Crime, by any other name, is still crime

Bill Keller again illustrates the basic cluelessness of the MSM:

Whatever the reason, I worry that we're not as worried as we should be. No president likes reporters sniffing after his secrets, but most come to realize that accountability is the price of power in our democracy. Some officials in this administration, and their more vociferous cheerleaders, seem to have a special animus towards reporters doing their jobs. There's sometimes a vindictive tone in way they talk about dragging reporters before grand juries and in the hints that reporters who look too hard into the public's business risk being branded traitors. I don't know how far action will follow rhetoric, but some days it sounds like the administration is declaring war at home on the values they profess to be promoting abroad. [Emphasis added]

What about the vindictive tone in the press who declare themselves adversaries of power? We elect people and trust them to make decisions, secretly if needed. We don't elect journalists to violate secrecy when it has nothing to do with political corruption, as in Watergate or the Pentagon Papers. Only the brain-damaged media fail to see why keeping the secrecy of the wiretaps of Al Qaeda phone calls is important for National Security. They have the right to comment, but not the right to do acts which would be illegal for anyone else.

President Bush respects the press, but they don't return the favor. He knows that a free press is necessary to a democracy, but they don't seem to understand that freedom entails responsibility, and when you are irresponsible, consequences follow. I think it's time that someone taught them.

We're not talking about ordinary crime here. We don't apply the same rules to war and spying on our national enemies. If journalists can't understand that, they should be given a long time in prison to try to figure it out. I would argue that the NYTimes ought to be put out of business and those involved in publishing the NSA wiretap story imprisoned. Let the employees find other jobs.