Now that Judy Miller’s been sprung and can look forward to lucrative book contracts, speaking deals and a return trip to the grand jury, I ask you, why? Just why? Why, if Scooter Libby granted her permission to reveal his name, didn’t she do just that? Why did she go to jail? Why did it take so long for her to "figure out" that Libby had given his o.k. for her to reveal his identity? And what’s with her "finding" notes of her conversation with Scooter Libby about Joe Wilson from 2003.
This is one of those stories where I have to conclude that all the principals - Judy Miller, Scooter Libby, and their lawyers - are lying. It’s simply impossible to believe that they’re all telling what they think is the truth and have merely confused a date or two. It’s possible that Judy decided to go to jail knowing full well that she didn’t have to in order to rehabilitate herself, to change her image from the NYT’s neocon comfort woman into first amendment martyr. If that’s what she was trying to accomplish, however, why would Sulzberger and Keller come so vehemently to her defense? If the whole thing was a PR ruse, would her bosses have been so vocal in their support, particularly since no one else at the paper or in the journalism community seemed to miss her?
Then again, we are talking about the same management team (plus or minus a few guys) that has never disciplined the egregious Jeff Gerth, despite having printed an apologia of sorts following the Wen Ho Lee debacle (but if you’re waiting for an analysis of what went wrong with his Whitewater coverage, don’t expect the NYT to do it. Read Fools for Scandal instead).
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