NPR Host Demands That Assange Do Something Its Own Reporters Are Told Never to Do by Naomi LaChance.
From the post:
In a ten-minute interview aired Wednesday morning, NPR’s David Greene asked Wikileaks founder Julian Assange five times to reveal the sources of the leaked information he has published on the internet.
A major tenet of American journalism is that reporters protect their sources. Wikileaks is certainly not a traditional news organization, but Greene’s persistent attempts to get Assange to violate confidentiality was alarming, especially considering that there has been no challenge to the authenticity of the material in question.
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NPR (National Public Radio) shows its true colors, not as a free and independent press but as a lackey of the Democratic Party in this interview with Assange.
David Greene (Morning Edition) was fixated on repeating the unconfirmed reports that the Russians (which Russians no one every says), were behind the leak of DNC emails.
You can read the transcript of Assange/Greene interview for yourself.
Greene never asks one substantive question about the 20,000 emails. Not one. The first leak of its kind and all Greene does is whine about rumors of Russian involvement.
Well, that’s not entirely fair, Greene does have this exchange with Assange:
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GREENE: Well, let me – apart from the different investigations, could you see people in the U.S. government thinking that you might be a threat to national security?ASSANGE: Well, I mean, there’s great people in the U.S. government – many of them are our sources – and there’s terrible people in the U.S. government. Unfortunately, the U.S. government is a – you know, a reflection, to some degree, of the rest of society. So it’s filled with its share of paranoid and sociopathic power climbers…
GREENE: But is it paranoid to look at these uncensored documents?
ASSANGE: …People who make errors of judgment, etc.
GREENE: Is it paranoid to look at these uncensored documents, these emails, that are released by you? And if they believe that that could change a U.S. presidential election, could be a threat to national security, why isn’t it logical…
ASSANGE: I just – I mean…
GREENE: …For them to see you as a possible threat?
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Hmmm, telling the truth about DNC emails can be a threat to national security?
What a bizarre concept in a democracy! Disclosure of evidence of manipulation of the democratic process is a “…threat to national security?”
NPR can and should do better than David Greene shilling for the Democratic Party.