Yesterday, Obama press secretary Jay Carney tried to reassure the press that Obama values the the First Amendment as the White House finds itself scrambling to silence the drumbeat of legitimate criticism from a newly-awakened main-stream-media in response to the Justice Department's seizing AP's phone records and accusing Fox News reporter James Rosen conspiring to violate the Espionage Act.
WaPo reported:
“If you’re asking me whether the president believes that journalists should be prosecuted for doing their jobs, the answer is no,” Carney said in his daily briefing.
Carney told reporters Tuesday that he spoke to the president after that briefing about the controversy over the case involving the network’s chief Washington correspondent, James Rosen, and a former State Department arms expert, Stephen Kim.
“He cannot and I cannot comment on the specifics of any ongoing criminal matter,” Carney said, but “I can tell you that in our conversation yesterday, he reiterated just how important he believes it is that reporters, that all of you and your colleagues are able to do your jobs in a free and open way.”
If Obama is so against targeting journalists, then why has the Obama administration spent so many federal resources investigating, subpoenaing and obtaining search warrants based on possible violations of the Espionage Act to justify still more surveillance? And why has Obama offered no credible justification for the record-setting use of the Espionage Act to target so-called "leakers," who are more often than not whistleblowers, when countless reporters
have said that effort alone chills their ability to do their jobs?
The Justice Department's actions - particularly getting a search warrant based on probable cause that Rosen conspired to violate the Espionage Act - have every indicia of a federal criminal investigation, possible grand jury activity, and forthcoming indictment. So, Obama is asking the press to forget that the Justice Department is spying on them and making them into targets for federal criminal investigations because his press secretary says that Obama says he doesn't want to prosecute journalists. Hopefully the main-steam-media won't be so hell bent on maintaining their precious anonymous government contacts that they'll be blindly soothed by this steaming pile of a promise.
I guess the White House sees no credibility issues with the fact that Carney already initially misled the public and the press about the White House having no knowledge of the latest scandals.
Obama's reassurance amounts to "just trust us." But "trust us" is hardly reassuring, especially considering that the Obama administration has empaneled a grand jury to investigate Wikileaks under the same theory it used as justification for accusing Rosen of violating the Espionage Act, has waged an unprecedented war on whistleblowers bringing more prosecutions for alleged mishandling of classified information than all past administrations combined (glad to see the main-stream-media picked up my line), and ignored its own regulations in obtaining subpoenas for AP phone records potentially compromising the communications of over 100 journalists. Even the Washington Post's editorial board was incredulous about Obama's conveniently-timed announcement that he supported a media shield law with a gaping exception for all things national security:
Mr. Obama’s support for it is at best cold comfort and at worst a transparent diversion. The issue remains what Justice did and whether it was consistent with existing legal authority — which consists of the First Amendment and a long-standing department policy designed to prevent violations of it.
It's a rare occasion when WaPo's editorial board and I make the
same point.
Obama's latest assurance sounds like he values the First Amendment, but his actions don't match his soaring rhetoric, a disturbing theme throughout his presidency, particularly on government transparency and accountability matters. If Obama stops spying on reporters, stops using the Espionage Act to prosecute whistleblowers, and supports a media shield law that has meaningful protection for national security reporting, then his promise to not criminally prosecute journalists will mean more than his promise to close Guantanamo has come to mean.