Views » October 21, 2005

Lies Judith Miller Told Us

By Joel Bleifuss

In the last few months all manner of gas has been expended on the Valerie Plame case.

Did Karl Rove and Scooter Libby out Plame as a CIA officer to punish her husband Joseph Wilson IV? Who else in the White House knew of or condoned this crime? And is there some kind of medal we can bestow on Judith Miller, who suffered prison to protect her First Amendment rights?

Yes it makes for good drama, but in a perverse way the Plame case obscures the larger story. The media understandably finds it more interesting to ferret out the specific crimes of a Karl Rove than to reflect on the larger, more profound crime: how we were misled into invading Iraq. First, the Bush administration created a catalogue of lies and misinformation in order to justify invasion. Second, some prominent members of the national media parroted those lies.

And no one squawked louder than the New York Times’ Miller. As a former CIA analyst told Salon’s James C. Moore: “The White House had a perfect deal with Miller. [U.S.-funded Iraqi dissident Ahmed] Chalabi is providing the Bush people with the information they need to support their political objectives with Iraq, and he is supplying the same material to Judy Miller. Chalabi tips her on something and then she goes to the White House, which has already heard the same thing from Chalabi, and she gets it corroborated by some insider she always describes as a ‘senior administration official.’ “

For example, on September 8, 2002, Miller reported on the front page of the Times that intercepted aluminum tubes indicated that Saddam was developing a nuclear bomb. That day, Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice and Dick Cheney all appeared on Sunday morning talk shows, citing Miller’s sensational exposé, which was debunked, with much less fanfare, five days later.

On May 26, 2004, Times Executive Editor Bill Keller explained that an internal audit “found a number of instances of coverage that was not as rigorous as it should have been.” He cited six faulty stories about the threat posed by Iraq, all but one of which was written or co-written by Miller, who was not mentioned by name.

Miller has not been hesitant to voice her belief that Saddam posed a threat. She told Moore, “I understood that these people … who hated us so much … that if they ever got their hands on WMD, they would use them. Do I have a belief that the WMD exist, and a fear? Yeah, I have a real fear for my country.”

Salon’s Juan Cole, however, cautions against viewing Miller as a puppet of the neocons. He writes, “In the end, it seems that Miller will go down in history not so much as a true believer as a useful idiot.”

Over the course of her legal travails, the Times published 15 editorials defending Miller’s right to protect her sources. In October, the Society of Professional Journalists bestowed Miller with its “First Amendment Award.” The decision was not without controversy.

The Northern California Chapter tried to introduce a resolution that defended her right to protect her sources, but was critical of her conduct as a journalist, particularly her decision to permit Libby to “hide administration responsibility for attacks on WMD critic Joseph Wilson by allowing [Libby] to change his pre-agreed attribution from ‘senior administration official’ to ‘former hill staffer.’”

In slamming the award to Miller, Fairness and Accurancy in Reporting’s Jim Naureckas wrote, “By rewarding a reporter who was apparently collaborating with and protecting a powerful official [Scooter Libby] in an effort to punish the free speech of a government critic [Joeseph Wilson], the SPJ is undermining, not advancing, the principles of the First Amendment.”

Out of prison, Miller promised that once she returned to work she would cover “the same thing I’ve always covered—threats to our country.”

Which means, we presume, she’ll be covering the White House.

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• Reader Comments

  The news leading up to, during and following the invasion of Iraq reads like Abbott and Costello’s “Who’s on First?” routine. 

  Like other historical events (Kennedy, King, Kennedy (KKK?) assassinations, Pearl Harbor, etc.) we will probably never know for certain Who? How? What? or When? What we now know is we have a world class tangle to keep the talking heads employed forever.

  If “No news is good news.” then with 24/7 news…!

  Posted by whattheheck on Oct 21, 2005 at 6:33 PM

  Salon’s Juan Cole, however, cautions against viewing Miller as a puppet of the neocons. He writes, “In the end, it seems that Miller will go down in history not so much as a true believer as a useful idiot.”

  I hate to think of Juan Cole as Salon’s Juan Cole. I recognize your quote and was puzzled by it when I first read it on Juan Cole’s site myself.

  Judith Miller’s masquerade as a reporter did not go undetected as the NYTimes. The only reason she’s had such a long run is because she is under the personal protection of the paper’s publisher, Arthur Ochs Sulzberger Jr.

  Judith Miller is a neocon.

  I noted on another blog that one of Judith Miller’s high shoool classmates was Richard Perle. Coincidence i suppose.

  No, it’s more than Judith Miller at fault here.

  It was the NYTimes as an institution shilling for the present, neocon American regime.

  They will never regain the credibility much less the respect they once enjoyed.

  Thanks to the Pinch and Judy Show nearly 2000 Americans and tens of thousands of Iraqis have been murdered on behalf of the Oil, War, and Likud lobbies and our nation left in financial ruin.

  Posted by John Francis Lee on Oct 22, 2005 at 6:52 AM

  America is in tatters,all news sources are bought,the politicians are bought,democracy is gone.
  Amid electronic voting booths,court appointed president in 2000 ( banana Republic style)
  the cost to field a candidate is so high that the cmmon man has no chance to run
  I long for the common man
  with the common goals,common ideas,and common sense
  there has to be a fundamental shift from lobbyists,high priced elections,lies and deceit .Is there a hero left in America that can come forth and save America from the Elite
  rich class.

  Posted by skullker on Oct 23, 2005 at 1:23 AM

  Why the amazement?  So many of us knew these were lies and tried to tell the world at all the protests and rallies organized by the peace movement.  Judith Miller was complicit in the lies of the Bush administration….what else is new?

  But even more lies are waiting to be exposed… I wonder if they ever will…

  [url=“http://tvnewslies.org/html/where_the_hell_is_your_9_11_pr.html
  “]CLICK HERE[/url]

  Posted by skipper7 on Oct 27, 2005 at 3:13 AM

  “There is a big problem with this simple narrative. It is that the Times, along with The Post and other news organizations, ran many alarming stories about Iraq’s weapons programs before the election of George W. Bush. A quick search through the Times archives before 2001 produces such headlines as “Iraq Has Network of Outside Help on Arms, Experts Say”(November 1998), “U.S. Says Iraq Aided Production of Chemical Weapons in Sudan”(August 1998), “Iraq Suspected of Secret Germ War Effort” (February 2000), “Signs of Iraqi Arms Buildup Bedevil U.S. Administration” (February 2000), “Flight Tests Show Iraq Has Resumed a Missile Program” (July 2000). (A somewhat shorter list can be compiled from The Post’s archives, including a September 1998 headline: “Iraqi Work Toward A-Bomb Reported.”) The Times stories were written by Barbara Crossette, Tim Weiner and Steven Lee Myers; Miller shared a byline on one.”

  http://tinyurl.com/dlr7t

  “Investigators in Yemen yesterday uncovered evidence suggesting the bomb attack on the warship USS Cole had been a meticulously organised conspiracy, which a leading US terrorism expert said may have been the first joint operation between Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein.”

  http://tinyurl.com/8j2o

  “Mr Fandy said senior members of the Saudi royal family told him in recent weeks that they had received assurances from the Taleban leader, Mullah Mohamed Omar, that once the radical Islamist movement secured control over Afghan territory, Bin Laden would be forced to leave. “It’s a matter of time now for Osama.” He said Bin Laden would have a strong ideological aversion to accepting Iraqi hospitality, but might have little choice.”

  http://tinyurl.com/7rwd

  Last but not least, some video from the late 90’s.  What is really THAT long ago?:

  rtsp://63.66.59.40/mrc/binladen061704.rm

  Mr. Bleifuss, along with most of the rest of the “media”, seem to be rather selective in what and when they choose to “investigate”, and what they choose to forget from the all too recent past.

  Posted by Natalie on Oct 27, 2005 at 5:52 AM

• extended discussion >>>Continued...

  Discussions with more than 5 comments are continued on our special discussion page to encourage continuity and ease of use. There are currently 8 posts.

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