Yeah. Its really an outrage that Don Rumsfeld has to answer for his gross incompetence. I can't help wondering how you would be reacting if Bill Clinto was still president and a soldier going into war asked the secdef that question. You and your Repblican-worshipping brether would be hoarse from shouting your approval.
I can't see how this reporter was doing anything more than taking a few unusual steps to see that the truth came out. That's why your panties are in such a bunch!

Clark,

Please explain how breaking the SPJ's Code of Ethics by this reporter is okay.

I really, really want to know. The guy is gloating about what a great thing he did by forsaking reporting for advocacy.

You won't get very far, trust me. His agenda is and was plain for any sentient being to see, and he's going to have to pay the piper for it.

Rail away if you wish, but he's pretty much signed his resignation papers by being idiotic enough to brag about this on Poynter. He deserves whatever backlash he and his newspaper get, and you can be sure there will be a backlash.

Clark, the point is that he didn't need to violate journalistic ethics to get the questions answered. He could have asked them himself. He crossed two ethical lines.

I don't know that he did violate this code of ethics. It seems unlikely that he would have had any chance to ask Rumsfeld a question. The link you give has this quote: "Pitts said he worked with guardsmen after being told reporters would not be allowed to ask Rumsfeld questions."
Clearly, by arranging things the way he did, the reporter was going outside of normal channels to get information. But I haven't seen any suggestion that he helped spread false information. It obviously rang true with the soldiers in the room who are getting ready to put their lives on the line for their country.
You guys are upset because the question embarrassed Rumsfeld; and coming from a soldier who seemed to know what he was talking about instead of a member of the dreaded "MSM" it had much more force. And I bet our troops get better protection quicker than they would have otherwise
Conservatives have become such whiny winners. You cry foul at everything. I am trying to imagine your outrage if this had happened to President Gore, or President Kerry. I just can't picture it.

Clark,

You are missing the point completely. Pitts planted questions with the troops and actively sought out the people who would be among those carrying the mikes to seek out those soldiers to ask Rumsfeld the questions.

That, as far as journalistic ethics goes, is abhorrent. The man has no journalistic legs to stand on now - none. He was concerned about making a story, not covering a story. Whether he was going to be in a Humvee or not.

If you are unable to see the difference there (advocating vs. simply reporting) there isn't much anyone can do to change your mind.

He inserted himself and his agenda into the story, rather than simply reporting it. That's not to say any of those soldiers could not/would not ask Rumsfeld the question. Pitts actively worked to make sure the question would be asked, and for a reason - his own self-serving interests.

Huge difference.

Mark: Good point, excellently made. Thanks.

Clark: The major thing this blog has consistently stood for from day one of its inception three years ago is holding the media to account when it is unbiased, inaccurate or unethical. I would have called the reporter unethical if he had done this during a Democratic administration.

I don't mind that Rumsfeld was asked the question, and his answer - we're armoring vehicles as fast as we can - is acceptable.

As for the reporter, he didn't have to have the soldier pose his question because there were other ways to get the information. The question did not have to be asked of Rumsfeld - there are plenty of other people he could have asked. He could have done some research and found out who makes the armor, how long it takes, what it costs, etc., - in other words, he could have done some actual journalism. Instead he stage-managed a bit of theater.

I still don't buy it. Pitts didn't pose as a soldier. He didn't get a soldier to lie or misrepresent himself. I understand that he aided the process by talking to the soldiers. I think one difference between me and all of you is that I see (and I think the reporter does as well) the important story as the inadequate armor for our troops in the field. You all seem to see it as merely an attempt to engineer the humiliation of Rumsfeld. If that was all that was happening, then I would be inclined to agree with your arguments.
If Pitts hadn't done what he did, it is highly unlikely that the story would have got out since Rumsfeld wasn't going to take questions from reporters(which again I point out is in the story that Hobbs links too).
I admit, I may be missing something--I am no expert on the ethical duties of reporters. And I may be blinded by my loathing of Rumsfeld.
I will make more of an effort to check your website more often and I look forward to seeing you correct the errors of Fox News, National Review and The Washington Times; if they ever make any.

You could start with Wesley Pruden, Editor-in-Chief at the Washington Times.

In an article he personally wrote about John Kerry during the campaign, he meticulously removed the phrase "...told us that they had..." from Mr. Kerry's 1971 Senate testimony, and replaced it with "...".

Kerry's statement, "They told us that they had raped..." became "They...raped...".

Editor-in-Chief, no less.

I just want to say that it doesn't matter if Pitt's had a soldier ask this question. I am sure it would have been ask anyway. This is something all of the soldiers and their families have worried about and wanted to know. I know this because my husband is in the 278th and this was a ques tion that needed to be asked. I am very pround of our soldiers and I am glad that Pitt's is there and he does not deserve to lose his job over this. Everyone needs to focus on the main thing here. OUR SOLDIERS ARE NOT GETTING WHAT THEY NEED!!!

I think many of you are missing the point entirely. The issue at hand is not armor. I think we all agree our guys should have every level of protection available. Nobody disagrees with that.

The reporter manipulated a soldier into asking his question of Rumsfeld because "he saw it as an important story." Kind of like the ends justifies the means. It's become common in this guerilla politics atmosphere. I wonder if Clark would be defending this reporter's tactics so vehemently if he had engineered this following exchange:

Soldier: "Secretary Rumsfeld, many of the terrorists we're fighting are coming from Syria. Many of their weapons are coming from Syria. There have been reports of WMD being shipped to Syria. When are we going to invade 'em?"

If a reporter "saw" that as the story that needed to be covered and rigged the interview session to get it "out there," would Clark see it as okay? If (heaven forbid) a conservative reporter planted questions to get his views out because "that's the real story as he sees it" would everyone think it was okay? Surely not. Reporters are there to report events, not instigate events. Pitts instigated this event through his actions and then reported on it. Unethical. The subject doesn't matter.

That soldier looked pretty big to me. You tell him he was manipulated.

Also, understand that the company that produces the HumVee plating has the capacity to produce more, but has not received any orders to do so.

Don't you know that stuff costs some serious money? And it doesn't grow on trees.

I'd be happy to tell him he was used to further this reporter's agenda. I'd tell the same thing to the guys I supervised on active duty, and I hope his officers discussed the issue with him. Look, he has every right to ask the question, and if it was his, I'd applaud him. But it wasn't.

It does cost money...money John Kerry and several Democrats voted against. I don't want to turn this into a partisan issue, because it isn't. But if the Administration spends more taxpayer cash in Iraq for this stuff, I don't want to hear Al Franken and co. bitch about the amount of money we're spending in Iraq. Whatever ducats we drop there will be worth it in the long run.

Let's not confuse the issue here. More armor? Yes, please. Unethical "journalistic" tactics? You bet.

Bottom line: The troops need armor and the DOD needs to get it to 'em as fast as possible. And the reporter acted unethically by staging a news event rahter than merely covering it - and by failing to disclose in his story his role in creating the news.

Even his editor today has backtracked a bit and said it was wrong to fail to disclose to readers Pitts' role in staging the news.

The soldier could have refused and taken his chances with the punishment the reporter might have meted out.

Do you question the soldier's account of scavenging landfills for plating materials?

Not only did he do it dishonestly, but he asked a question that there's already an answer to. No vehicles are being sent INTO COMBAT without the proper armor. Let's say that again for the commenters here with consistent reading comprehension problems: no vehicles are being sent INTO COMBAT without the proper armor. Furthermore, the number of armored vehicles has increased dramatically--from a few hundred armored Humvees at the beginning of the war, to over 15,000 now. This reporter is trying to plant the notion that we're sending troops into combat without the proper armor, and that's just not true. Now, the question is, should all military vehicles, whether combat-bound or not, be armored? Probably, but when you're faced with using a military decimated by the previous inhabitant of the White House, you do what you can and build from there. There is certainly plenty of effort being put into remedying the situation; there's a plant near where I live in Texas that's working triple shifts turning out armor plating, for example. This wasn't about revealing some big problem with the war; this was about this reporter's agenda and trying to twist the truth.

From what I know about this incident, I do not believe that the reporter "crossed the line"... The question asked by Spc. Wilson has been on the minds of many of the people who serve in the military, and who support those who do.

I don't have time to say much more about this topic at the moment, but I wanted to let y'all know that there is some interesting material on this matter at the current home page of Soldiers for the Truth:
www.sftt.org

Thanks!

As a journalism student studying ethics, I can say, with at least a little authority, that the reporter did not cause any ethical dilemmas.

1) The reporter did not stage any news events. Rumsfeld agreed to speak to the troops and answer their questions. The guardsman who asked Rumsfeld the question for the reporter was doing so in order to get more information -- not in an attempt to "stage" a news event.

2) The reporter was unable to get access to Rumsfeld to ask his questions -- as mentioned in the blog article, the event was closed to reporters (why was it closed to reporters, by the way?). Therefore, alternate methods of information gathering had to be used -- including using other people to find information or ask questions, since the reporter could not be there.

The revelation that soldiers in Iraq were scrounging for metal in dumpyards is certainly vital to the public's perception of the competence of the senior military officials responsible for sending American forces into battle with sub-standard equipment. Asking questions of Rumsfeld through a third-party was necessary in this case.

3) There was a conflict of interest -- the soldier who asked the question no doubt wished to know for himself why he didn't have a Humvee with armor on it. The need for information, however, overruled this objection, because it was better to inform the public about this lack of armor than to avoid asking the question at all because of a possible ethical qualm.

I hope my comments help you re-evaluate your interpretation of the code of ethics that you have cited, and that you will further research the topic before passing judgment.