A Two-Pulitzer Journalist Makes One Real Strange Reply

The Seattle Post-Intelligencer's Senior Correspondent for Investigations has two Pulitzer's, a Sigma Delta Chi and gazillion other Journalism awards under his belt. But when it comes to e-mail replies he

• has Seinfeld writers answering;
• too many windows open on his PC desktop;
• a runaway auto responder; or
• may need a larger dose of Aricept.

Yesterday, via Google News, I read Andrew Schneider's interesting recollection of Julia Child in light of the mountain of WWII OSS files that the government just unsealed.

In the good old days of hot type, reporters launched their careers on newspaper "obit desks." I did. Today I proudly wear the mantle of one who (miraculously) never made an obit mistake. I always worried about published obit errors that could to re-annoy families for decades each time a scrap-booked, yellowing, clipped, error-containing obituary was reread at family events over the years.

So, fast-forward to Schneider's column about Julia Child and her OSS service. I liked it and sent one of my rare e-mail attaboys:

"Thanks for the Julia Child recollection. I’m not a CIA follower and had no idea she worked for Wild Bill Donovan. Closest I ever came to a spook in public was meeting Bill Colby in
Princeton."

Schneider's reply to me, too short for haiku, was Seinfeldian. Remember the episode where Jerry says, "You mean the panties your mother laid out for you?" Schneider's response to my laudatory comment was one short sentence:

"Does your mother know you talk that
way?"

I'm still scratching my head over Schneider's message and added his reply to the "No Good Deed Goes Unobfuscated" category.

P.S. I was in the Nassau Inn in Princeton in the 80's when I saw William Colby, the former DCI, who had gone to Princeton University before Columbia Law. Colby's successor at the CIA was George H.W. Bush. I recognized Colby in a heartbeat and while he went unnoticed by others I introduced myself and had a nice brief conversation with him. He died in a canoeing accident near his Maryland home in 1996.

The NY Times Outs Khalid Shaikh Mohammed's CIA Interrogator

Subtitled: "The Gray Lady sidesteps a black and white issue for some yellowish journalism."

Today the NY Times disclosed the identify of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed's CIA interrogator, his CIA family background and his new employer, thanks to flawed logic that self-allowed them to identify the former employee but protect other sources. "The editors judged that the name was necessary for the credibility and completeness of the article," reporter Scott Shane wrote.

I just Googled. Only because the interrogator's name appears in the NY Times article did I get approximately 35 "SERPS" (Search Engine Results Pages) thanks to syndication and a handful of bloggers who've read the article.Once the third page of Google's viral results is served one sees listings for an entertainer who, unfortunately, shares the same name. (That guy might need to be careful now, too.)

Shane wrote that, "two dozen current and former American and foreign intelligence officials" were interviewed for the article, and, "Most would speak of the highly classified program only on the condition of anonymity."

I don't know how many of those whom Shane called said only, "I'm not talking to you and don't under any circumstances identify me." In those cases Shane could still add that person to his roster of those "interviewed."

So, when Shane identifies anonymous sources as "colleagues," or "one CIA officer" or "one former CIA officer" or "one person" his whole article really could have been based on quotes from maybe one or two people. Perhaps a source had no love for the now-outed CIA interrogator.

The interrogator and the CIA asked the NY Times to not identify the man. "After discussion with agency officials and a lawyer for Mr. [Redacted], the newspaper declined the request, noting that Mr. [Redacted] had never worked under cover and that others involved in the campaign against Al Qaeda have been named in news stories and books. The editors judged that the name was necessary for the credibility and completeness of the article," the NY Times stated in an "Editor's Note."

Pure, unadulterated non-journalistic flawed logic. The article would have been just as informative if the person had not been identified. Shane could have vouched for him, too. Instead the NY Times identified, for a violent terrorist or an Al Qaeda wanbee, a man who helped bring KSM closer to the gallows.

Justifying the outing because, "others involved in the campaign against Al Qaeda have been named in news stories and books" is ridiculous.

The coup de grace? The NY Times also identified the employer of the now-retired interrogator.