Obama Worse Than Nixon? Pentagon Papers Attorney Decries AP Phone Probe

[limpyhobbler]

(Obama Worse Than Nixon? Pentagon Papers Attorney Decries AP Phone Probe, Julian Assange Persecution )
Published on May 17, 2013

http://www.democracynow.org - The Justice Department's disclosure that it had secretly subpoenaed phone records from the Associated Press has prompted a wave of comparisons between President Obama and Richard Nixon. Four decades ago, the Nixon administration attempted to block The New York Times from publishing a secret history of the Vietnam War leaked to the newspaper by whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg. Two days after the Times first published excerpts of what became known as the "Pentagon Papers," the Nixon government asked for and received a Supreme Court injunction against the newspaper, arguing that publication of the documents posed a "grave and immediate danger to the security of the United States." We speak to James Goodale, the general counsel at The New York Times during the Pentagon Papers crackdown. Goodale is a leading legal expert on the First Amendment and has just published a new book, "Fighting for the Press: The Inside Story of the Pentagon Papers and Other Battles." Goodale said he wrote book in part because of the work of Julian Assange of the whistleblowing website WikiLeaks, and how he is likely being targeted by the U.S. government in an ongoing grand jury probe. "My book is meant to be a clarion call to the journalist community. Wake up! There's danger out there," Goodale says. "You may not like Assange . But wake up! The first amendment is really going to be damaged. If Obama goes forward and succeeds, he will have succeeded where Nixon failed."

[Wellstone ruled]

1. Got to love all this B.S..

We have a sitting Grand Jury in D.C.,they are the ones looking into a possible Security Leak. Wake the F up folks,this has nothing to do with the crap going on in the so called Media. We might have a Rogue CIA thing on our hands. Somebody was chased out of Yemen in the middle of the night,because someone blew their cover.

Got a hunch some Rethug is just doing a smoke screen here to cover a more fatal incident. The so called bomb plot behind this story is very interesting.

And the Poppy fields flourish.

[limpyhobbler]

2. The government told the AP there was no security risk to publish the story.

So they went ahead and published it.

[Gabby Hayes]

3. He conveniently forgot Book Burner Reagan

and the evolution of the news business into corporate propaganda during the 1980's. That's not to mention the absurd FOIA restrictions Reagan and both Bushes enforced. As for attorneys in the newsroom, in my experience they have always leaned on the side of censorship.