Thanks for the correction. Sorry for calling you Mason. I guess that’s what happens when my blood pressure is about 220/125 after reading a defense of blabbing national security secrets on the front page of the Washington Post. Even if it is said tongue in cheek.

Beyond the wrong name, I could make all kinds of corrections to my comment…and it shows why I’m a bloggee and not a blogger.

Marshall can talk about special privileges for journalists as long as he wants, but there is no way that journalists should be judge, jury, and executioner when it comes to their ability to publish national security secrets on the front pages of national newspapers. They do not know which leak is going to lead the the escape of a terrorist or the death of a soldier.

All of this talk about immunity from responsibility for putting soldiers’ lives at risk is fine when one’s point of view has been tempered by four years in j-school and he/she lays an unspoken claim to an enlighted view of all things global. It is a little more raw when you have a son in uniform.

In my opinion, journalists who leak national security secrets in the interest of changing the policy of an elected administration have by default declared themselves as enemies of the administration, not simply critics.

[Editor’s note: I edited this comment to reflect my correct name. Most of the time I don’t care, but our friendly commenter called me “Mason” and I hate being called Mason. Hi, Sharon. My name is Marshall.]

You’re absolutely right about the courts recognizing national security exceptions. And that’s what ultimately makes this a hard question.

But in the terms of the Constitution singling out the press, here’s how I see the language:

The whole passage about speech is pretty general, and applies to the people generally, except that the Founders took the time and space to single out the press. I think that’s significant. So I think it’s more than the blanket prohibition you’ve described (though I agree, it’s that, too). I think they understoos, as we should, the unique role that a free press has to play in a free society.

It’s not clear to me that the Framers set the press above anyone else:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

That strikes me as a blanket prohibition against Congress making laws restraining speech ahead of time or punishing it afterwards. But the courts have long recognized national security exceptions.

I don’t believe reporters should be jailed for publishing classified info, but investigations and supeonas are fine. If this leads to some contempt citations and jail time, so be it.

So Jim, according to this logic the government should also be monitoring your phone records to determine if your friends have divulged classified information to you. After all disclosure is a crime whether it be to 1 or 1000 people.

Furthermore the government would need to monitor all your communications in case you pass along classified info recieved from one of your friends.

Once we go down this rabbit hole we may not emerge with the republic still in tact.

But not the reporters. They’re simply doing what they’re supposed to do — keeping us all informed. That’s their job. And it’s an important one because only an informed population can prevent a government from drifting inexorably towards tyranny.

Why should reporters be above the law? Freedom of the press is not granted to a privileged elite; it’s granted to all of us. We are all reporters under the constitution, including the government employees you admit ought to be prosecuted. Your position is inconsistent and undermines equality under the law.

I say, prosecute both leakers and the reporters who violate USC 18 793 and the Esponage Act. If you don’t like the law, then change it. In the meantime, the laws must be applied equally to all.

That “someone” was Senator Pat Roberts. Funny that no one has prosecuted him, and that you don’t even mention this.

“I don’t publish classified information.

Period.”

So there are absolutely no circumstances whatever, and absolutely no classified information whatever that ever warrants being leaked? Woodward and Bernstein shouldn’t have broken Watergate? The “secret” bombing of Cambodia (not secret to the Cambodians) shouldn’t have been revealed to Americans? And so on?

Not to mention that the Osama story is entirely bogus. You may want to drop that one from your repetoire.

OTB posts on the news from ABC that they’ve been told the government is monitoring the phone calls of certain journalists. Allow me to play devil’s advocate. It’s possible there is a media-centric spin to the way this is coming