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Wednesday, July 18, 2007
Judith Miller, City Journal contributor and Pulitzer Prize winning journalist, talks about the advantages of local intelligence in cities like LA and New York when it comes to combating terrorism.
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Why should we believe a word of anything Miller sez& what is her hidden agenda?
Judith Miller did not go to prison to protect her sources. She was not a journalist; she was a conduit through which Cheney and Libby disseminated misinformation. It all went wrong and she was afraid to roll over on Libby. Ask the Times why she's not there anymore.
In light of Judith Miller's misleading stories on WMDs in Iraq, which helped support Bush's war, she has as much credibility as Janet Cooke. Why would you put her on the air as a pundit. That affects your credibility as well.
Brian,
Emailing the show from Glasgow in Scotland where as you know we recently had a terrorist attack at our city airport.
CCTV will be an essential part of bringing these men to justice. Along with citizens using their mobile phones to capture the event, CCTV helped identify quickly the personnel involved.
I believe CCTV networks are used throughout London and it has helped to tackle, there are also talks of setting up CCTV cameras through out our city here in Glasgow. I believe it to be a key part of any city in this day and age where terrorism is effecting everyone!
Many thanks Brian for taking my point the show is fantastic!
Andrew in Glasgow, Scotland
I agree - she has little credibility left. And publishing in the Manhattan Institute's house organ doesn't help her.
This woman is as responsible for the deaths of tens of thousands in Iraq as George Bush, and is a disgrace to journalism. She has no credibility and is obviously using your show to try and rehabilitate herself. Shameless. Dave in Cobble Hill
Why are you letting this woman run off at the mouth?
It's interesting to hear what the powers that be are feeding judy Miller, but she has no credibility.
I slept through the beginning of this interview - what a way to wake up, damn it -
so if Brian asked the Princess of Darkness this obvious question, I missed it:
How is it that Jailbird Judy still gets such access to security and public safety officers? Is this part of our anti-terroism protocol now, give ex-cons whatever they want?
Is Mr. Lehrer just sleepy today, why is he letting Miller just speechify like this? Very disappointing.
For one with a bad reputation for reliability, Miller certainly seems to quote her own analysis more than that of any sources.
Also, if the quotes about the NYPD not sharing are so out-of-date, why are they in her article?
On a lighter note, only a politician would say, "You know, Brian..." as frequently as this journalist.
Since the documents are secret we don't know whether the police have broken the laws.
Last week you had William Kristol on your show. This week you have Judith MIller. Who is next? Cheney, Perle, Wolfowitz, Feith etc. -- this list can go on forever!!
Does anyone find it strange that NYers, at the center of the storm, are more interested in civil liberties than worried about terrorism? Could it be because, with due respects to the victims of 9/11 and their loved ones, very few people die of terrorism, and everyone is influenced by the police state?
Brian,
And again you have on another discredited propagandist for the Bush regime and you fail to ask her tough questions.
WHY IS NPR HAVIUNG ON ALL THESE DISCREDITED LIARS??!!!!!!! KRYSTOL, NOVAK AND JUDITH YELLOW-JOURNALISM MILLER????? ARE YOU KIDDING??? AM I LISTENING TO FOX RADIO SUDDENLY? HAVE ON PEOPLE FROM THE RIGHT WHO ARE NOT DISCREDITED LIARS!!! WHO CARES WHAT SHE SAYS, SHE NO LONGER HAS ANY CREDIBILITY WHATSOEVER!!!
Judith Miller is an integral part of the failure of the MSM that has lead us to where we are. It's journalism made easy: ask a high level government official what he thinks is going on and print it with no critical evaluation.
For christsake get her off. We really don't care what she has to say she's a killer of soldiers. Send her for treatment.
Pathetic: a journalist is not supposed to
"believe", rather find out the facts and report about those and those only.
You had to be a moron to believe that Iraq had meaningful quantities of WMDs. I could barely find Iraq on a map in the summer of 02, but by the end of the year, even I knew they weren't there. By the time W invaded, Iraq had been searched thouroughly. Did Miller, with her breathless reporting everytime one rusty barrel was found, think that the inspectors went first to the 400 sites LEAST likely to have WMDs? I think not. I think she's an unrepentent neocon warmonger.
I don't object that you invite such an incompetent hack to your show. I object that you didn't challenge her blathering.
is there a more incompetent, naive, suck up reporter out there? her sources on Iraq were skeptical enough? wow. she got played like a flute. shoot, she's partially responsible for the Iraq war herself, and in turn the increased strength of al qaeda. nice job judy! keep up the good work with Ray Kelly and his band of quasi fascists.
I am just wondering along with all the rest of the listeners why Brian would have this rhymes with witch on!!
Killer of soldiers is 100% correct. That's exactly what she is. She shouldn't be allowed to show her war-mongering propogandist yellow-journalist face anywhere in the media. What exactly is the agenda of NPR that they are having this parade of war-mongerers on? I certainly am not hearing anyone against the war getting that much time recently? What's the agenda, Brian?
Why Judith Miller has any credibility is beyond me. She's more known for her selling of WMDs to the American public than she is for Plamegate, as positied by your blurb.
Anyway, Brian, you gave her a pass on top of all of this. You questioned about the alleged terrorist plots against NYC rightfully; inquiring if they were just the "glimmer in one's imagination" or if there were actually proof of these perps having the materials to carry out an attack. Miller responsed affirmatively, but when on only to describe the states of minds of these individuals as proof of their guilt. You had NO follow-up to that.
It's hard to donate to NPR with such freindly chit-chat passing as news analysis.
When was the last time you had Noam Chomsky on your show? He would be a formitable guest. He's read by more people world-wide that Thomas Friedman, William Kristol and George Will combined.
Respectfully,
John Elfrank-Dana
He won't have Chomsky on because he probably views him the same way he views Michael Moore...but while Brian will criticize Moore for being to "one-sided" in his documentaries (a ridiculous criticism considering that Moore's films are more like a thesis trying to prove his viewpoint as opposed to a Ken Burns type film which presents only fact...Moore never made any claims to be a journalist) Brian seems perfectly content with people from the RIGHT-WING who present one-sided views...like Miller. How can Brian criticize Moore for being so one-sided in Sicko while having a friendly brown-nosing session with Miller who was out there with her propoganda influencing policy and public opinion to a much greater degree than Moore and people dying as a result of her one sided and often untruthful reporting???????
the HEIGHT of hypocrisy
Can we stop this nonsense and just get some CREDIBLE people from the right to express their views? Or at least if you must have these propogandists on, will you stop sitting there impassively as the bs streams neverending from their mouths? One or the other. If not then your show will continue to gradually appear to become FOX news radio.
Brian, Brian, Brian . . .
Giving a platform to the disgraced Judith Miller is, in itself, disgraceful.
It's important to hear people like Judy Miller for the same reason that hospitals have weekly meetings to review their mistakes -- to better understand how this tragedy could come about, and learn how to prevent it again.
After hearing Miller, and reading her article in City Journal http://www.city-journal.org/html/17_3_preventing_terrorism.html I do understand her better.
Police officials and terrorist experts advance their careers by promoting themselves, and that's why people like Kelly, Bratton, and her other sources talk to Miller. A good journalist would discount self-promotion, but Miller takes it all in uncritically.
Journalism students should read the City Journal to learn how people go wrong when they break the rules. The first rule of journalism is to talk to people on all sides of the story (which is why Brian has these idiots on all the time). You could see this in the old Wall Street Journal. They would develop an idea, and then -- bang! They get a quote from somebody challenging the idea.
Nowhere in Miller's article does she quote a civil libertarian, or anyone who would challenge the premises of the war on terror. She mentions Shahawar Matin Siraj, the Herald Square bomber, who was convicted on the testimony of two witnesses, and said that "the jury decided he was guilty," as if that settled it. She omits the fact that one witness was paid, and one was a schizophrenic who testified in exchange for being freed from jail. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shahawar_Matin_Siraj A competent journalist would have interviewed somebody with a different perspective, like Martin Stolar, Siraj's lawyer (who also wants to advance his career by promoting himself).
NPR listeners also know that juries are wrong all the time. They heard the story on This American Life of a 60-year-old Muslim man who was entrapped and sentenced to life in prison for a prosecution-initiated plot to buy missiles to blow up airliners at JFK. We heard one of the jurors say that he was entrapped, and she was browbeaten by the other jurors into convicting him.
It's not people like Siraj who are going to "fuck this country very bad," to use Miller's favorite quote. It's people like Miller herself, who haven't learned the basic lesson to talk to people on all sides.
I didn't really get an opportunity to fully articulate the points I wanted to make due to lack of time and a bit of stage fright, but this subject is too important to be entirely derailed by outrage over Bryan's invitation of Judith Miller to the show. The police department's radical expansion of its own jurisdiction and power is a disturbing trend to which not nearly enough people are paying attention.
Miller kept saying that the NYPD can be trusted to exercise its newfound powers so long as there is effective oversight, but from where will this oversight be provided? I heard her mention the courts, but what about the city council? We shouldn't need to wage expensive and lengthy legal battles when our elected representatives could address any concerns before we sacrifice resources and liberty for these surveillance programs. Furthermore, who is behind this new seizure of power? Did Mayor Bloomberg order the creation what is essentially a domestic intelligence service in the NYPD, or was this solely Ray Kelly's idea, executed with the Mayor's tacit approval?
The nature of the terrorist threat the NYPD is working against also needs examination. I thought it hypocritical for Ms. Miller to criticize her detractors on the internet for indulging in conspiratorial thinking when she displayed the same tendencies by putting forward elaborate, nightmarish scenarios involving chemical weapons, well-disciplined cells, and paid informants. However, the most dangerous domestic terrorist attacks that have occurred since 2001 have been the Anthrax case (which to my knowledge has never been solved) and the DC sniper shootings (which probably should not even be considered a terrorist attack). The cases most similar to the situations Ms. Miller proposed have all featured risible "terrorists" who were either too incompetent to pose real threats or were egged on by well-compensated informants or both.
This comment has rambled on for too long, but this segment has raised an enormous array of vital issues and I thank you, Bryan, for starting the conversation, even if it did mean having a questionable figure such as Judith Miller on the show. Don't let the criticism above this post get you down; though Miller's claims need to be heavily scrutinized, the issue needed to be raised. Please follow up on this segment on Friday!
Norman's post makes a few important points more succinctly than I could have, and with more detail as well. It should also be said that good journalism entails not just quoting from various opposing sources but also in-depth research and a drive to determine where the reality lies on the ideological continuum. Journalists should also be prepared to find that the entire discourse is unreflective of reality, and that all sides of a given issue are basing their arguments on false assumptions and fallacious reasoning. The sort of undisciplined journalism Judith Miller practices leads to complete fiascoes like the coverage of the run-up to the Iraq war and the rise of the Intelligent Design movement.
(By the way, the This American Life episode Norman mentioned can be heard here: http://www.thisamericanlife.org/Radio_Episode.aspx?episode=292)
How About a Follow-Up Friday on Miller !!!!!
The idea that any reader would read anything the shameless neocon propagandist Ms. Miller has to say about intelligence is preposterous.
That you would feature her as a guest despite the fact that she remains an unrepentant, fanatical mouthpiece for the Libby, Cheney, Wolfowitz crew is astounding.
She is one of the collaborators who aided Libby and Cheney's propaganda campaign
JM
I have no love for Judith Miller, but she's not the only one covering this story. Check out this piece from the NYer 2 years ago:
http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2005/07/25/050725fa_fact2
My point would be that whatever your feelings about Miller, the real issue here is counterterrorism and how it's effectively carried out, as well as civil liberties and how they're to be safeguarded in our evolving circumstances.
As a resident of the city, I am both encouraged by the NYPD's approach (in that I have no faith whatsoever in the feds, and I do think the NYPD is both better positioned and better motivated to do the job well) and troubled by its civil liberties implications. And *that*, rather than Judith Miller, seems to be what we should be talking about.
I love your show. I am a avid listener here in Europe. Judith Miller has lost all credibility in my eyes. There is nothing she could talk about that would be believable to me. Once an untruth teller (liar) always a freaking LIAR. While she can go no lower in my eyes, you giving her a forum seriously diminishes your credibility. You asked her about the Times' ideology - what about hers. She sold out to power and that sell out helped in a major way to get our Nation into a war and cost many people their lives. NOTHING SHE CAN EVER SAY could forgive thaose actions.
"It's important to hear people like Judy Miller for the same reason that hospitals have weekly meetings to review their mistakes -- to better understand how this tragedy could come about, and learn how to prevent it again."
So why does Brian give her pass after pass? He should grill her with tough followup questions.
Judy Miller is some kind of celeb, probably with connections high up on the Corp. for Public Broadcasting or something.
If you want more understanding, watch Brian's interview with Chomsky on YouTube. Brian's behavior is typical of mainstream media interviewers: he doesn't understand what Chomsky is saying (note in particular the question about limited presidential debate in 2004). Chomsky is just over their heads. These people need to prepare to interview Chomsky; actually read and understand his positions.
Hey john elfrank-dana,
I thought Brian did an excellent job with the Chomsky interview at
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9lagoz6TJnM&NR=1 .
Here's another excellent interview with Chomsky
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fOIM1_xOSro&mode=related&search= .
Let's go all the way and have a full day's show with Tom Friedman, Judy Miller, Bill Kristol, and all the other discredited lying sacks of horse manure who got us into this war through their mendacity or stupidity (or both). I know I haven't heard enough about or by them in a while.
Please stop giving these over-exposed idiots any more air time.
Brian, Your providing a platform for this discredited propagandist for Bush/Ziocon lies and deceit is really disapointing. For you to participitate in Millers attempted rehabilitation does a diservice to all the hundreds of thousands who have been killed or maimed, in part due to her verbatim "reporting" of Bush administration talking points and fabrications that were then used to justify the lead up to this nightmare "war" and occupation. Why would anyone believe a word this sycophant shill now writes, especially regarding the continuing phoney "war on terror". This was a shameful episode that should be rectified.
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