The WashPost & Walter Pincus finally publish a long multi-point correction to their original article

[Catherina]

I hope the original wasn't posted here because it was so over the top, but if it was, or if it's quoted, well now you know.

The WashPost and Walter Pincus finally publish a long multi-point correction to their original article

Walter Pincus
Fine Print

Questions for Snowden
By Walter Pincus,

CORRECTION: This Fine Print column (also published in the July 9 A-section print edition of The Washington Post) incorrectly said that an article by journalist Glenn Greenwald was written for the WikiLeaks Press blog. The article, about filmmaker Laura Poitras and WikiLeaks being targeted by U.S. officials, was written for the online publication Salon and first appeared April 8, 2012. Its appearance on the WikiLeaks Press blog two days later was a reposting.

The Fine Print column also asserted that WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, during a May 29 interview with Democracy Now, “previewed” the story that Greenwald wrote for the Guardian newspaper about the Obama administration’s involvement in the collection of Americans’ phone records. There is no evidence that Assange had advance knowledge of the story; the assertion was based on a previously published interview in which Assange discussed an earlier surveillance project involving the collection of phone records.

The column also did not mention Snowden’s past work in the intelligence community. The lack of this context may have created the impression that Snowden’s work for Booz Allen Hamilton gave him his first access to classified surveillance programs.

....

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/questions-for-snowden/2013/07/08/d06ee0f8-e428-11e2-80eb-3145e2994a55_story.html

[Bonhomme Richard]

1. +1....Incoming. n/t

[Cleita]

2. Better late than never.

[Luminous Animal]

3. And yet he still had to go with the "what ifs" about the eeeevil "puppetmaster" Assange...

who, even from his 24 hour surveilled lair in the Ecuadorian Embassy can cast his spell on humans to go against their conscience and spill the secrets of the pure and kindly U.S. government.

[sabrina 1]

7. Yes, that was such an amateur attempt at smearing people that I was surprised Pincus would

not be ashamed to attach his name to it.

Did they get to him too? Airc, he did some pretty good coverage of the Judith Miller affair, but I could be wrong.

[GoneFishin]

4. No danger of details about Snowden or Assange being misconstrued on DU.

[NineNightsHanging]

5. a lil snippet about ole pincus

Pincus returned to the Washington Post in 1975 where specialized in writing about the CIA and the intelligence community. Pincus always defended the activities of the CIA and criticizedSeymour Hersh for his "advocacy journalism" when he tried to expose the illegal activities of the agency. He also condemned the House Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA) and in February 1977, described it as "perhaps the worst example of Congressional inquiry run amok."

In 1979 Deborah Davis published Katharine the Great in 1987. Katharine Graham persuaded the publishers William Jovanovich, to pulp the book. As well as looking at the life of this newspaper proprietor, Davis explored the relationship between the CIA and the Washington Post. Davis also became the first journalist to expose Operation Mockingbird. She also named Walter Pincus as being one of the journalists willing to promote the views of the CIA.

[sabrina 1]

8. Thanks for that background, interesting to say the least. Am I correct in my recollection

that Pincus did some good reporting on the Judith Miller/Iraq War coverage? I'm trying to remember where he stood during that period.

[NineNightsHanging]

12. yes he did...at least after the fact

the wash post editorial board supported the war.

Some in the CIA were apparently not thrilled with the idea of that particular war, if what Ive read is true.

There's no denying his long association with the CIA in any case---from wiki

"After his discharge from the Army, Pincus spied on American students abroad for the Central Intelligence Agency, writing an article which appeared in the San Jose Mercury News on February 18th, 1967, the headline, "How I Traveled Abroad on C.I.A. Subsidy. "I had been briefed in Washington on each of them," he wrote "None was remotely aware of CIA's interest."

[Catherina]

10. Thank you. This is great information to have. What a slimeball n/t

[Hydra]

6. Better late than never

But the people who took this stuff and ran with it are unlikely to accept these corrections. The updates on that Atlantic article didn't really clear up the damage done to Morales' pretty clear narrative about how he got blocked from going home on suspicion of carrying Snowden.

[Catherina]

9. A day late and a dollar short but as you said, better that than never

I don't hold my breath on the people who ran with it, or similar hit pieces, but at least everyone else will know how malicious and dishonest the smear campaign is. These journalists and propagandists have to be dragged into reluctantly making the fewest corrections they think will repackaged their distortions into something semi-respectable. It would be laughable if it weren't for the damage.

[Hydra]

11. The damage is huge

A democrat I know laps it up when she sees stuff on the news about how many "militants" or "The #2 leader of Al-Qaeda" has been killed. She hates it when I bring up how a week later it gets retracted and they admit a funeral group or some random civs were the ones who got blasted.

That sort of bait and switch propaganda works WAY too well. The initial impression is made, so the correction is usually ignored.

How they hell did we get to this point in the US? I remember things like this were huge issues we were supposed to have with the USSR back in the day.