Here's what I thought you'd like to hear about today:

1. When Should The Press Shut Their Traps? - Just ask JFK
2. Self Cannonization in the Press - What they think of themselves and their critics

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When Should The Press Shut Their Traps?

Powerline blog has been all over the NY Times story disclosing national security secrets in a time of war. Today, I'm going to play two items on that subject. The first is a talk show on Minnesota Public Radio from last week, on which Scott Johnson of PowerLine appeared. He writes about it here.

Scott was on Minnesota Public Radio today, doing his best to inform that network's generally liberal listeners on the legal issues surrounding the New York Times' anti-anti-terrorism leaks. The listeners were mostly enraged... We can only hope that somewhere, there were MPR listeners who appreciated the opportunity to hear someone who actually knew what he was talking about.

Play clip.

Later on a caller is so incoherent that Scott seems to give up on responding. Great radio.

Play clip.

I applaud Scott for taking on all comers in this radio program, and coming off as exceptionally knowledgeable on the subject matter.

The second Powerline related clip today is from a post that pointed out John F. Kennedy's address to the press on national security. It's a 19 minute speech, and this excerpt is from 5 minutes in. Some say that Kennedy should have applauded the press disclosure of secrets during his administration, since it allowed him to back away from war over Castro's Cuba. I doubt that he actually felt that way at the time. In this clip is asking the newspaper publishers, who as you may remember at the time were overwhelmingly Republican, to refrain from publishing classified secrets, even though we were at relative peace. The Cold War was at its height, and the President felt compelled, only three months into his presidency, to deliver a carefully prepared speech on this subject. Perhaps it's time for President Bush to do the same.

Powerline writes:

On April 27, 1961, President John Kennedy delivered a speech before the American Newspaper Publishers Association at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in New York. He addressed the issue of the press's role in preserving national security in the Cold War.

Play clip.

Self Cannonization on Meet the Press

On the Corner on National Review Online, Jonah Goldberg saw Meet the Press on Sunday, and said that it was not pretty.

Today's "Meet the Press" roundtable, still going, is a scandal of media egocentrism. With the exception of Bill Bennett, the groupthink on display is staggering. Criticizing the media is inherently silly according to this papal conclave of journalists. Any criticism is either an example of know-nothing populism or cynical electioneering, according to Dana Priest, Bill Safire, John Harwood et al. Journalists are always heroes and leakers should never be prosecuted. We're always right, no matter what.

It's just an outrageous display of self-importance.

A reader writes in to Jonah to say:

But, Holy Guacamole.... That Meet the Press roundtable was simply breathtaking in it's self canonization. Wow. I was left almost speechless. Well, some expletives came to mind, of course, but shouting at the TV has long since lost its soothing effect.

Can you believe the underhanded dig that Dana Priest took at Bill Bennett by using as an example that some people want to make "casino gambling" a crime? I don't know how he did it, but the self control Bennett displayed was Olympian. I'da popped her in the kisser. And hard, too.

Keep up the good work, and tell Cosmo to stop barking at the TV now. It was painful, but it's over.

Play clip.

Notice how Andrea addresses Bill's points with reference to Richard Clarke, that bastion of unbiased Bush Derangement Syndrome, and then asks William Safire to comment instead. Fair is fair I guess, each one gets a turn to be heard.

Next up is Dana Priest, recipient of a Pulitzer Prize for publishing classified secrets about prisons in Eastern Europe in the Washington Post, giving her learned legal opinion on the disclosure laws.

Play clip.

She's wrong of course. It is a crime to participate in a conspiracy to disclose classified secrets affecting national security. It's not wishful thinking, as she claims here. And notice the carefully selected example she chooses, gambling, as a case where some think a practice should be illegal. Bill Bennett is well known as a high stakes gambler. Dig, dig, dig, More like meow, meow, meow. Dana enters into the discussion later in the show:

Play clip.

Bill Bennett was almost pitiful in his requests to finish his points, but that's the nature of political talk shows since the days of the McLaughlin Group. Notice at the end there Safire gets his platitude in about the First Amendment. It's a nice parallel to the Kennedy reference to the press being the only business protected in the Bill of Rights. But as we all know, that protection is not absolute. If the press publishes information that can be shown to damage national security, they can be prosecuted. Whether it is wise to do so is another issue. But clearly they do not have a license to break the law, despite William Safire's nice words.

Meanwhile, over at Howard Kurtz' Reliable Sources, Hugh Hewitt had some nice TV time to counter Eric Lichtblau, the writer of the NY Times story on the secret tracking of terrorist financing using the SWIFT system. This clip starts with Gene Robinson of the Washington Post repeating a whole string of Democratic talking points, which only serves to increase the heat in Hugh Hewitt's response.

Play clip.

So now we have Eric Lichtblau saying that the legality of the program would not prevent the publication. He would publish regardless of whether it is abusing our privacy or not. And it wasn't even secret, even though the word secret appears over a dozen times in his front page NY Times story, as Powerline Blog discovered. And we have Geneva Overholser from the University of Missouri Journalism Program saying that even if it helps the terrorists they should publish it. Is there any reason that the NY Times should not publish classified information that harms national security in a time of war? Not according to these guests. It's all fair game for them. Apparently the only guide is if it hurts the Bush Administration.

Let's find out what the executive editor of the NY Times has to say about why he published. Bill Keller was on CBS's Face the Nation in Sunday.

(CBS) Bill Keller, The New York Times' executive editor; Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa.; and Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., joined "Face The Nation."

Bill Keller defends The New York Times' decision to print a report about a secret government program to examine millions of financial records in an effort to find terrorists, while two U.S. senators debate whether or not the choice was wise.

Here's a section where Keller said that the Times often withheld publication to preserve national security. Well, thanks for nothing, jackass. Why did you fail to suppress it this time? Slow news day? Here's Bob Schieffer talking the Keller.

Play clip.

Let's repeat one sentence in that discussion that really shows where the NY Times is coming from.

The question we start with is why would you not publish? And sometimes there's good reason. When lives are clearly at risk, we often hold back information.

Did you get that? They often don't publish when lives are clearly at risk, but that implies that sometimes they do publish when people's lives are clearly at risk. As Powerline asks, "Who died and left you President?" No one wants an unelected group of elitist NY Times editors determining our national security. But that's what we have. As the guys at Powerline later asked, If the NY Times were around in April of 1775, do you suppose we might be reading there the codes Paul Revere was planning to use in the Old North Church, "One if by land, two if by sea"? Most likely.