Don't Let The Back Door Hit Ya.....

where the good lord split ya.....AP reports: Judith Miller, the New York Times reporter who was first lionized, then vilified by her own newspaper for her role in the CIA leak case, retired from the Times on Wednesday, declaring that she had to leave because she had "become the news." Sure Judy I believe that..NOT. It's obvious to anyone with half a brain that the NYT was more than willing to get rid of this millstone that was around their neck. Expect to see Judy on every TV appearance her agent can get her on so she can play the martyr role to the hilt, and claim she is lobbying for a federal shield law for reporters. That's well and good Judy but what you were involved in would not have been covered by any "shield" regarding sources. You were not protecting a source, you were protecting yourself and the individual(s) who did the deed not a whistleblower. As usual, her ego takes precedent over good reporting. That's more than obvious if you read the current article in The Washington Post. Here are a few excerpts: "I am so powerful and influential that I take over Army divisions? I run the New York Times newsroom single-handedly? And now I take the country to war? Wow! That must be one heck of a reporter. I've heard of pushy broads, but this brings the pushy broad to a new level." ------- For instance, Miller was promoted in the late 1980s to an editing job as deputy Washington bureau chief. And it was a disaster. She ran roughshod over staff so harshly that Max Frankel, then the paper's executive editor, said he "relieved her of that job." "She was very anxiety-ridden and tough on a lot of people," he says. That's probably why most other reporters at the NYT looked of "questionable behaviour", and "getting too close to her sources". Now that's an understatement to say the least. Take this excerpt from the article as an example: Adam Clymer, retired political correspondent for the Times, recalls an episode during the 1988 presidential campaign, when Miller was deputy Washington bureau chief. Then the political editor based in New York, Clymer was awakened just after midnight one morning by a call from Miller, he says. She was demanding that a story about Democratic candidate Michael Dukakis be pulled from the paper. The story was too soft, she complained -- and said Lee Atwater, the political strategist for Vice President George H.W. Bush, believed it was soft as well. Clymer said he was stunned to realize that Atwater apparently had either seen the story or been told about it before publication. He and Miller argued, he recalls, and he ultimately hung up on her, twice. To Clymer, it was an indication of what he and others believe is Miller's main problem. "She had gotten too close to her sources," he says. Read the entire WaPo article, it gives quite an insight into not only her but her "lightening-rod" persona.