Judith Miller's "entanglements"

[donsu]

http://www.counterpunch.com/

When Divas Collide: Maureen Dowd v. Judy Miller

-snip-

What Keller actually wrote was the following:

"if I had known the details of Judy's entanglement with Libby, I'd have been more careful in how the paper articulated its defense and perhaps more willing than I had been to support efforts aimed at exploring compromises."

"Entanglement" is a curiously suggestive word, given the notoriously rich and varied texture of Judy Miller's sexual resumé whose imagined contours have been the sport of newsrooms and hotel bars around the world. Certainly Miller took it that way, writing in response, "As for your reference to my 'entanglement' with Mr. Libby, I had no personal, social, or other relationship with him except as a source." Welcome to The Times as Pay-Per-View Reality TV.

-snip-

By way of a coda: My favorite among Judy's amours has always been the British consular official in Tripoli whom Judy had once made the plaything of an idle hour, or of the need for some document or fragment of information. The British journalist David Blundy, later killed in Central America, was in the cellar of the British consulate in Tripoli during the US bombing raid in Reagan-time, designed to kill Qadaffi. Also present was Judy's conquest, the consular official. The wretched man had never got over Judy and as the bombs crashed down and the building trembled on its foundations, he took ever heavier swigs from a bottle of Scotch and moaned in his broad Scottish accent, "She's a terrr-ible, terrrr-ible woman, but I love her (CRASH) She's a terrrr." (CRASH, etc)
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[Name removed]

1. Deleted message

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[enough]

2. Cockburn skewers the Times:

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Keller's sniveling "internal" memo throwing Miller over the side, which he obviously knew would be forwarded to Howard Kurtz ten seconds after he hit the SEND key, seems to me to be entirely disgusting. The Times nailed Miller's colors to its mast many years ago. There are decades' worth of her atrocious mendacities in its archives, and decades' worth of accurate refutations of her news stories ignored by Times' editors.

Miller's game was the Times' game. They were witting co-conspirators. When Miller co-wrote (with Stephen Engelberg and William Broad) Germs: Biological Weapons and America's Secret War, the Times was happy to print her stories in the paper designed to push the book up into Bestseller status, in a staggering conflict of interest that earned the paper plenty of money. This, remember, was when Miller was sent that mysterious envelope of white powder that turned out not to be anthrax spores, which gave the book yet another boost.

It's way too late in the game for Times editors to start whining that Judy misled them. They printed her rubbish because they were disposed to believe it, and for Keller to turn on her now in an "internal" memo designed for public consumption is cowardly and despicable. The gentlemanly thing for Keller to do would to keep a stiff upper lip, let Dowd and the reporters toss Miller on their horns and, if circumstances warrant, fall upon his sword, accompanied in this act by the publisher, unless the Times' shareholders shoot him first for presiding over the 53 per cent drop in profits this year.

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[kurth]

3. The New York Times is a fine newspaper

except for its war cheerleading and numerous lies, which renders it unfit for wrapping fish.