Washington DC is a city of conflict
special interests and for the journalists working their potential
conflicts of interest
six months ago just as of the tech barren from Amazon dot com bought the
washington post for $250 million dollars
two months later Amazon a company that's all about data
wanna $600 million dollar contract with the Central Intelligence Agency
for cloud computing services that has set off the alarm bells a group called
roots action .org is asking
how can the post write a piece on the CIA without first disclosing to its
readers
that its owners other company Amazon is being paid to safeguard
the agency's data all this is going down in the wake of the Edward snowden
NSA story on surveillance in america and whatever the post
the only newspaper ever to take down an american president
like many papers it was losing money between fifty and a hundred million
dollars a year but
is a potential conflict I've interest a price that a money-losing publication
simply has to pay
after it gets bailed out by a tech billionaire The Listening Post
flow Phillips now on the post the Amazon CIA deal
and the possible implications for the paper's journalists the No
the basic principle agenda this in is to acknowledge when the owner the media
outlet
has a major financial relationship with this subject
have coverage so begins the petition presented to the washington post last
month
requesting the paper be open with its readers
about the fact that its new ad Jeff basil's
has recently secured a home billion dollar deal
the data processing and security between his
old company Amazon I'm CIA so on the one hand
Amazon he is paid all this money by the CIA to keep it
secrets as a clandestine agency on the other hand
The Washington Post is reporting on
all sorts of aspects in the CIS the big issue no
course surveillance and there with the NSA is doing
with the FBI is doing with this year he is doing legally or illegally
and so if you have the owner of the POS
breaking about looking forward to our her successful relationship with the CIA
through Amazon does that prevent any conflict for you the fact that you
provide the cloud that the CIA uses for its data I don't think so
give me a break a question country journalism requires if it's going to be
authentic
that people know what they're getting and the best way to deal with that has
to be candid with the readers whenever there's
substantial coverage at the CIA that's not happening
on the petition signed by more than 33,000 Americans
was taken in person by Norman Solomon to the post executive editor
Martin Baron requesting full disclosure about a potential conflict of interest
whenever the post reports on the CIA the paper refused
The Listening Post requested an interview with Aaron
who declined percent isn't email saying no journalists here have
any links to the CIA as is evident from %ah journalism
with reported aggressively on the CIA and other agencies
much to the consternation post I certainly
been reporting on an essay abuses that really isn't the point it's really
the disclosure shining the spotlight on it let people decide for themselves at
the post reporting
is a good inaccurate and not pulling any punches
what I say that shouldn't trust anything post right about it absolutely
not but should have that information this
built-in conflict on when you do read one their stories
we put that to Dana priest the post
Pulitzer prize-winning investigative reporter much of his work over the past
28 years
has focused on intelligence in counterterrorism it's correct
that they say that we need to
the talk about are conflicts of interest we don't need to do in every story we've
done it before
Jeff bases on suppose now but it's really Amazon that has the relationship
we're gonna be very mindful up the public perception if
any one at the washington post any editor
any owner any publisher ever ever said to me
don't write about that because we have corporate interest
I would be outta there in a second the relationship between mainstream media
outlets in the CIA
is not unique to the post known you back in 1977
colbern sting one-hopper the reporting team that catapulted the post into the
global spotlight with watergate
produce an extensive report from rolling Stone magazine
exposing previously classified relationships
dating back to the nineteen fifties between the CIA
and some of the most influential media outlets in america
including the New York Times CBS News
and time magazine according to burn seen
more than four hundred journalists secretly carried out assignments for the
CIA
during the Cold War buns teen wrote reporters shed their notebooks
editors shed that stops including the New York Times which
over a 15-year period sent a dozen or so
undercover reporters around the world to provide assistance to the agency
back in 1967 the washington post itself
disclose that the past CIA
had been paying a had paid a million dollars over five years to the Newspaper
Guild that the union of reporters editors and others
and then the 19 seventies there was the Carl Bernstein
peace 19 eighty the you tell appears in salisbury top reporter at The New York
Times order
book that three chapters on the times and that the CIA
connections so things don't change over time I hated
you know be done chill abramson but she is now the executive editor of the New
York Times
and we wish Ian the early 2000's
Bush US bureau chief in in washington where judy miller was working for hotels
all manner of Liza weapons of mass destruction mushroom pie there anything
else
she got promotion so if these people keep bubbling to the top
and then you have conflicts of interest
par excellence on poor people reserves well
polo there's not much hope that the press the mainstream press
is going to give us the right time a day
and given the mainstream media's track record over the past decade
many Americans are understandably dubious when it comes to reporting on
intelligence matters
a law was passed in 1996 prohibiting the use of journalists as agents or assets
by intelligence agencies
for congress then could never have foreseen a world in which a tech barren
Woodbine american media institution with the CIA contract
hanging over them like a cloud triggering questions over conflict of
interest
and demands for disclosure I have to be frank when I read the petition I thought
well have you been reading the washington post we have been
second to nobody in the world reporting on critical stories
having to do with the CIA just last month by road a
very large story called CIA covert action in Columbia
just recently the post again has been out in front on
writing about the national security agency the
documents the Edwards snowden has released and we've continued to be
very aggressive been mad despite the
critical nature love
the politics around that the revelations from Edward snowden about
the NS they have really shown how deep and wide the surveillance activities go
and so frankly if our petition urging full disclosure from the washington post
about their
CIA Bastos Amazon ties
this just begins to pull on the thread you know if it's a
few pixels on a screen if it's a little bit of the ink in the printed article
then people know a little bit more about the conflict of interest that exist
four decades ago the washington post made journalistic history
by taking down a president today it's just another newspaper struggling to
survive the changing economic landscape
which begs the question: can the post or any paper
really afford to look a gift horse like Jeff bozos
in the house