MONTECITO MURMURS: OLD JOURNOS DOING DRINKS, ETHICALLY CHALLENGED

The Underbelly of America's Most Expensive ZIP Code

We assemble every so often, order cocktails, gift ourselves with gab.

An Honor Bar server honors us with libations, signaling time to mouth off about whatever the hell we want. Reminds me of sitting in the open air outside Café Dauphin Verte in Monaco three decades ago, the elders holding court to forecast fluctuations of various currencies. They mostly got it wrong.

But money is not on our minds.  And we always get it right.

This evening’s topic is journalistic ethics.

Growing up on London’s Fleet Street, I don’t have any. So I’m relying on my American-trained buds to teach me a few in my autumn years of reportage, finally get with the program. 

And thus, I pose the following hypothetical question: 

You are working on a story about a Hollywood star who has cuddled up to a foreign dictator hostile to the United States and you’ve figured out this Hollywood star is working secretly as an “access agent” for the CIA. Think Nicolas Cage in the movie The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent. Anyway, As such, you (being the reporter), contact the CIA for a comment and the CIA responds by requesting that you not run the story because, whether true or not, it would compromise their ‘access agent’ program. What do you do? Publish or don’t publish?”

Old Fashioned (named after his cocktail of choice) says not to publish, on the basis that it may place this hypothetical Hollywood star-moonlighting- as-“access agent” in harm’s way.

“But if it were true, and it actually placed this star in harm’s way,” I say, “the CIA would stand it down or pull him out. So let’s say it’s not about the ‘access agent’s’ safety but about potentially compromising this star from making future trips to see the dictator—or compromising the entire program.”

Old Fashioned is moved a little but he still is not sure he would publish.

“Look, it’s the CIA’s job to keep what they do secret,” I press. “But the fourth estate’s job is to keep the public informed by exposing what the CIA is doing if they’re not clever enough to keep it under wraps. Because if we as mere journalists can figure it out, couldn’t that dictator’s intelligence service also figure it out? Then that agent would really be in trouble.”

Old Fashioned comes round. “With that kind of reasoning, I see it.” 

I turn to Martini (named after his cocktail of choice), who was subject to very strict ethics as an anchorman for TV news.

“This is our job,” says Martini solemnly. “And that is what makes us a democracy, freedom of the press to keep our government in check. My vote would be for running it.”

“Thank you, gents,” I say. “Allow me to burden you both with a second hypothetical situation. Let’s say you, the reporter, discovered that a police chief in a U.S. city is a transsexual. Do you report that?”

Old Fashioned shrugs. “Why would you?” He shakes his head. “It’s nobody’s business but their own.”

“Good point,” I say, “and that’s why I’m asking, because I believe in personal privacy too. But bear in mind that a police chief is a public servant. And shouldn’t the public be fully informed about the person in charge of policing their city?”

“No, “ says Old Fashioned. “I don’t see why they should.”

“Okay, let’s say the police chief in question was under no obligation to inform a city vetting committee of their transgender status and, thus, did not make such a disclosure. There are two issues still at play if you, the reporter, should come upon such a scenario: One. If this person is the first transsexual to become a police chief, wouldn’t that be newsworthy? And two.  Wouldn’t that person wanting to keep it secret be potentially opening his- or herself up to blackmail since he or she is in a sensitive job?”  

Old Fashioned sees my point but remains on the fence on whether or not he’d publish.

Martini, on the other hand, is adamant that such a story is in the public interest and duty demands that it be reported. 

“Okay, since things tend to happen in triplicate, here’s one final ethics quandary: After that we’ll revert to mouthing off and cutting cheezers.”

A server takes our order for an assortment of snacks to keep us loaded up.

“What if someone brought you a story that a certain sheriff in the county in which you operate as a reporter is married and having an affair?”

“Again,” says Old Fashioned, “his or her private life is their business. Save it for the National Enquirer.”

“Again,” I ask, “couldn’t it potentially subject the sheriff to blackmail?”

“How so?”

“Let’s say someone who knows the sheriff and also knows about this affair gets arrested for a DUI—or worse, a more serious crime. Won’t this person expect the sheriff to get the charges dropped because of this ‘scandalous’ knowledge?”

“Sounds like a stretch.”

“But possible nonetheless.”

“I’m still not there.”

“Okay, let’s sex it up a bit. Pun fully intended. It’s an election year and the sheriff is up for reelection. Then what?”

“Is this alleged affair leaked to the reporter by the opposing candidate’s opposition research team?” 

“What difference should that make, ethically speaking? Information is information. All that should matter is whether it’s true or not. But for the sake of this hypothetical situation, let’s say ‘no,’ it has nothing to do with campaign smears. The source of the information has no horse in the race but just happens to have heard some gossip that the reporter confirms to be true.”

“I don’t know,” says Old Fashioned.

“Would it be any different it was Bill Clinton?” Martini pipes in. “Because no one seemed too ethically out-of-joint about the Monica Lewinsky revelations.”

“Wasn’t that Matt Drudge?”

“Yeah, it was before most people heard of the Drudge Report. Back then, Drudge was breaking news instead of just aggregating it. In fact, it was the Lewinsky affair that put him on the map.”

“I see your point.”

“At our TV news organization,” says Martini. “we had policies governing various situations.”

“Can you give us an example?”

“Of course. If we showed up at a demonstration with a camera crew and the protestors suddenly jumped into action just because we had arrived, we had an ironclad rule to switch off the cameras and leave. This policy was put in place on the basis that if the protestors were acting out just for us, we would be responsible for inciting them. 

“A news organization needs an institutional checklist of factors for deciding what is ethically newsworthy and what isn’t.”

What say you, dear reader?

Feel welcome to contribute with comments on one, two or all three of these hypothetical ethical dilemmas.