The Lessons of Deep Throat

How relevant are the lessons of Deep Throat and Watergate today -- to the modern press corps, in particular?

Opinion writers are finding plenty to say about that.

David Sarasohn, an associate editor at the Portland Oregonian, writes: "Along with the always-useful 'Follow the money,' Watergate left us another message: When the White House goes on the attack against reporters, it's probably because there's something it doesn't want reported. . . .

"Deep Throat may now seem a distant figure, but deep pressure seems a familiar attitude. . . .

"Taking on Nixon, after all, was not an inviting prospect. Just re-elected, citing a mandate, he'd purged most of his Cabinet and replaced them with White House loyalists. He denounced opponents as elitists, and claimed the support of a 'silent majority,' while his vice president stumped the country attacking newspapers and TV networks for not saying that Vietnam was going splendidly."

The Pioneer Press of St. Paul, Minn., editorializes: "It's tempting to disconnect the just-jolted memories of the Nixon constitutional crisis from the goings-on in Washington and the news media now. Different times, different actors . . . But there are also shadowy recesses of relativism that might have shifted but surely not disappeared at the highest levels of American government. . . .

"The challenge then and now for citizens is to insist on transparency so they can judge the public conduct of public servants. . . .

"It was downright eerie on Tuesday that as the Felt disclosure emerged, President Bush was denouncing a critical report by the human rights group Amnesty International as based on the word of 'people who hate America.' It was a hallmark of the Nixon White House to see criticism or questioning as reason to put the dissenter on an 'enemies list.' It was the hallmark of those times, too, for Nixon to purge independent thinkers and replace them with unquestioning loyalists."

Clark Hoyt, the Washington editor for Knight Ridder Newspapers, writes: "The lessons of Deep Throat are important for today's journalists and the public. Anonymous sources are in ill repute these days, partly because journalists have overused them, allowed them to launch partisan attacks and even, tragically, invented them. But even the solidest anonymous sources, who decline to be identified out of genuine fear of reprisal, are often under attack, not because the information they provide is wrong but because it doesn't support a particular political agenda."

David J. Sirota writes on the American Prospect Web site: "American journalism today has lost its confrontational, hold-their-feet-to-the-fire attitude that gave it a reputation as our government's fourth check and balance. Young reporters can't imagine what that kind of reporting really is because they've never experienced it."

Newsday's editorial board writes: "When the system is rigged by the powerful to thwart the rule of law, the news media are a key safety valve. The press provides an effective way for the truth to get out to the public, even when the most powerful boss in the free world is doing all he can to make sure it never does.

"There's a lesson in that, particularly as government secrecy has been ratcheted up in the war on terror and President George W. Bush has taken to disparaging the news media's use of anonymous sources."