing that calling torture by its name was not advisable until those responsible for overseeing the torture were in the clear, legally speaking. Along those lines, Baquet draws on the fact that now “the debate is focused less on whether the methods violated a statute or treaty provision and more on whether they worked.” But that is precisely one of the long-standing problems with torture coverage– restricting it to a discussion of utility and not legality. Overall, one gets the sense that the paper has decided that it is politically safe, ten years down the road, to call torture by its name.
Yes. How convenient that it’s now ok to call it what it is. Not the NY Times’ finest hour. But then much of its behavior on crucial issues during the last decade has been very questionable. And they have a very difficult time coming to terms with it.
There’s more at the link.