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Formation of the National News Council Judicial Ethics and the National News Council
11-1973 The aN tional News Council's s News Clippings, 1973 November 5 - 1973 December 26 The aN tional News Council, Inc.
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Recommended Citation The aN tional News Council, Inc., The National News Council's s News Clippings, 1973 November 5 - 1973 December 26 (1973). Available at: http://repository.uchastings.edu/nnc/172
This News Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Judicial Ethics and the National News Council at UC Hastings Scholarship Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Formation of the National News Council by an authorized administrator of UC Hastings Scholarship Repository. For more information, please contact [email protected]. illflTtt-t'tq.7n1is G'rUUtitt The process by which such press councils corne to their MiNNEAPOLIS, MINN. decisions is as important (sometimes more important) D. 240.275 SliI'!. 674,302 than the decision itself. Interestingly, the .l\\·o ch:cf executives of the counc il s in DEC 1 4 1973 question-former California Supreme Court Chief Jus tice Roger Traynor of the national group and Minnesota Supreille Court Judge C. Donald Peterson - both sug gested that open deliberations may stir up problems with the laws of defamation. The meetings were held near Racine in the \Vindspread reviews Conrerence Center, a m,l[velous rustic lodge designed by Frank Lloyd Wright for t he operators of the Johnson \Vax works. Later it was given to their foundation for varioLls sessions JiI.;.; thi.s fOj' consider<,tion of eloquent ideas. One meeti!1g last year of journalists, educaLors Meeting question not open and shut ai1d attorneys :lorrived at the obvious conclusion that the public has little or no concern about press freedom and B:; Irv Letofsky the right to know. Slaff Writer
A Minnesota council member. Universitv of Minnesota Racine, Wis. Professor J. Edward Gerald, while admitting he wants "The new members of the nudist colony," said Jim Bel r open meetings when rver he plays the role of reponer, mann, "arc embarrassed for a while and then the v Come proclaimed that he wants government by law, not by to like it." Bormann is the longtime new sman at \VCCO, journalism. later kicked upstairs to grander duties as public nff:l irs director. I can't be sure how he comes to know :;0 much One of the instigators of the state council, Robert Shaw, about nudists but I endorse his fleshy analogy. manager of the Minnesota Newspaper Association, argued back that "The people have a right to see people It came durin~ a debate on why meetings on public mat· on a public body in action ... What ters should be open to public people, like their reprcsen we are talking about (dosed ses tatitves from the press. It was, apparently, not a sUC I':eS3- , " .~':" ~ . f\.~::<" sions) is our own comfort." Without ful analogy, since the participants in t2' . ~ perfect visibility to the public, there the parlay-the new NaLional News arise the same old suspicions, he Council and th: older Minnesota Press ; "'; :/ " ,,, went on. Council, of which l30rmann is a mem , ber-seem content to go alon.[! in a . I} l' At. one point or another, both of the pattern of open hearings on the evi . , " I V"' ...... · judges dismissed the issue as minor. dence but closed deliberations. ) Neither is journalistic in his orienta tion, as far as I know. But they \,,'ere Wha t irony, that organizations SilP \ ...... - - joined in their sentiment, b~"'RJlph posedly devoted to freedom of the Otwell, managing editor of the Chi press should even con~ider procet:c! cago Sun-Times and president of the ings in star chambers. It is too per Society of Professional Journalists fect. , ,- . . (fc,rmerly Sigma Delta Chi), who .::... _" .1 ;. ••.: ought to know better. In my bias, closed meeting sugges t Bormann arrogance. Thq' reflect a suspicion Another problem with closed meetings is that the reca of the journalistic process and' a lack of r E: opeCi for thE pitulation of what went on often comes out muddled. An public 's ability to understand. If we have l ca r-:-icci any Associateo Press report on the meetings here said that thing from recent political events it should be lhJt de the discussion with the Minnesota council was closed. As mocracy requires confidence and credibility in pu blic ~tf a matter of fact, that was the only meeting that was fairs. open.- , . ) Clayton Fritchey . It's been billed 'candor' but • • •
WASHINGTON-Thanks to the White the former attorney general and ex Nixon. can hardly be criticized for House's "Operation Gand~ r , " P r e ~ ident . campaign manager, kept him in the hating. "instant analysis," either on the Nixon has now made "full disclosure" dark. \ . air or in the press. If it weren't for about many of the biggest problems About burglarizing the office of Dan that, the President could have dis and difficulties besetting him. As a re iel Ellsberg's psychiatrist: John Ehrl proved Lincoln's dictum that you can't sult, the American people finally .have ichman and Egil Krogh went way be fool all the people all the time. an explanation of how it all happened. yond their instructions. Even against press surveillance, he It's hard to understand why Nixon Explaining the mystery of wiretap has shown over the years that it is held out so long against taking the pub ping his own brother, Donald Nixon, possible to fool enough people enough of the time-at least enough to get lic into his confidence, tor, as his dis out in California: Well, Donald knew elected and reelected President. cloffilres make perfectly clear, he has about it all the time. It seems he just been the innocent, long-suffering victim craves to be bugged. MOST OF the President's "full dis of political enemies and close associ In respect to John Dean's testimony closures" have already been punctured ates who let him down. For example: that Nixon knew everything about the by a diligent press, but there is one in On the energy cr,isis: His far-seeing Watergate scandal: "I'm not saying particular- the insinuation that Lyndon efforts to head off this emergency were John Dean is a liar. I am just saying Johnson personally tutored ;Nixon on sabotaged by a stubborn, benighted, he's mistaken." [Note : Nixon has the how to beat the income tax-that needs unfriendly,Congress. tapes to prove it, too, but somehow further debunking. they have been lost.] Nixon gave his Vice Presidential pa REGARDING THE Watergate tapes The reason why he asserted the doc pers [at a claimed valuation of and that gaping gap on the June 20, trine of "executive privilege," and at $500,000] to the National Archives, and 1972, recording discovered py Nixon's first refused to let the courts have any in return took a handsome tax dequc personal secretary, Miss Woods: It was White House tapes or other Presiden tion. He said he got the idea from Rose Mary's boo-boo. . tial documents: It's Thomas Jefferson's L.B.J. after the 1968 election. But John Recapitulating the crisis over the fir fault. Jefferson set the precedent, and son himself, who had Presidential pa ing of special prosecutor Archibald Nixon had to uphold it . . pers worth millions of dollars, chose CJ)x:....Nixan.. w as double,cr-{)Ssed 13 m·· xl theg _hat- *lOO,OO() cash"Contribu not to ~t-ake advantage-oi-a tax loophole mer Atty. Gen. Elliot Richardson. ; , tion [all in $100 bills] from Howard that Congress was then in the process Concerning complaints over the ad Hughes to the President's crony, Bebe of outlawing, altho he had taken some ministration giving the milk industry a Rebozo : Bebe stashed it away in a deductions in previous years. His later multimillion-dollar price boost after a safety deposit box for several years decision cost his estate a large sum. large campaign contribution: Congress and simply didn't tell his old White . The record shows that Nixon had tak and George McGovern "put a pistol to House friend anything about it. en a deduction for some of his papers our head. " Has any President in history ever previous to his talk with L.B ..J. Apropos of the methods by which been wronged so much by so many The White House is now sending out Nixon avoided many thousands of dol people, especially by those closest to thousands of "fact sheets" to give "Op lars of income taxes: He just took a tip him? In the light of the President's eration Candor" the widest distribution. from former President Lyndon John blamelessness, how could the people's The President says, "If you feel that son. confidence in him reach·an all-time low you need more information, write to As to why Nixon was so long in in the pUblic-opinion polls? His answer: me and I will give it to you." catching on to the Watergate break-in Television and its "vicious distortion" Don't Write-telegraph. and subsequent coverup: John Mitchell, of the "facts." Los Angeles Times Syndi cale 16 Section 1 Chicago -Trib\:lne, 1 uesday, December 11, 1973 Pers active A forum--ideas, .analysis, diverse opinion -I White House Won/tJoin\ InS,tudy of News Media . r""F etU 1J(dt l' Ol~ PIIOVIDEIICE RI 22& AN ·APPEAL FOR FAIRNESS 'lIS PR£SIOtu RICI! 11-05 1120A £Sf . AIID I!. 'lxOl SEVENTH IN A SERIES THE: VIlITE HOUSE CONDENSED l/ASHINGTOR DC WE !mGI: YOU , IR. PRESIDnT 011 B ""ERICA lIS, rOT TO . ' EHAL' or IIlLLrONS SURnE.DEl! ONE 0' IIUDATE TO YOUR SEDITIOUS D JOT OR O~ TnnE OF YOUl! T !:TRACTORS THE RAPE OF AMERICA HE:y APoE SABOTAGING A~D P • THE .ONUS IS O. THE:~ , • REYING 01 THE: n. I IJ1'1.ACABLE PARTISANS T- 'ATIO • • ALLIED VIT/f , nc. y ARE HOLD "The media have lost their sense of honor ••• to the pimps who sell grand TIlE SELF.SEEXaa AND . ING CAPTIVE: THE WEAK YIEtD -TO 'THE: UNSCRUPULOUS orr -UEED, jury testimony," said Francis L. .Dale, former publishe.r9fth~ Cincir:tnatJ, Enquirer, • . FEAR, To .BRIBER . ICE-HOLD£/tS VIlO . '1', TO IITIIiIDAT Hno naHon can tolerat,e a ·freedom of the press that divides Its society. (AP11/18173) I'II£SIDEIT ANDREW JOHNSON V 1011, AID TO BLACKIIAI!.. PARI%SAB IIIPEAC-H/!£NT . DULII lOT YIELII EVE. AFTE .. THE PRESIDENTS-WOULD BE PALLBEARERS media and their allies. Here, then, is a capsuled CI VIL. II ' lHOOGH THE: 'AllOi liAS M, "l1li HE: liAS VIJlDICAT£!) II Tlit VAKE 0' Who are they and .what do they hope to gain? part of the Nixon administration's record: THE: 'IRSr I'R£SIIIEIT fa I!OIITIIAGE ; WE ~O 'OT E"I'Ecr You TO 8E They are the conglomerates, corporate giants PEACEMAKING: THROUGH .AllIANCES, PERSUASION, FRIEND 1lS'ATU8LE mlIA. HE: PR£SIDElCr fa l'JiE of the media, · among them the New York SHIP AND FIRMNESS; New Initiative in U.S. foreign policy ••• Yal ARE ONE OF Times (SALT, PENTAGON thefts), the ,«ash- THE NIXON DOCTRINE. . THE: GREATEST I'R B£!.OVtD COUNTRy, AND YOU ARE CH £SIDEns 11 l'Ht HISTORy 0,. OUIl ington Post - Newsweek - Los Anftles Times ~ JOURNEYS FOR PEACE: 8ECAIISE OF · ALLEHGED Brc·AUS cartel, Time magazine, the ne orks. RUMANIA-First President of USA to visit Rumania. '1'0011 INDOIfITABLE COURAGE E 0' YOUI! STRENGTII . ABC, AlII BECA USE F ' BECAUSE 0' , NBC, CBS (payola) and a harem of minions MAINLAND CHINA-First American President to travel to • 0 YOUR HONUIIENTAL AC H . • • YOUR I'ATRIOfISIf with a gluttonous appetite .for POWER AND Peking for conferences with Mao Tse·tung and Chou En·lia. WE SllSSCRIBE l'0 .JIJLII: 'S EXHORrArzo: :~;US AT HOPI!: UD ABROAD. • PROFIT -exemptfrom anti-trust laws. J Embargo on direct trade re scinded after 21 years. UN ad- VIlLI IIIIUT ES TrElf, O. BEHALF OF lalIT, TI GHT , fIGHr- Now, this is not .to say' that everyone in the mission supported and U.S. Uason Office in Peking opened. ARE IIILLI06S OF AII£RICA 'S. WE 4th t · k th t II th d' t SOVIET RUSSIA-Meeting with Russian leaders in Moscow ItSnCTf'ULL r trollS esta e IS a nave or a · a e Issen ers and Washington. Strategic Arms limitations Ta lks initiated. liT • from our position are self-serving. There are, • VIET NAM and Southeast Asia: Accord to end war and release Ii lQrAL. CITIzt.s·_C OIIIIutn: 'elt to be objective, many 'newspapers, newsmen and newscasters, columnists and pundits. and of U.S. prisoners of war. :wtEss TO THE: I'RESIDElCy political dissenters ·who are equitable, bal- • MIDDLE £AST: Cease·fire negotiated successfuny. anced and moral. But they are in the minority, • INTERNATIONAL TRADE: basic reforms proposed and enacted, THE WHIT! IfO~1I and when weighed against the big corporate DEVELOPING: by providing maximum opportunities for America's most IrA'H'I' ~41l1'ra.cliSco ct\ .... idt ~ 15' Harris Poll Shows a .Growing Disenchantment in U.S. ** Mon., Dec. 3, 1973 bring up if they had a Washington government scandals t his unions only television wrong in America;" 37 per ing the feeling. cade, the survey concluded chance to sit doWn and talk year, the public had 'become news and the press have ris cent disagreed with that that 5 per 'cent of Ameri with President Nixon, three In the past few years most " . Asked to eX!plain their out of every four persons pessimistiC and alienated. A en in the public's esteem statement, and the remain concern, one-quarter 0 f cans "expressed disen~hant Americans have lost confi said "Watergate." dence in their government clear majority, the survey since 1966, the survey ing were "not sure". The those sampled s aid that ment," compared with only showed, believe that. "there showed. Harris organization s aid "government leaders are 29 per cent who answered Forty-one per cent of · the and many other institutions ptUb:1ic expressed a "great that they deal with in their is something deeply wrong" The percentage of Ameri- that it was the first time corrupt and i'll1mora[." More that way in 1966. in the country. cans who showed "a great since the assassinations of people gave that reason than deal" of confidence in televi daily lives, according to a • Well over half and up to sion news, more confidence survey released by a con State and local officials, deal of confidence' in the the Rev. Martin Luther King any other. t1u'ee-qual'ters of tJhose surr Jr. and Senator Robert F . than they had in most other gressionaJ committee yes on the other hand, tend to be executive branch of the fed veyed agreed with such state Kennedy in 1968 that a ma .• By 63 per cent to 34 per instituti ons. Only 17 percent terday. optimistic and to believe era 1 government di'opped cent, state officials denied ments as "wire-tapping and of the officials had such con that the problems tl)at led to from 41 per cent in 1966 to 27 jority had . answered the spying undel' the excuse of The survey was conducted th at som ething is "deeply fidence in television :report the public cynicism are per cent in 1972 and to 19 per question affirmatively. national security is a serious by Louis Harris and Asso wrong." Local .offici'als dis ing. transitory. cent last September, the puted that statement by 48 threat to people's privacy" ciates for the Senate Sub Harris study stated. • T his disenchantment As for the written press, committee on Intergovern Of many familiar institu- cut across a number of sta per cent to 45 per cent. and "most 'eilective offkials SOper cent of the public and tions in society - including Among the findings: tistical lines, with high pro • Based on four questions are in politics for all they only 19 per cent of the offi mental Relations. personally can get out of it medicine, the military, 01'- • A majority of American portions of per,soll'S in every that the Harris team has cta!ls expressed hiJghConfi Its authors concluded that, ganized religion, go ve r n-' , -53 percent - agreed that income level and every sec used on a "scale of aliena for themselves." dence. in the wake of disclosures of ment, universities and labor "there is something deeply tion of the couptry evidenc- tion" ifor more than a de- • Asked what they would New York Time. CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR -- 12/26/73 • Council p .~§ ed to hear COin amis By George MoueyhlID St::tff correspondent of The Christian Science Monitor New York The counell has Rlso asked News What has the U.S. National News week magazine to supply more infor The study, he added, wUl also -- It also alms to serve as a defender Council been doing since it set up shop mation abont a story It ran on the examine the Impact of the fairness of press freedom by helping waro off across the street from Lincoln Center revolt in Chile in response to doctrine Of; the electronic media. Tha.t attempts by government or others to in New York City? a reader's complaint. And it is doctrine provides that a broadcaster encroach upon the media's right to. Complaints have only been trickling looking Into a complaint against the must give adequate coverage to con cover events as they see fit. In, says William B. Arthur, executive Corporation for Public Broadcasting troversial lilsues and that an Indlvid· The council is financed solely by director of the council and former about a program In which a viewer ual or organization has the right to funds from 10 foundations. It has no editor of Look magazine. contends only one side of a con reply where personal attacks can be ties to the the media or the govern No surprise, he says, because he trOVErsial issue involving a Newark, proved. ment. Its only enforcement power,~ feels the national media gene;-ally do N.J ., public housing project was that of public opinion; it ha.s m) a good job of reporting the news fai.rly Mr. Arthur admits that without the presCl'ted. coercive or subpoena powers but and accurately. But he exp ects com cooperation of the news medIa the A numbe:: of news organizations National News Council probably will relies on its reports to the public as Its plalnts will increase as the news have made it clear that they do not oIlly weapon. council becomes more widcly !mown. fall. "The council will be judged on Its support tl1<; news councll and will not performance," he feeis, and if at the Such press councils are not new. The wat(:hdog organization r.s.s been coopt'!'a te "'lIh it Mr. Arthur says Other countries have had them fOr keeping tabs since August on fairness end of three years, when Its pilot he understands their skepticism. funding nms out, the council has yea.rs. The National News Council' in news reporting. here in fact, is modeled after the One of the first complai'1ts it Is "They'rc reo.sonable newsmen," he failed to win over manv of the editors acds, "they jU9t want to be fihown." who are eyeing it skeptically today, British Press Council which has been' looking Into are those President Nixon In operation more than 20 years . 26 [The ChrIstian SCience :r-kOi:!to, In . then the experiment will likely be made at his Oct. press conference A recent ~. tudy made by the Amer In which Mr. Nixon called some tends to support the council. At a dropped. meeting of the Am erican Society of ican Newspapers Publishers Associ telev ision newscasts "outrageous, But he thinks time and performance ation found that many daUy news-. vicious, and distorted." Newspaper E: dltofs last year, Monitor editor John Hughes ::a!d he Intended wlll prove to many .doubtlng editors papers In the U.S. already are takL,g Roger J . Tra ynor, chairman of the that the councJ.J Is a help, not a steps to be more accountable to Ll-)elr : [0 ·~aopcI · a t e with ei€ caunell provided council and former chief justice of the hindrance, to keeping the press free. It "op-e rated respcnslbly," that its readers. Among the steps: an om- ' California Supreme COld, called the Investigating complaints Is not the budsman to watch fairness, a local mt.m bers were of "high c<111 ber." that Pl'csident's allegations "so serious council's oniy role. press council, surveys of news Its d e mall(~ ::; upon erj ~t ors ' Hm e "were that they warrant a public airing." Made up of 15 prominent per50ns _ sources and readers, an advisor:' r.ot unreasonable," a rI d tl!at it "st.urd six from the media and nine ou tsiders board on fairness. Details awaited ily defends p[l~ S~ free dom.··) The council has la'.lnched what it The News Councll aiso h;:-,s launChed says will be a thorough and indepen its first ma jor study whIch will deal dent investigation of the Nixon with tnt! potential threat to a free charges. It has received assurances press pOled by Ir,c reased demands for of cooperation from the three net access to til(: media. works but thus far has had no success The stliUy. ~; a l d Mr. Traynor, is In in getting the White House to pin down response to the growing dem B~ ' L~uren Soth Lasky's "moonlighting" in 1972 How Editor of The RE!9lster and Tribune ever. they have known at least since Editorial Page, last June when Magrud er testliied about "HE PRESS of America has hasked in it The faIlure of NANA to do anything 1 the sunlight of oeserH'cl praise for lis about this is inexcusable. investigation and expo~ur(' of the Water gate crimes anri other politicill ('orTUp Spied on tion of the Nixon ildministr8.tion . If tile :'.lcGovern newspilpers. pilrticularly '- '::;;;r,~'i;''''~? the Washington Post. .<_.J One rf':Json may be that Goldt· rg had had not persisted in 6 j; a conflict of interest of his (I'.\'n~ His wife . Lucianne Cumminf,:s Goldberg. their efiorts to uncover :c"" ' > di~ the scandal. It IS doubt- :" ?i~ .. also worker! for thf' Committee to Re ful that it would ha ve l -~ ~ ~ - .. '; elect the President. a fact ! did not been brought to light \, ",~. ~ , ~ know when I wrote the article of Au CT • 21. 0 and the guilty br_ought r .'-:_ .j Mrs. Goldberg traveled as a reporter to JustIce . .. ~. +~7; ..' : with Senator George i\lcGovern's cam However. It IS onh· ~ ,J Ji <" . fair to concede that the :':"'" . b . paign group. She was at the same time working a~ a politlc,l spy for the Nixon record of the press in VIOOR re-election committcp . the political co~ruption LASKY ;\!urr;lV ill. Chotiner. a former politi of 1972·73 is not lIn~ullierl. cal :Jri viser to the President. hirer! ~lrs . Lilst Aug. 21 I wro te iln article in The Goldberg for $l.0011 a WE'f'k. She was to Register abollt il pi~cf' of dp('cpti o!1 prr ·Iook for "r E'il!I~' dirty stuff .. who W;:J.S pptraterl h\' the i\orth Amenc;Jn \ews ~ieepirIg wit h whom . what Sf'Cl"et Serv paper Alliance !\.-\:"iA) and a writer for that newspaper syndicate named Victor ice mer were doing With the stf\\ard esses. \\"ho ~moked pol on the plane - Lasky. that sort of thtng." she told the Wash Lasky workrrl for the Commiltee 10 Rp-elect the Prpsirlf'nt leRr, and re ington Star-!\ews. :'.Irs. Goldberg gl)t her credentials for C(~ived a fF~ tain",r fee from th;]t organi the :vlcGovern press pl;me as a rep!'e zation ilt the SClme time hI' was \\"!"itin~ a political colilmn for :\.\\A. \eithrr ~('ntati\"e of il hook publ isher. She cold L The American press has had only the nicest tbings to say about Salvador Allende since his death. Newspapers, magazines, and television have been saturated with mel- I ancholy accounts of his abbreviated revolution. The i complete reverse is true for the junta that deposed AI- J lende; the worse said about them, the better. In its A November 2 issue the Wall Street Journal shows, in I workmanlike fashion, how the higher journalism proceeds I by examining recent articles in The Nation and News- week. In The Nation, Professor E. Bradford Burns, a Latin American scholar from UCLA, tries to show how popu lar Allende was. On September 4, one week before the coup, there was a Pfo-Allende demonstration. Burns witnessed the gathering and claimed in his story that 800,000 Chileans were there, making it the largest dem onstration in Chile's history. (Burns was a piker com pared to the British Guardian. It said there were 1,250,000 demonstrators.) However, as luck would have it, Everett G. Martin of the Wall Street Journnl was at the same demonstration and he estimated a crowd of no more than twenty thousand, which it turns out was just about the police estimate. Martin note~ that Bums failed to mention a demonstration the following day which did attract hundreds of thousands. Its purpose was to call for the ~esignation of Allende. Martin picks apart other points in Professor Bums's article. To blame America for Chile's economic failure is, well, "ludicrous-American egocentrism at its worst. Despite [America's] credit blockade, Dr. Allende's regime received more international credit than any other Chilean govemment in history." Months before the coup, Al lende's nephew-a fervent supporter of his uncle-had despaired for his government, telling Martin: "There's no more ideology, everything is corrupt. All the [ruling circles] think about is power and money." -Bad as it is, The Nation article is not in the same biased journalism league as Newsw.eek. "Last week I slipped through a side door in the Santiago morgue," John Barnes wrote in the October 8 Newsweek. "One hundred and fifty bodies were laid out on the ground floor . ... Up stairs I passed through a swing door -and there in a dimly lit corridor lay at least fifty more bodies . .. . I was able to obtain an official morgue body count from the daughter of a member. of its staff: By the 14th day fol lowing the coup, she said, the morgue had received and processed 2,796 corpses." According to the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, a doctor unsympathetic to the junta, and the morgue's director, the Barnes account is one of the more imaginative pieces of investigative journalism; 2,796 is not the number of bodies the morgue processed in the first 14 days of the coup-but of all the bodies processed from January 1 to September 21. Another example: The sprawled body of a dead am putee was prominently pictured in the, story. The caption read: "A dead amputee in Santiago: The reign of terror was worse than anybody imagined." The man, it turns out, was killed not by junta soldiers but by a Chevrolet \ truck. . Press Safe!!uards . S· r f CPu.mteh '. ( ~ f~ telt.k-t '(oJ ( 4> , '3 Y ? • A PANEL OF LAWYERS, journalists, schol .ars and other specialists has propo~ed a series of recommendations for legal changes to increase the flow,of information to the public, some of which ' we find of great merit. The panel's proposals for a national "sh~eld law" to protect reporters' confidential sources and its can for lifting all federal controls over radio and television news show content have a particu larly vital purpose: to preserve the free press un der the First Amendment and to safeguard the media in disseminating news. Various .states, including California, already have , laws that permit reporters to protect their confidential sources of infdrmation, but.the panel seeks a federal law, broad enough to exempt re porters from revealing their sources, even where the reporter witnesse~ a killing or has advance knowledge that one is to take place. , IN URGING COMPLETE DECONTROL of broadcast news, the panel not only 'recommends removal of all government power to regulate pro 'gram content, but also seeks elimination' of the' so-called "fairness doctrine." This seemingly desi'r able guarantee of "equal time" has proved coun terproductive and in practice has constricted rath e'r than promoted debate on political and other is sues. The recommendations emerged from the an nual Chief Justice Warren Conference on Advoca cy, held at Harvard University under sponsorship of the research arm of the Roscoe Pound-Ameri can Trial Lawyers Foundation. As its president, Herbert Bennett observed, its report was in no way concerned "with protection of journalists nor news media or enhancement of the legal profes sion. It was strictly for the benefit of the public." 8 jH :r.... dfCf ~ ...Iidf rues., Nov. 20, 1973 * Panel Urges New Press Safeguards Cambridge, Mass. A series of sweeping legal changes intended to ease the flow of information to the public was urged yesterday hy a panel of .58 lawyers, journalists, scholars and other specialists. The proposals include the passage of a strong federal shield law to protect report ers, and the removal of all government control over tel evision and radio program ming. The . recommendations grew out of the annual Chief Justice Earl Warren Confer ence on Advocacy held here last June and sponsored by the Roscoe Pound-American Trial Lawyers Foundation. In releasing the report, Herbert H. Bennett, a Port land, Me., labor attorney who is president of the Cam bridge-based foundation, de clared that the question of a free press is "a most vital issue to our democracy." He added that the report was "in no way concerned with the protection of journalists or news media or the en hancement of the legal pro fession - it was strictly for the benefit of the public." The major recommenda tions are: • The establishment of a national journalists' privi lege that would exempt re JIOl'teI"S ffOm being com pelled to reveal the sources of information gained in con fidence. Although the group stopped short of approving. an absolute privilege, it still rejected the idea of creating an exception even when a reporter observes a killing or has advance knowledge. that one will take place. • Amendment of the F e Ii era I Communications Act to remove from·the gov ernment all power to regu late program cmntent on ra dio and television, eliminat ing, among other things, the "fairness doctrine.". • Use of the antitrust laws to resist concentration of media ownership in geo graphical areas. • Legislation requiring that all requests for infor mation under the Freedom of Information Act be pro cessed within ten to 20 days. • Extensions of the Free dom of Information Act to Congress and to the states. • Establishment of an in dependent government agen cy to review national securi ty documents to determine if the classification system is being abused. • Requirement that the government pay court costs for successful information suits and that the govern ment be forced to justify the withholdings of any portion ' of a document. New York TilJlflL I William F. Buckley, Jr. OPINION ~an JmetteD J,Xaminer TIIeIIIIy, Moo.llk, 20, 1973 Page 26 Distinctions in reportjD~ I DO NOT TIDNK the press is "distort days." ed" or ''vicious'' in any categorical sense, J but I do think there is a tendency in the In due course I received a t,1 ;boile eel press to magnify and thus distort: and from the New York Times, wantiDtl to mow unquestionably Mr. Nixon is frequently the more about the sensational development I victim of that kind of thing. Permit me to had predicted. I replied that I knew of no recount a personal experience. sensational development, had predieted no such thing, nor had Sen. GoldwMer in IJlY I Ten days ago I spoke at Kansas State presence. On the matter of resignation,. I University. In response to the question, explairled that to say the odds favor resigDa ''What did I think the future held out for Mr. tion is different from predicting resignation. Nixon?" I replied that the odds had now in To say the odds favor rain tomorrow is Dot my opinion changed, favoring the possibility to predict rain tomorrow. of resignation. . These nice distinctions were not report- The next day I met happily with Senator ed back to the readers of the New York Goldwater at the annual meeting of a Times. Perhaps the distinctions are too mee. foundation of which he and I and a few other Professor Hugh Kenner has recorded that a. tigers (including Sen. Tower, Thunnond, and newspaper is a "low definitioDal medNm," Lausche) are trustees. After the meeting . and that it is unsafe to attempt in it' a was over, Sen. Goldwater and I drove to the thought the accuracy of which depends on airport together and, awaiting our flights, the correct placement of a comma. chatted together at the coffee shop. Now, a week having gone by, I am A moment or two later a gentleman receiving mail from all over the world materialized who identified himself as being asking when would the news come out of the from the local CBS. He ~esired us to '·startling development" that brought Sen. perform before his camera crew respecting Goldwater and me to make a "secret rendtz Mr. Nixon and Watergate. We declined - vous in Wichita, Kansas" for the purpose of ever so politely and eNer so firmly. discussing the "mechanics of President Nbi C?n's resignation." The following morning, front page, New York Times. "Newsmen in Wichita, Kansas, In the first place, insofar a8 it eonteI;rtI reported seeing Sen. Barry Goldwater of me, it is mysteriously flatteriDg. I bne ID Arizona and William F. Buckley Jr., the delusions about my own power to bring • • . conservative columnist, in 'deep discussion' Nixon down. Who do they think I am? JoIlD at the airport there today. Mr. Buckley Dean ill? spoke last night at Kansas State University - where he said that he believed Mr. Nixon In the second place, though at tbis point would resign because of the Watergate several newspapers have received from my scandal at the urging of Mr. Goldwater and own mouth the news that I made DO other friends. Mr. Buckley and Mr. Goldwa prediction about any Watergate develOp ter were quoted by the Associated Press as ment, I have yet to see a single ~to saying they expected a startling develop said correction. This is the kind of .... Mr. ment in the Watergate affair in the riext few Nixon is complaining about. \ Tues., Nov. 20, 1973 .~IU' ,-..a"else. (!\r."ictt 13 The TV That Really Needles Nixon New York as an escape valve for the President is a sore loser. . . up with: "Personally, I As irreverent as Carson is, The remark lit up ABC country: Watergate hurts so He's sending the tapes to don't think the President is he still has not gone as far switchboards and caused President- Nixon may much it is probably better Sirica . . . Nobody said they acting like a king . . . After as sportcaster Don Meredith presidential speechwriter think he is taking a beating to laugh at it. had to be on spools." all, he only fired Archibald during an ABC telecast of a Patrick Buchanan t 0 be at the hands of network Cox ... Originally', h e Monday night footban game. awakened from sleep by an news commentators, but Another time: "Nixon got While the newscasters can planned to have him behead Mter watching Mr. Nixon's angry "former high admin lately other segments of tel a little confused ... instead ' ed." favorite football team, the istration official" (the fol only report deadpan the sto of a tape recorder, he tried evision have been taking up ry of the White House tapes, Washington Redskins, lose lowing week Meredith apol where the straight news pro to play the tapes on a power Carson plants his barbs to Pittsburgh, Meredith ob ogized to the president on Carson can mirror what is saw." grams leave off. on many people's minds, and skips away with the served that if they kept los TV.) A sportscaster recently re saying the unsayable and When Mr. Nixon fired spe comment: "I'm not taking a ing, "Tricky Dickie" might ferred to him in prime time getting a laugh at the same cial prosecutor Archibald stand. I'm just reporting the drop in on a practice ses as "Tricky Dickie," and time: "I wouldn't say the Cox, Carson's gagmen came news." sion. Johnny Carson has been zinging him steadily in his opening monologue on the "Tonight Show." Public figures, even presi dents, have always been fair game for comedians and their joke writers, but it would be hard to recall a comparable time when Car son, who reaches 14 million viewers nightly, zeroed in so frequently on one target. In a way, he is probably acting \q WATERGATE Page 8-~.1Jf.1Exu~ltl1.rr {;:{ Tues., Nov. 20, 1973 swer to the aicoholism bit. which has never had any White House hints at 'Richardson problem' basis whatever." Nixon loyalists ~ and ap> \ parently the Prestdent him Knight News Service RealChed ' at his home, Jr., also referred to drinking "I think it is a little odd ,fare, Defense and, finally, Richardson said all of llis to-come-to-a-full-sfop kind of self ' - 3IPPea'l." angry Wlitlh Richards'on s'aid yesterday by Richardson at a briefing that if tllis (drinking) were a Justice. tickets since the age of 16 tickets. Ri~haTdlson . WASHINGTON - Some the cij]ar-ges are "'absolute on Watergate for Republican problem," Richardson said, h!ad been compiiJ.ed and cir top administration officials "The last ticket I got was They resented a news sto nO'll~sens , e , " He said he is senators, " that I would have been Richardson admitted that culated in Mass'schusetls by are quietly peddling innuen sIickened and dis .,f Jl 11' irepho to President Nixon posed with a baby in Orlando, Fla., after"tapping" Mas t e r Seargeant Edward Kleizo (left) on the face Saturday night Nixon Criticizes Stories .On Airport Incident Key Biscayne, Fla. incident. The White House yester Asked if Mr. Nixon day condemned as " unethi P,oH ,of Lawyers 'seemed to be angry, Kleizo cal and unprofessional re replied: "011, no, at no time porting" based on "rumor · Here Favo'rs whatsoever. No way, Impos and gossip" news accounts sible." that said President Nixon The two pool reporters slapped a man at McCoy Air Impea,ehment were William Eaton of the Force Base outside Orlando, The Barrister.s Club said Chicago Daily News and Fla., Saturday. yesterday t hat 697 young M a t t Cooney of Westing The alleged victim des San Francisco lawyers be hous.e Broadcastrng Cor-p. cribed the President's actio-u lieve the HOllse of Reoresen- as "a friendly gesture" and tatives should vote articles A. S me .t-'reSWent wa: a "tap" on the cheek. of impeachment against shal5ing hands with specta President Nixon. tors lined up along a fence, Yesterday's Wall Street "'he approached a short, , Journal reported that Mr. T h,e c1ub, representing balding man and his son, " Nixon "soundly slapped the 1700 attorneys under the age the report said. man's face and walked on'" of 36, said it sent out a ques after the incident, which tionnaire on the issue and The man reported, -accord took place following the received 859 replies - 133 ing to the poolers, that Ule President asked: "Are you President's que s t i 0 n members saying that im and-answer session with the peachment should not be the boy's mother or grand Associated Press Managing voted and 29 abstaining. mother?" Editor's Association. "Neither," he replied. Club president Carl A. Reports of the incident Leonard noted that voting "The President craned his "distorted a friendly ges articles of impeachment neck for another look," the report said. "Bright flood ture," a White House state does not necessarily imply a ment said. vote for removal from of lights at the airport might have affected his vision. "This is an example of ir fice, since the Senate would' responsible and twisted ac act asa jury on the charges. .. 'Of course not,' said the I counts which have been cir President. At the same time culated in recent months. the President spoke he deHv without adequate substantia ered a light slap to the tion and which create false man's face." debate in the White House 'The two poolers said that impressions concerning the Press Corps because the President 0 f tiJ,.e United "the light ·slap had the ve poolers had made no men locity that a man might use States," the statement said. tion of the incident in the in slapping shaving lotion on "The motives of those who written pool report Saturday night. The poolers main his own face . . . the Presi generated the rumors and dent did not appear to be an ,those who wrote these sto tained that there was no signficance to the incident gry, but may have been flus ries can ' only be explained tered by his mistake in by the reporters involved;" but late Sunday night they wrote a pool report and post identity. The President then Master Sergeant -Edward ed it in the press room here. went on to pose for pictures K. Kleizo, a 50-year-old Air with a baby." Force veteran with service The Wall Street Journal, When one of the poolers in Vietnam, said yesterday the New York Daily News asked the man what had oc "this is the greatest honor I and the St. Louis Post Dis cUlTed,he replied: "The ever had; -to shake the hand patch filed stories about the President slapped me." The c of the President is a great incident, although the televi poolers then ran to board , privilege. To have the Presi sion networks al)d the ma Air Force One, without get dent tap you on the cheek-I jority of newspapers repre ting the man's name. won't wash my fa ce." sented decided that there Kleizo's pioture appeared was insufficient basis for a next day in the Orlando Sen Asked if his son, John, 7, story. had not gone through the tinel because he was next to terminal saying "the Presi "Two members of the Sa the , mother with the baby dent slapped my daddy," tUl·day night pool observed who was photographed. Kleizo replied: "Yes, he did, a n encounter that they Kleizo's identity bee am e but he didn't mean it that thought at the time was in known yesterday. way." significant and still do" Reached by' telephone, Sunday night's posted po'ol Kleizo said he had used the Kleizo said he had told report said. word slapped, adding: "You Mr. Nixon he w~ s "one of don't say the President the greatest Presidents Kleizo said no one from tapped me." we've ever had and the the White House staff had President reached over and talked to him about the inci When John Kleizo was tapped his face-like a pat dent or the news reports. asked about the incident, he you give a basketball player But Mrs. Kleizo said a lieu said the President thought after he's made a basket. " tenant colonel had contacted he (his father) was my The incident came to light her husband. Kleizo said no grandma. It was s6 dark Sunday when one of the pool one told him what to say and spotlights in his eyes." reporters on the President's when questioned about the Washin.gtoll Post plane told his colleagues what he had seen Saturday night. There fo llowed r,- . - Page [email protected] * Tues., Nov. 20, 1973 , TV Watching Outdoor Activities TV itself·is the message for Americans I ' Cu Itural Events are the people of other nations. To put it another way: By John Lear where primary conversation takes up the most time is These data come from "The Use of Time," a book just Th ubiquitous presence Of the automobile has come Institute for Social Research Kragujevac in Yugoslavia. published in The Netherlands by an editorial team head close to destroying the simple pleasure of going for a ~ by Alexander Sza-lai, a United Nations agency official walk. President Nixon's attack on TV news coverage could The American priority on time for conversation falls Whose interest in time budgeting began with his research have repercussions far beyond those the President has in at the 15th place in the catalog of uses of the 1440 minutes work as a member of the llungarian Academy of of the day. So, to see where the national enthusiasm for How all this will be affected by President Nixon's mind. Sciences. ' lambasting of TV news coverage can only be guessed at. TV puts us , we must look at the first 15 uses of time in For television is where the American people live, or cities of the United States, in Pskov, and in Kr,agujevac: \ ,They 'show that despite a daily hour 'and a half spent King Features Syndicate, Inc., 1973 as Marshal McLuhan would phrase it, television itself is on TV in America, the period of time given to newspaper the message for Americans. U.S.A. Pskov, Kragujevac, (44 cities) U.S.S.R. Yugoslavia reading in American cities is still longer than the news· il.2 On an average day, the typical citizens of this coun jn mins. in mins. in mins. paper reading period in any of the lsurveyed nations. try spends more time watching the TV screen than he Sleep 470 462' 472 But only the Peruvians now spend less time reading s~ ends in any other way except sleeping or working. Main job 225 324 230 books than Americ,ans do, while citizens of the Commu 91 33 34 nist world spend four and more times as long. At the stroke of every midnight, more people are TV (at home ) I Eating 81 72 79 awake in the United States than in any other place on \It is clear from other data assembled in "The Use of earth, and the commonly accepted reason is ·an eager Personal care 69 49 58 Social fi3 13 33 ~e, " (see accompanying table) that Americans are ness to stay up to date with the electronic messages. Dl.ucb 1I~ s.Cl! ;..n ... ,. n1... ."v~ ..." . 1... "- 1_ -! - "--' • _ _ .L ,..).,.~ Home chores 58 38 49 , People of ather countries watch TV, too , in propor Coolrlng' 44 55 70 tion to the availability of the medium and their national Child care 32 35 23 sense of perspective. Among them, however, the perspec Personal travel 31 34 24 tive is markedly different. Anyone of a half dozen other Laundry 26 28 28 uses of time - cooking, eating, personal grooming, home Household care chores, care of children, and personal travel-has more (other than shopping meaning than TV does to their lives. and garden/pets) 24 17 26 Newspaper reading 24 15 20 A much older art of communic;ltion, con ver s~tion , Leisure travel 19 21 21 has estalblished itself over time as a vital facet of human Conversation 18 8 28 experience. It is, therefore, an appropriate benchmark, or means of comparison, for use here. Sleep is a biological necessity; it deserves and g~ts Simple application of it is virtually impossible be the first command on time. Work is required for suvival; cause' there are various standards for measuring conver· its , claim on time comes second only to the claim of sleep. sation. Man cannot work without eating, cannot eat Without cooking, cannat Cook acceptable food unless the cook and . Insofar as primary conversation can be sorted out the kitchen are clean and the children are properly the time the average American spends in pursuit of it looked after . falls exactly at the midpoint of the spectrum observed in cities and 'suburbS of 12 nations covered by the largest As a planetary creature, then, man could be expected and most comprehensive survey ever made of the daily to tend to all these matters before takiilg time to watch activities of man. ' TV. And, as the above figures show, that is the sequence of events in Pskov and Kragujevac. TV rates only. sev The surveyed city ' in which people spend the least enth priority on the day's time in Kragujevac and ninth time in primary conversation is Pskov in the Union of priority in Pskov. But in 44 cities of the United States, TV Soviet Socialist Republics. There the average daily con takes up the third biggest chunk of time between one versational quota is eight minutes. The surveyed city sunrise and the next. ---y; _ / ! c; /Ull,~ Broadcast, print plications" of more media access, Mr. to prcsidei Traynor cited landmark cases in new in inter'Of! media will share, interpretations. The Nel\' York Times v. dent Riche share alike in Sullivan (1964) restricted the definition 10 While ~f libelous journalism to statements pub man Walt news council's lished from "proved malice." In the later major inr ~ Rosenbloom v. Metromedia (1971) de subjects. j access study cision, broadcasters were given similar major inte Ex-judge Traynor, playing devil's protection from libel charges. In Red Lion alleecd advocate, leaves little room for Broadcasting Co. v. FCC (1969), how ElIsbcre. J optimism that either medium ever, the court had "upheld the a,"hority Cox; w it~ can deny voice to outsiders of the FCC to implement the estab. Space Adrr lished fairness doctrine on coverage of er New Y The National News Council's recently public issues by spe!ling out mand-Jtory Russell G. announced study on access to the media procedures in the event of a broadcast hcads of s versus frecdom of the press may well link ing of a personal attack or political Watergate the broadcast and print media in a case editorial," Mr. Traynor explained. The orski Nov of dual-if not double-jeopardy, says Miami Herald case this summer simj"llv President I a bonanza in Mil the man who's responsible. Although the put the same onus on the ncwspapers, peatcdly study was inspired by a July 1973 Flori he s Broadcasting Nov 19 1973 48 a2?4 d 1 bylec: evu v Press Freed.om 240 ------ , ~ must :provide C-.l'.lJ.l ad.! tori at s:p:tcc to a . :politician ~,t cri tlcized ..'\ .~ ' ~d is a vansu~rd case . ~1th wid.e implications for :press freedom, the j~~ cbairma,n .of the recently formed. Natiot:al J:1e;'?g~Ullcil said Frid~. ,:, - .. ' ~ J. Roger J. ~raYnor, a former , Chief justicaof the , ca11forni~.Su~rome ',,~'1J :iA . ~~ .. ~ Court, said the recent Florida suprcme . Court decision, aGai{Jst the. , ,:~) - ' ~ M1e:.mi He-raId. mieht 8;9011 a nei'7 dire ction for th$ 9.. 'Uf.lGt~.cn of :;iublic t ~ ,·1.J access to the med1a. :But p he adCled, 'llie ruling .. 'S70oke the le..nguage '~~ i rJ of freedcm~ not revcesB1on.'~ .. \ 1J Ria remarks Yffire :prepared. for _t5, tb. annual CcnvGct10n ~ the New ~{j :~ England Society o:fNevrS:pclper Edit ors,. .. . ' 'f~ ' .Tl"aynor said the deci3icn .:basgood and bad. points, but ~ ~ ; ;~ - -- ' no "opan a.nd. . shut simplicity,.!' , _ ' ''' C ~l J ' . cOlt 1s. in tact a. classic hard case .and no one can )?red.ict . AJ whether 1 t will finally lse.d. to, 'bad ,law or good. Journalists ': ~ sa well us lav'lYers must confront . 59" U3.re~ all , the . argum~nts ' ;., Ji , . ~ that must _ bD .mustered :for both sides of this vanguard ca.ze," ~•J. ' said. Traynor. ; I ,lr :~ The Flor1d.a cese is being. appealed qv , newspaper J.)ublisners ' in that state. ~ey have ,ind.1c;1ted. tb.t they ~.Lll take it to the 1;i ~1 ,t :'1 U.S. suprcmeCouxt if necossary • . i :~ 'I, ;,1 Traynorsa1d the counc~l, . for~.ed tllis year, intcnd.s 'to conduct '''1 ' ,' ,.:\ ' '.:J . a study of ~ub11c access to therned1a. Prof~Bonno C. SChm1dt_Jr~ L ~ of Col\:nl·1a UrJivcrs1ty La.w School will cond.uct the study. he said. j ~ 18251,)];S 11-09 ' ~ . ~~~~: ;':'::::;"'~;::.:~::.;"o/?: y : ,.,":~ " " -~,, \.. " '::r;;; :e~- , ,*' ... - - C• . '" ' • . < ) ...... I J t • I ; .', .•. r ... ~*f:~:~tT;1~~,i-~:~.:*IS:?:t~~~;~~!1f:1~3~c~:;:~f!:~}:T.?~0(~~ " r>~~?[:- ' .- RESS BIAS? The Nation ews Council, s up last summer ~o study press acc~cy fairness, can't dis over what specific ( m- pIal is the White HouJ e has. Executive DI ec tor, illiam Arthur ~ wired Press Secrel ry Zie er once, phoned m four time!\.. But 'ere. hasn't been any response et.WS Ib1uAJ'?'!I", ON THE RIGHT .-.----- by William F. Buckley, Jr. For Release Saturday or Sunday, November 17-18, 1973, or thereafter A TENDENCY TO DISTORT I do not think the press is "distorted" or "vicious" in any categorical sense, but I do think there is a tendency in the press to magnify and thus distort: and unquestionably Mr. Nixon is frequently the victim of that kind of thing. Permit me to recount a personal experience. Ten days ago I spoke at Kansas State University. In response to the question, What did I think the future held out for Mr. Nixon? I replied that the odds had now in my opinion changed, favoring the possibility of resignation. The next day I met happily with Senator Goldwater at the annual meeting of a founda tion of which he and I and a few other tigers (including Senators Tower, Thurmond, and Lausche) are trustees. After the meeting was over, Senator Goldwater and I drove to the airport together and, awaiting our flights, chatted together at the coffee shop. A moment or two later a gentleman materialized who identified himself as being from the local CBS. He desired us to perform before his camera crew respecting Mr. Nixon and watergate. We declined -- ever so politely, and ever so firmly. Presently we got up, passed the camera crew and the indomitable reporter, saying, amiably, not a word. The following morning, front page, New York Times. "Newsmen in Wichita, Kansas, reported seeing Senator Barry Goldwater of Arizona and William F. Buckley Jr., the con servative columnist, in 'deep discussion' at the airport there today. Mr. Buckley spoke last night at Kansas State University where he said that he believed Mr. Nixon would resign because of the Watergate scandal at the urging of Mr. Goldwater and other friends. Mr. Buckley and Mr. Goldwater were quoted by The Associated Press as saying they expected a startling development in the Watergate affair in the next few days." In due course I received a telephone call from the New York Times, wanting to know more about the sensational development I had predicted. I replied that I knew of no sensational development, had predicted no such thing, nor had Senator Goldwater in my presence. On the matter of resignation, I explained that to say the odds favor resigna tion is different from predicting resignation. To say the odds favor rain tomorrow is not to predict rain tomorrow. These nice distinctions were not reported back to the readers of the New York Times. Perhaps the distinctions are too nice. Professor Hugh Kenner has recorded that a newspaper is a "low definitional medium," and that it is unsafe to attempt in it a thought the accur acy of which depends on the correct placement of a comma. Now, a week having gone by, I am receiving mail from allover the world, asking when would the news come out of the "startling development" that brought Senator Goldwater and me to make a "secret rendezvous in Wichita, Kansas" for the purpose of discussing the "mechanics of President Nixon's resignation." In the first place, insofar as it concerns me, it is mysteriously flattering. I have no delusions about my own power to bring Mr. Nixon down. Who do they think I am? John Dean III? In the second place, though at this point several newspapers have received from my own mouth the news that I made no prediction about any Watergate development, I have yet to see a single reference to said correction. This is the kind of thing Mr. Nixon is complaining about, if you see what I mean. # # # NATIONAL REVIEW 150 East 35th Street New York, N.Y. 10016 Phone: ORegon 9-7330 EdiJor-in-C hiel: WM. F. BUCKLEY, JR. Pub/iIher: WILLIAM ft.. RUSHER November 10, 1973 AuociaJe Pub/iIher: J. P. McFADDEN EdiJorI: JAMES BURNHAM JEFFREY HART Managing EdiJor: Dear Mr. Gallagher: PRISCILLA L. BUCKLEY AU;IJanJ Pub/iIher: On Sunday, November 4, I read in the papers, and EDWARD A. CAPANO AdllerJiI;ng DirecJor: then heard quoted on television, the statement that ROBERT F. SENNorr, JR. Senator Goldwater and I had predicted a "startling development" during the follOWing week from the Watergate investigation, and that I had "predicted" President Nixon's resignation. I made no such allusion to any such development, and neither did Senator Goldwater in my presence. I have since checked with the senator, and find that he made no such allusions after I boarded the plane. I am at a loss to understand how it is that we were so misreported. I'd appreciate having your explanation of this incident. Yours faithfully, Wm. F. Buckley Jr. Mr. Wes Gallagher President and General Manager The Associated Press 50 Rockefeller Plaza New York, N.Y. 10020 THE WALL STREET JOURNAL" THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 15, 1973 Newsweek Replies on Chile By KENNETH AUCHINCLOSS and turned left along a corridor, not knowing were of working class people. There were On November 2, The Wall Street Journal where I was going. At an Intersection, where some student types. They were totally naked, devoted a major part ot its editnrial page to the corridor divided, I turned right. I pushed some with clothes plIed up on them. They all had papers identifying them or aying 'NN,' an attempt to discredit Newsweek's account through some swinging doors.' "There were the corpses, lying stretched which means unknown or unidentitled. A few of the ki'llings that took place in Chile after out naked, side by side, packed tight together, bodies had neat bullet holes, others had gap the military coup ot September 11. In an edi their heads-or what remained of them In ing wounds. Some had parts of their aJrulls torial and two lengthy articles-one by its most Instances-leaning upward aga.inst the missing or huge holes or mangled arms-all Latin American correspondent Everett G. wall, staring silently out ;in front of them. 1 really bad wounds. :My first impression was Martin (a former Newsweek correspondent) don't know about 'perception shock,' but I that they had been executed by mortar fire. and the other by Chilean journalist Pablo Hu was shaking from head to foot. I walked out, "The bodies were sWI tender, rigor mortis neeus-the Journal suggested that a report by back down the corridor, down the and had not set in. While I was there, more boclles Newsweek correspondent John Barnes in the stairs, out into the open. I returned with a Chilean were being brought In. 1 asked a doctor if magazine's Oe1ober 8 issue was "grossly ex friend so that I would have a. witness if only there were autopsies being performed and he aggerated" and "based on events which replied, 'Well, we do what we 'can-for some didn't happen and figures that were misinter just to tell me that r- had seen what I had seen. We stood there looking. I remember at yes, for others, we just do a report SIn how preted." These are serious charges- in my they look.' view, utterly unfounded and untrue. Let's ex the end of the line there was a young kid with blonde hair, perilSips in his late teens, so un "Since we couldn't find Jorge, we went amine them, one by one. like the others with their black hair and high into another office wbere they kept records. 1. Mr. Huneeus accuses Newsweek of cheek bones. 1 asked my friend why the bod Finally, one said, 'Oh, yes, he must have been somethfng called "journalistic imperialism." ies looked so white and soft for people with brought In by the Tacna Regiment (one of To cover the Ohilean coup, he says, the maga such obvious peasant features. He suggested several army garrisons in Santiago). We went 'zine "sends from London a British correspon It was because they had already bled. But he back, climbed over the bodies, and went Into dent" who "makes no ettol't to understand didn't really know. another room that looked like a typical wbat Is really going on here." The implication "The next day, we decided 'we had to go morgue. There were four bodies on metal - that Mr. Barnes is a complete stranger to back and try to get some pictures. We figured stretchers (1' didn't get to see how many bod· Chile whose reporting was based on a tew ies were In refrigerated drawers). One body days' acquaintance with Chilean affalrs-is Newsweek is proud to have was of Jorge. It was bullet-ridden with two totally fa'lse, as Mr. Huneeus knows full well. large gaping wounds in his chest and leg. Mr. Barnes was Newsweek's Latin American been one of the first publications' "I went back to the records office and read correspondent from 1970 (the year Salvador to report these tragic facts. his autopsy report which sald he was Allende was elected president ot Chile) until that at about 1 :30 the morgue workers would 'wounded in the street.' Later, Enrique Car· January ot this year, when he transferred to be at their lunch. It was a different man on vallo, the Under Secretary for Foreign Af, the London bureau. He has spent consldef'able the door. But the same flashing of my pass fairs, told me that he heard that Rlos had time in Chile and contributed to a number of worked again. I was wearing a blue polo 'tried to escape.' " major Newsweek .stories on the Allende re necked sweaJter with a white linen jacket with 3. Mr. Huneeus says that the dead ampu' gime. It was because of this familiarity with my camera tucked inside It. My photographer tee pictured in Newsweek was killed before the Chilean scene that Newsweek sent him in. colleague had already set an estimated light the coup in a traffic accident. The pbotogra. In the course ot his previous reporting, Inci" reading. When we reached the swing door, pher, Mr. Guillermo Gomez Mora, reports dentally, he has occasionally had harsh things my friend pushed it open with his "elbow; that the man was killed during the height of to say about Allende's government; on an looked in, and then nodded to me. I walked the violence In Santiago after the coup. But earlier assignment in Latin America, he once quickly through. 1 saw It was a different lot of because :Mr. Gomez :Mora was not present spent three weeks in one of Fidel Castro's bodies, more of them. I stared at them for a when the man died, he cannot be sure jails. Mr. Barnes has emphatically not shown second. In place ot the blonde kid, there was whether he was Jtilled by gunfire or a truck, any special mvor or sympathy to Marxist an old man, with the bottom front of his face The Body CQUDt regimes. gone up to the upper lip. Now a look at Mr. HUJ:leeus' credentials. 4. How many people have been killed In ,-As I went to the camera, a man In a the aftermath of the coup? Mr. Barnes quoted He Is a skillful, perceptive joornl!-Iist and a white jacket carrying a sheet of paper walked patriotic Chilean, but he is also a committed the daughter of a morgue staff member as through the sWingi~g doors at the far end of anti-AHendist on the .right of the Christian saying that by the fourteenth day atter the the \!orridor. I .turned and crashed my way coup, the morgue had received 2,798 bodies. Democratic Party. The Journal correctly re through the door behind me. We left at a ports 'that he has assisted Newsweek corre Mr. Huneeus says this is the morgue's body walking run. But no one had followed !-Is as count for the entire year up to that time. Jon. spondents. In the second week after the coup, we stood panting for alr out in the sunlight. Mr. Barnes himself interviewed Mr. Huneeus athan Kandell of The New York Times, quot. Five minutes later, when we had stopped ing official sources In the morgue, reports the to get the views of a wealthy, sophisticated shaking, I said 1 was going to have one same version as Mr. Huneeus. But Marlise SI· Chilean who was wen-known as an opponent last go. mons of The Washington Post talked with & of the regime. In his own' piece In the Journal, "We got halfway down the corridor that Mr. Huneeus wrote: "The military mterven European ambassador in Santiago who said led to the swing doors when a man came he had been to the morgue and that during otion is the logical outcome of a Marxist re around the corner. I don't know whether it the first week after the coup, 2,Il00 boclles gime." 1 have no doubt of :Mr. Huneeus' pro had was the same one; he went past us but then been processed. fessional integrity, but it is a long stretch to turned and asked, 'Where are you going?' We What is beyond dispute Is that there was & can him, as the Journal does, "objective and said in unison 'To the bathroom.' He said, independent. " gigantic surge In the morgue's businen after !You had better follow me.' As we walked be the coup. Time magazine reporter Rudolph 2. :Mr. Huneeus seeks to discredit Mr. hind him back down the corridor, we both Rauch wrote that he had seen on the morgue Barnes' account of his visit to the Santiago must have been thinking that things wt\uTc!n't wall, the same week that Barnes was there, morgue by quoting morgue staffers who say go too well with us, what with the camera ·and there are .inaccuracies in his physical descrip "a list 01. 300 people whose bodies were to be those bodies in the corridor. As we reached tlaimed by relatives. Next day the list was tion of the place 'and who speculate that, if he the short flight of stairs that led down to the gone, along with a later list 01. 120 Bamea that did get lnalde, he fell victim to what a morgue side door, the two of us peeled aft as though patbolopst caDs "perception shock": "When had been tacked up and then hurriedly pulled in formation, and we were out of the door in a down at army order. According to an oftlclal exposed to a couple of bodies, he explained, 'shot and into the crowd of women." of the morgue, it normally handled about 12 the abock alters perception capa.billties" (Mr. Skeptics may ask what independent evl. Huneeus evidently suffers from "syntax corpses a "reek." 'Plat would make l'OUIhlT dence exists that Barnes was telllng the truth. 4IiO bodies in 1973 up to the day of tbe shock"). Barnes reports that b.e was in coup. :Mr. He was 110t able to take a photograph for the The morgue, even by its own calcul&tlons, deed shocked to see 70 or so corpses llned in reasona he has described. He cannot identify the corridor-but no more so than in his other processed a vast number of bodies in the pe the person who accompanied him because of riod following the military takeover. fJIMl(lunters With nolent death covering wIIHe the obvious1lkeUhood of reprisals against the And other recent estimates bear out Mr. s in tile Dominican Nigeria man. But as it , there Is another wit· Barnea, on ~e magnitude of the kiJJbII'; III te.. ~• .w~~e!..-ml"-,en 1 ~~~~::e::rn~I:r~el:an~d~. ~I~n~~~~~:!~~--! Oc 1, rector 'WIllIam E. Colby . ,.that the authorities are presumably ber 19, days after the coup and five days said "we would estimate It Is between 2,000 that Mr. Barnes was allowed to get in, before Barnes' visit, a United Nations otft. and 3,000 kl:Ued during the strugglea." In a that therefore the staff had good reason. to clal spent over an hour and a half at the New York Times dispatch from Santiaco suggest that It was all a fabrication. morgue and counted some 188 bodies. datelined November 4, ~del1 reported: "At Mr B ' A t Luis I . Ramallo, a Spaniard who is a mem- least 2,000 people have lost their lives-most • ames CCOUD ber of UNESCO and the former ~cting Secre- To wggest tba.t Bames simply made up tary General of the Latin American Faculty of them victims of unannounced execuOoDS fWI report on the morgue seems to me a. des- of Social Sciences, went to the morgue to carried out after the resistance to the armed perate and grotesque charge against an expe· search for the body of a young Bolivian, forces had ended." And on September 25, Ad· rienced, first-rate journalist. In fact he was in Jorge Rlos, who had been studying in Chile miral Jose Merino, a member of the Chilean the morgue four times. Here is Barnes' full under a UNESCO-c reated program. ,Rios had military junta, gave an Interview to a Dutch account of that experience: been seized on September 12 by a military pa- television station in which he said that 3,Il00 "It all began by accident. On the morning trol at his home, in front ot his wife and two persons had been killed In the violence. One of September 24, a photographer colleague children. Here is Ramallo's description of cou'ld go on reciting the details of executioDs bad been at the city cemetery, across the what he saw in the morgue: and shootings that have come to light since street from the morgue, taking pictures of "I went' to the morgue on September 19th :Mr. Barnes' stnry. Newsweek is ~ud to grieving peasant families burying their dead at about noon. When you went up the stairs, have been one of the flr8t publlca.t1ons to re In the 'potters field' section of the cemetery. you would turn left and walk along a passage port these tragic facts. As she was leaving, she saw a truck drive wa~ I asked a passing attendant in a white through the gates into the courtyard ot the coat for help. A girl took me to a records Mr. AuchitlcZoS8 is execuU"e editor 01 morgue. In the back were plIed naked corpses room. She looked through an alphabetized Newsweek. -ten, perhaps fifteen. She rushed over to loose-leaf book and said, 'Yes, Jorge Rios Is take a. picture. A soldier promptly stopped registered. His wife was here a half an hour her. A morgue official came over and told her . ago and identified the body.' I asked to see it. Editor's Note to leave. 'It's hard to get in here at the best of The woman gave' me a Small piece of paper No one disputes that there were many times,' he said. 'These are very difficult with her signature and the numb~r of the deaths in the Chilean coup. The Wall Street times. You had better leave quickly.' body and told me to 'go out the same door I Journal's initial dispatch, printed on Sept. 17, "I was having lunch at the Hotel Carrera came in and that I would see a gate, which quoted estimates of from 1,000 to 11,000 deaths ' Sheraton when she came back and told me was an ambulance entrance that led into a lin the flglrting. On Sept. 211, another dispatch what she had seen. It suddenly dawned on me courtyard and the main building where the reported the occurrence of summary execu what was going on: The junta was being so bodies were. I showed the pass to a man who tions, but said that civilian deaths throughout 'bureaucratic (and the Ohileans are the most took us to a large non-airconditioned room the country were estimated at fewer than Il00. bureaucratic' people in South America) that that certainly did not appear to me to be a The Newsweek story talked of "mass exe they were processing their victims instead of morgue. The room was filled with bodies. cutions" and said "the reign of terror bas al digging a !hole ·and getting rid ot them. "There were four rows ot them and the ready gone much further than most people "I went to the morgue that afternoon. people were so close together that it appeared thought." In citing the 2,798 figure for corpses There was no hope ot getting In the main en- as it their arms were linked. We were jump handled by the Santiago morgue alone, it tl'8J1ce. But there was a sma:ll side staft door, ing over the bodies which were obviously in 'added that "no one knows how many have near where the lists of names of several some sort ot numerical order. But we could 'been disposed of elsewhere" and that "the hundred bodies were posted along with other not find the one corresponding to our number. presumption is thaJt the executions have fol lists that simply read one ,after another 'ca- The man was upset and said, 'Well, I don't lowed a. similar pattern in other cities." daver- unidentitied male,' or 'cadaver-unl- know what happened, you'll have to look for On the basis ot our own correspondent's dentifled female.' A large crowd ot silent him yourself.' So then, really, we spent ai reporting during the coup, and reports by Mr. Chileans, all of them working class, stood most one hour ·in there going from body to Huneeus and others since, we agree with Mr. around silently looking at the lists. There was body seeing if we could tlnd Jorge. I was look Auchincloss that the figures quoted In the laSt a darkened window over the center of the ing at body after body, one after another. I paragraph ot his article are reasonable esti door. I tapped on it and held up my junta- counted 184 (the iist posted on the door out- mates of the total casualties, from both como. signed press pass. The door was opened by an side numbered only 130). bat and executions, throughout Chile. elderly, fat little man wearing a white coat. I "I saw tour or five children, two girls and Whether they confirm Mr. Barnes' original lwa1ked right past him, up a flight of steps, three boys f or 9 years old. Most of the bodies report we leave to the reader to judge. THE BOSTON 0HOENIX, NOVEMBER 13, 1,73 -----~ National Council Probes TV News By Frank Rose ------1 NEW YORK - It must be galling House says were Walter Cronkite's to Richard Nixon to know that onlv three interviews until he inter Walter Cronkite is the one they trust. vie'wed Leon JAworski, Nixon's. After all, it should Oe obvjous tilat choice to succeed Cox. They were' Cronkite, and everyone else et CBS, with Cox, John Dean and Dar.iel and at the other networks. And i;1 all E1I5herg. the other media, is out to get the Schnurman and council Director President. Why elsp v,,-olde t bey kci'p "V,;::a m Arthur flew to Washin/{ton talking about impeachment? Ip.st week in an unsuccessful attempt So Nixon. iTI what rna.\. prove t() be to get S01dcthlllf, more definite, Their his next·to-the-la:;t press conJerence. eff0rts to t H;k to Pre55 SecrPt.ary fWn lashed out at the "OU! rll"M'~lS. 7.eiridcr were !'rtlitlpss, but Chuck vicious, distorted reporting" which C()I·son. according to Schnurman, he seems to think IS r·o5lJonsihle for ";;(.io the ;let works had created an his latest crisis. But ':lObodv, of :.::mnsphere of impeachment." course, takes him ;ericusiv. That's nl)t nice but it's not much to Nobod.v , \ hat i:-,. Wi~.~l the apparent \o,;orK ()Il. exception of the j\ationai ' ; PW< And the networks have already Council. the ~ommittt'e set un :ast said ~hel' '. 'on't be able to COl)perate summer to safeguard the treed'om ,, :' lin less ~ i ' ~:J get a request for specific the media and to ir.\'t>:;tigate ~llilf L; f S ~ -a n,,:: rif)t, . Bot h ABC l!'1d ;-inC of media bias. Sine!' t he council h,-l\'p been more or less coo! to the began opeT11tions in.July. its iirr.~ has ('l)Uli t Ii from the beginning - b<,en occupied mostiy b.v cumplair.ts "We've always felt that what the of unfairness from e \Vashing-ton pllhlic dot'sn't need is a self group. Accuracy ir. \Iedia. al: of ~1ppl)inted group . like this." said Ii which wt're found to be insubstantial spnkesman for ABC - and CBS, after staff investigations. There WRS which uri"ir.aliv support~d the coun the Miami case - in which the ri!. i~ unhappy with its decision to Miami Herald was put under court look into the government network order to grant equal ~pace to all controversy. Richard Salant, the political candidates. a rulin!! which if president' of CBS :"(:\\,5 and a upheld would apply the "fairnc~s mem ber of the Twentieth-Ccntu:y doctrin .... to newspapers as well as rund task force which rec'JI:1mended broadcast media - but when \'ixon ,he crcatil)n of the c::luncil, wrOle laid into the networks. the council Art hur that t he task force "never must ha\'e ~e!'n its chailce. cOlllempl,lled that the cour.cil would So a we(·k ilfter '" ixon's Oct. 26 serve as a forum for. or an ad press conference - :\ week t hp.t was judicator of. !!o\'ernment complaints punctuated by follow-up Broadcasting Nov S 1973 24 - , ,-,.,- . I ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH ."at., \01' , :l, ·1971 Challenge To A Free Press In deciding to study President Nixon's as· his enormous power to command news tinlt' sertion that. he gets unfair and inaccurate tele· and a national audience and his power, espe visicn news coverage, the new National News cially with respect to the electronic media, to Council has 'undertaken a task in which it can punish the media through the use of federal perform a public service. The White HOJSC agencies-such a hostile attitucie poses a threa: and t~e networks should co·operate with thE to freedom of the press which should not be effort. taken lightly either by the media or the public. The Nixon Administration's long·term animus The power of the President to undermine toward the news media was further substan· the credibility of the media and, by the samE' tiated this week by documents obtained by Sen· token, to intimidate it, was evident after Fri· ate investigators showing that the President day's press conference when TV network personally took part in the initiation of plans samplings of public opinion showed not on~ y to use tax investigations, antitrust action and a nega tive reaction to the President but also, other means to put pressure on newspapers, inexplicably in this context, a negative reaction broadcasting firms and reporters considered to to the usually bland network news. This curious " be unfriendly. juxtaposition of reactions, sugge sting that the . Mr, Nixon's personal outrage against the tele public couldn 't believe either the President or vision networks in particular came to a visible the networks, implies a dangerous erosion of climax last Friday evening with the President's confidence in in stitutions. repeated emotional outbur5!s against news and Unfortunately the networks, though they comment on his Adminj~tration, Mr. Nixon 's have attempted it, cannot effectively defend almost paranoid reaction to the media was reo themselves without seeming to be self·serving. flected in such aston;shingly intemperate pres The News Council, however, can seek to find idential press conference remarks as "out· out whether there 'is any evidence to support rageous, vicious, distorted reporting, . , frantic, the President's blunderbuss charges, for which hysterical reporting . , . a commentator takes he cited hardly a scintilla of documentation, an.! a bit of news' and then with knowledge of what of issuing a rep9rt which would vindicate tht the facts are distorts it viciously," media or show how it might improve its per Coming from a lesser official, such charge.; formance, Such a report from this privately might be taken by the media and by the pub· endowed and avowedly impartial organization lic as characteristic of the healthy friction that would help to set the record straight and put normally exists between government and an freedom of the press in its deserved privileged enterprising and uninhibited press, But coming perspective after an unprecedented assault 011 from the President of the United States-with its prerogatives, a THE LOUISVILLE TIMES, MO;\lDAY, NOVEIv\B:R 5, 197 3 I This nevvs study co uld help us all At his press conference last week, The National News Council is about President Nixon said: .,] have never to do. or try to do, just that. Whether heard or seen such outrageous, yi it can succeed depends in large part cious, distorted reporting in 27 years on the coo peration it gets from both of public life . , ' . Wh en people are the White I!ouse and the dispe nsers pounded n ig ht after night with that of l1e\VS, especially the television kind of frantic. hyster ical reporting, grvup upon \\'hich the President bore it naturallv shakcs their co nfid ence. " do\\'l1 heavilv. From the White 1Iouse That statcmcnt s uggests, of c our ~c, it needs specifics: What precisely was any number of questions that mi ght t.h e President indicting, which par be asked about it. \\'e would like to tic ular news stories or telecasts? From concentrate on 1\1'0: First. what spe the media it needs copies of the cific pi eces of reportinQ di:l :'Ill'. st ories or ta pes of the telecasts. Nixon har e in mind as be ing "out rageous, vi cious, distort ed "? Second , The American Broadcasting Co m 1s it true that the reporting was in panv, the Co lumbia Broadcasting fact thaI bad" System, the National Broadcasting As to the second question, no doubt Co mpany. and The New York Times all hal'e agreed to su p pl~' specific ma a great lll anv r\ mer icans al r ca d~ ' have made up their minds. one way or the terials, Whether the White House wi ll other. But it WOu ld help the majority make specific charges apparently is who are uncertain about both the fair not known yet. ness of the press and the cr e dibilit ~, But if both the accuser and the ac of the President if some reasonablv cused cooperate, the National News imp;1rti al and authoritative study Council's study could be of enormous could be made of Mr. Nixo n 's charges. service to the Amer ican public.