The Newspaper of War

[Octafish]

3. NYT publishes Michael Kinsley's First Amendment hit piece

The paper of record prefers authority, as in the wealthy and powerful, over democratic authority, as in the First Amendment.

Michael Kinsley Piles on Greenwald and the Free Press

by Matthew Rothschild
Published on Friday, May 23, 2014 by The Progressive

Michael Kinsley goes after Glenn Greenwald in a nasty review that was just published by the New York Times and that will appear in this Sunday’s Week in Review.

At stake not only is Greenwald’s reputation but the very notion of what constitutes freedom of the press on national security issues.

Kinsley dumps on Greenwald with ad hominem attacks, saying, “Greenwald seems like a self-righteous sourpuss,” and calling him bombastic and comparing him to Robespierre and Trotsky.

More seriously, he takes the side of David Gregory, host of Meet the Press, who asked Greenwald, “To the extent that you have aided and abetted Snowden . . . why shouldn’t you, Mr. Greenwald, be charged with a crime?”

SNIP...

As Hugo Black noted, the First Amendment explicitly protects the journalistic profession in unequivocal terms. And it does so for the best of reasons: to serve as a check on the very government that Kinsley wants to give more power to.

SOURCE: http://www.commondreams.org/view/2014/05/23-1

FTR: I defended Kinsley when a NAZI called him a "worm" on Crossfire. I still would.