Book Deals, Threat or Menace

[TheSportsPredictor]

 

[Azrael]

We go through this every time Woodward publishes a book.

He's still an associate editor at the Washington Post.

Not sure why Marty Baron puts up with it.

 

[The Big Ragu]

To me, that is kind of like asking why the NY Yankees don't disavow Derek Jeter now that he owns the Miami Marlins. The WaPo gets just as much or more by keeping Bob Woodward associated with the paper, as he gets from the paper.

 

[Azrael]

Clearly, that's the reasoning.

I just disagree with it, both as journalism and as a mechanism for reciprocal promotion.

 

[Small Town Guy]

Thoughts on Wemple's thread?

Woodward is a book author and the implicit understanding with his sources is that he'll interview them, interview them again and again and again until he can stitch together something authoritative, in book form. That method explains how he gets officials and presidents to cooperate with him. If he were doing daily dispatches and attending all the White House briefings, he wouldn't be getting 18 on-the-record interviews with President Trump.

I certainly see both sides (sorry for the dreaded phrase) but given what I said earlier in the thread, I tend to come down more on Wemple's side. And I also go back to, if the standard is any important news should be given to whatever outlet employs the person and never saved for a book, no staff person at any outlet would ever be able to write any nonfiction book that wasn't a collection of previously published work. It's Woodward in this case, it's Schmidt in another but hundreds of important books with critical information have been written by people employed at the time by papers, magazines, networks, etc. Books that contained stories and scoops they kept from their employer. Accept it, or castigate every single author who does this. And for those outlets, allow it for everyone or no one at all.

 

[MeanGreenATO]

Let's go ahead and say Woodward doesn't sit on this info. What, exactly, changes? Anyone with half a brain knew Trump was lying through his teeth. Does this admission to Woodward affect policy? No, it probably doesn't. Am I wrong?

 

[Michael_ Gee]

Let's go ahead and say Woodward doesn't sit on this info. What, exactly, changes? Anyone with half a brain knew Trump was lying through his teeth. Does this admission to Woodward affect policy? No, it probably doesn't. Am I wrong?

It's on tape, with the President admitting he lied. On tape. Yeah, I think it affects policy. It might well have kept his redneck imitators like Kemp and DeSantis from reopening their states too soon, fudging stats, etc.

 

[Sam Mills 51]

Let's go ahead and say Woodward doesn't sit on this info. What, exactly, changes? Anyone with half a brain knew Trump was lying through his teeth. Does this admission to Woodward affect policy? No, it probably doesn't. Am I wrong?

But what if getting Trump to admit how wrong he was - and that it should have been taken seriously much sooner - saved lives?

195,000 dead and counting. How many thousands don't die if that information comes out much sooner than at least six months after what is considered the start of the pandemic in this country? Does Trump walk it back? Does Fox News and its idiotic nighttime anchors - of whatever subhuman form you wish to call them - blame the virus on Democrats/liberals/the left? By bringing this out sooner, does it throw a banana peel under Trump, Fox News and the conservative propaganda machine before it gets a chance to gain traction among the folks foolish enough to believe anything and everything they say?

I don't wish to come across as trying to vilify Woodward in any way, shape or form. But if coming out with this information months ago could have saved a lot of lives, it is well worth the discussion.

 

[Azrael]

Woodward defends Woodward.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/life...d7fc32-f2d1-11ea-b796-2dd09962649c_story.html

 

[Azrael]

Thoughts on Wemple's thread?



I certainly see both sides (sorry for the dreaded phrase) but given what I said earlier in the thread, I tend to come down more on Wemple's side. And I also go back to, if the standard is any important news should be given to whatever outlet employs the person and never saved for a book, no staff person at any outlet would ever be able to write any nonfiction book that wasn't a collection of previously published work. It's Woodward in this case, it's Schmidt in another but hundreds of important books with critical information have been written by people employed at the time by papers, magazines, networks, etc. Books that contained stories and scoops they kept from their employer. Accept it, or castigate every single author who does this. And for those outlets, allow it for everyone or no one at all.

I think there's a difference between a beat reporter withholding information gathered in the course of daily reporting and Woodward, who is a writer of books doing almost no work for the daily paper.

If a beat reporter wants to write a book, let it be during a leave of absence, and with new reporting. Information gathered while working for a newspaper belongs to - and in - the newspaper.

If Woodward does no work for the WaPo, take his name off the masthead. Ethical conflict solved.

In the meantime, I'm not sure how much real benefit redounds to the Post when they excerpt Woodward's books.

 

[The Big Ragu]

He has been with the WaPo since 1971. He is synonomous with the paper b/c of Watergate. His name is on the masthead, but it's ceremonial, not because he really does any work. It's pretty well understood that he writes books. I just don't see the ethical conflict others are seeing. I think the benefit to the Post is the cred / name recognition it gets by having Bob Woodward associated with the paper. He's a legendary investigative reporter. They are the paper that gets to say, "He's our guy."

 

[Small Town Guy]

Kind of reminds me of Pacino's line from The Insider. "I'm Lowell Bergman from 60 Minutes. You take the 60 Minutes out of that sentence, nobody returns your call."

It's probably been about 45 years since Woodward needed "The Washington Post" at the end of his calls for someone to take it, so it's maybe a reverse of the Bergman situation in that the Post benefits from him being affiliated more than he probably does. "I'm Bob Woodward the freelance writer" still gets him any interview.