Socio-political Film Studies was one of my favorite things from College. I’m going to touch on this occasionally, it’ll be a regular series.
Yeah, um, did I mention that The New York Times sat on the NSA Wiretapping story until AFTER the most important election in generations – why? Because the criminal exposed in the story was afraid of losing an election if the crimes were revealed. The criminal? George W. Bush.
Did you catch that? As The Times tried to explain it:
The White House asked The New York Times not to publish this article, arguing that it could jeopardize continuing investigations and alert would-be terrorists that they might be under scrutiny. After meeting with senior administration officials to hear their concerns, the newspaper delayed publication for a year to conduct additional reporting. Some information that administration officials argued could be useful to terrorists has been omitted.
So this story could have been published earlier. A story about how the President personally broke the law 30 times. If the story does not unduly threaten national security NOW, and it clearly doesn’t, it wouldn’t have a year ago.
I’m curious about how precise the measure of a year is. Slightly more than a year ago, the country was conducting an election of some note. Did the NYT hold the story past the election, thereby depriving the public of information relevant to their choice for President? Why did the NYT hold the story? In what context did administration officials urge the NYT not to publish, and who did the urging?
The story says, not in answer to these questions:
Before the 2004 election, the official said, some N.S.A. personnel worried that the program might come under scrutiny by Congressional or criminal investigators if Senator John Kerry, the Democratic nominee, was elected president.
Wait a minute. Is that actually, in fact, the answer to those very questions? Afterall, regarding this very case, President Bush is guilty of breaking the law 30 times. The Democrats, in the minority, lack subpoena power. So why would the NYT help criminals stay out of jail? What’s the word for that? Accessory, I think. I do think that’s a felony too.
Once again, American filmmakers in the 1970s nailed it. Presented for your consideration, Sydney Pollack’s 1975 film “Three Days of The Condor.” In this clip, CIA Analyst Joseph Turner (Robert Redford) tells CIA Coup Member J. Higgins (Cliff Robertson) that he has blown the whistle on a secret cabal within the CIA which is manufacturing evidence and plotting to start a war in Iran in order to seize the oil in the region. Crazy. I know. Yeah, so, in this final scene, the two walk through Times Square so as to make tails and bugging difficult.
[Turner and Higgins stop in front of The New York Times.]
Turner: I told ‘em a story. You play games; I told ‘em a story.
Higgins: Oh, you… you poor, dumb son of a bitch. You’ve done more damage than you know.
Turner: I hope so. [Turns to leave]
Higgins: Hey Turner! How do you know they’ll print it? You can take a walk…but how far if they don’t print it?
Turner: They’ll print it.
Higgins: How do you know?
Now we know. And now we also know how far Turner would get on a walk in the woods.
