[LINK] ethics above the law?

[Richard Chirgwin]

Stewart Fist wrote:
> Richard wrote
>
>   
>> Actually the court didn't find them guilty.  They plead guilty.
>>
>> The court appears to have taken it on face value.  The court could of
>> course conduct due inquiry and find them not guilty based on their ethical
>> values, which have in all senses hurt no one, except those whom tried to
>> use them as a means of defence.
>>
>> To me, based on what I've read, it should have been dismissed and perhaps,
>> again base don what I've read, the Judge was hinting, next time plead not
>> guilty.
>>     
Eek! Just so as the record's straight, mail clients which misattribute 
the author are a real pain - I didn't write this; it was a response to 
what I *did* write (something along the lines of "they knew they were 
going to get in trouble; they took an informed decision to commit a 
contempt of court. In other words, they didn't 'put their ethics above 
the law', they exercised their decision knowing they would be subject to 
the law).
>
> If you believe that the judge must uphold the law, even if he disagrees with
> it, then he did exactly the right thing. And this is a good thing for
> journalism, in a back-handed sort of way, because it publicises the fact
> that whistleblowers can trust journalists not to put them in.
>   
And a good thing for whistleblowers...
>  The judge does have discretion, however, in terms of the sentence he
> imposes, and this will be an interesting test of whether he was hinting or
> not.
>
> Part of the problem, in my opinion, is that journalists have never really
> defined the privilege they claim.
>
> For instance in the Scooter Libby case, that woman went to jail for some
> time because she wouldn't reveal his name.
>
> But Libby clearly was not a whistleblower at the base of the pyramid trying
> to effect change at the top, but a deliberate planter of top-down
> information trying to mislead the public.
>
> She had far more of a responsibility to her readers than she had to Libby.
> And she should have made this distinction, and revealed her sources.
> There's no way in the world I would defend anyone who deliberately fed me
> misinformation.
>   
The Libby case probably illustrates why it's a good thing to have a 
clear-cut ethical statement in the Code of Ethics. You don't need to 
stroke and reassure the seasoned political player, but the guy at the 
bottom of the tree is far less likely to trust the journalist to keep 
the secret. So if journalists started making a judgement - "this guy's a 
scumbag, I'm going to drop him in it" - then the Senator Libby types 
will still play media management, but the scared little guys won't blow 
so many whistles.

RC
>
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