The Trouble With Secrecy
The trouble with the lack of open records is that the secrets are bound to get out. When that happens, what was hidden always gets sensationalized and the revelation always seems worse than it probably would have been had the event not been covered up in the first place. This is almost always the case when the event ordinarily would not even command a page 20 position in the local newspaper.
While we realize that even a traffic arrest can seem like major news in Key West, in a city the size of Miami, there are hundreds of arrests in an evening. Of those, only the most serious felonies (usually involving violence or large quantities of drugs) are likely to raise a news-brow. But let an intrepid reporter even think that something is being covered up or someone is getting "special treatment" and the journalistic pheromones go into such an uncontrollable episode of heat that a hound dog could drown in the saliva generated by the panting to get the story. This appears to be true even when the "story" is more than half a dozen years old, has little relevance to any current event concerning the person in the "story," or otherwise would generate only a titter -- among the consigliere.
The only other time an event generates such a journalistic feeding frenzy is when the event has the scent of sex. Then journalists (who must appear starved for it ) seem to lose all sense of restraint and don their National Enquirer waders to slog through muck to bag their quarry. Such sex-driven feeding frenzies of the National Enquirer variety usually involve quarry seeking attention, directly or indirectly. A case in point: the erstwhile "star" whose crotch recently was memorialized by the paparazzi. But arguably that story at least was a "current" event, if one can call crotch-watching an "event."
Harder to understand, much less explain, is the fascination with an almost seven year old arrest in Miami that did not result in a prosecution or a conviction. Perhaps part of a rational explanation is to be found is in the philosophy of journalism that drives any particular reporter or editor. That philosophy is usually made up of a combination of instinct, news acumen, ethics, drive, political sense, passion, and character all operating together in assessing and producing a story. Another part is whether a tip was involved.
Reporters are almost cop-like when a tip is involved, particularly when the tip comes from another reporter or a trusted source. Reporters are duty-bound to follow up on a tip for a whole variety of reasons. First, a tip is just that. You never know where it will lead. It may be nothing, but it may also be the story of the decade. A part of your job is detective work if you are an investigative reporter. Second, if your tip is from a trusted or credible source, it is journalistic malpractice to ignore it. Another reason you have to follow up on a tip, especially from a trusted source or another reporter is that if you don't, you won't get any more tips. Tips are like favors. If you ignore them, people will stop giving you favors. Your thank you for the favor is your follow-up. Your extra thank you is the resulting story. That story says to the one providing you the lead, "Well done." Your follow up and the appearance of that story is empowering to your source. It vindicates his or her notions of justice, whether or not you intended that result. So there are compelling reasons for a reporter to follow up on tips and get the facts.
What a reporter (or editor) chooses to do with those facts is another matter. That decision is often at the root of the criticism the press receives because the public is a great second-guesser and Monday morning quarterback. Many journalists (and editors) solve the "what-to-do-with-the-information problem" by simply going with the story. They prefer to err on the side of telling most, if not all, as accurately as they can while depending on the readers' ability to sift and winnow the information appropriately. Otherwise, the journalist must take on the very dilemma posed by the secrecy of the information the reporter has uncovered: whether the secrecy was appropriate in the first place. If it was not, then why is the reporter continuing to perpetuate that inappropriate secrecy by sitting on the information?
The sifting and winnowing approach seems to work fairly well and has another advantage. It keeps the press independent from influence by the rich or politically powerful and results in a more open society. The truth is that the public is a pretty forgiving lot, and is able to cut people it feels have gotten a bad rap in the media a good deal of slack, even if what was said about them turns out to be accurate. That was likely the case with President Clinton's interlude with Monica Lewinsky. What most of the public got steamed about was not his interlude but was that he was not exactly forthcoming about it. To be sure there were some who disapproved of the relationship with Monica in general, but the polling seemed to show that the public was more concerned with the denials than with the details of Clinton's Monica folly.
So will anyone really care about what really happened to Tom Tukey, or whether it (whatever IT is) happened, as Dennis Cooper portrays it? Some may, especially Mr. Tukey. However, the people we have heard from in the Annex, who are not particularly rabid Tukey supporters, seem to care little about the event, if they even are aware of it. For these folks, and perhaps others, ultimately the burning questions will be these: what does whatever happened, if it happened, in Miami on some date almost seven years ago have to do with what is happening NOW with TAMPOA? And, how, if at all, does it affect the job (yes, volunteer or not, it is a job) he does or must do in the future as TAMPOA's President? Until those questions get aired and answered, the whole event, even if it produces an abundance of back-porch-cocktail-hour tongue-wagging among the power elite at the Annex and sells a lot of newspapers, is a yawn.
The real lesson that is lost on the tongue-wagging-cocktail-set is that the story would have been a non-event, even for Key West The Newspaper, had some in the Florida justice system not tried to cover it up. That's the trouble with improper secrecy in government. The fallout is always worse than the initial event.
While we realize that even a traffic arrest can seem like major news in Key West, in a city the size of Miami, there are hundreds of arrests in an evening. Of those, only the most serious felonies (usually involving violence or large quantities of drugs) are likely to raise a news-brow. But let an intrepid reporter even think that something is being covered up or someone is getting "special treatment" and the journalistic pheromones go into such an uncontrollable episode of heat that a hound dog could drown in the saliva generated by the panting to get the story. This appears to be true even when the "story" is more than half a dozen years old, has little relevance to any current event concerning the person in the "story," or otherwise would generate only a titter -- among the consigliere.
The only other time an event generates such a journalistic feeding frenzy is when the event has the scent of sex. Then journalists (who must appear starved for it ) seem to lose all sense of restraint and don their National Enquirer waders to slog through muck to bag their quarry. Such sex-driven feeding frenzies of the National Enquirer variety usually involve quarry seeking attention, directly or indirectly. A case in point: the erstwhile "star" whose crotch recently was memorialized by the paparazzi. But arguably that story at least was a "current" event, if one can call crotch-watching an "event."
Harder to understand, much less explain, is the fascination with an almost seven year old arrest in Miami that did not result in a prosecution or a conviction. Perhaps part of a rational explanation is to be found is in the philosophy of journalism that drives any particular reporter or editor. That philosophy is usually made up of a combination of instinct, news acumen, ethics, drive, political sense, passion, and character all operating together in assessing and producing a story. Another part is whether a tip was involved.
Reporters are almost cop-like when a tip is involved, particularly when the tip comes from another reporter or a trusted source. Reporters are duty-bound to follow up on a tip for a whole variety of reasons. First, a tip is just that. You never know where it will lead. It may be nothing, but it may also be the story of the decade. A part of your job is detective work if you are an investigative reporter. Second, if your tip is from a trusted or credible source, it is journalistic malpractice to ignore it. Another reason you have to follow up on a tip, especially from a trusted source or another reporter is that if you don't, you won't get any more tips. Tips are like favors. If you ignore them, people will stop giving you favors. Your thank you for the favor is your follow-up. Your extra thank you is the resulting story. That story says to the one providing you the lead, "Well done." Your follow up and the appearance of that story is empowering to your source. It vindicates his or her notions of justice, whether or not you intended that result. So there are compelling reasons for a reporter to follow up on tips and get the facts.
What a reporter (or editor) chooses to do with those facts is another matter. That decision is often at the root of the criticism the press receives because the public is a great second-guesser and Monday morning quarterback. Many journalists (and editors) solve the "what-to-do-with-the-information problem" by simply going with the story. They prefer to err on the side of telling most, if not all, as accurately as they can while depending on the readers' ability to sift and winnow the information appropriately. Otherwise, the journalist must take on the very dilemma posed by the secrecy of the information the reporter has uncovered: whether the secrecy was appropriate in the first place. If it was not, then why is the reporter continuing to perpetuate that inappropriate secrecy by sitting on the information?
The sifting and winnowing approach seems to work fairly well and has another advantage. It keeps the press independent from influence by the rich or politically powerful and results in a more open society. The truth is that the public is a pretty forgiving lot, and is able to cut people it feels have gotten a bad rap in the media a good deal of slack, even if what was said about them turns out to be accurate. That was likely the case with President Clinton's interlude with Monica Lewinsky. What most of the public got steamed about was not his interlude but was that he was not exactly forthcoming about it. To be sure there were some who disapproved of the relationship with Monica in general, but the polling seemed to show that the public was more concerned with the denials than with the details of Clinton's Monica folly.
So will anyone really care about what really happened to Tom Tukey, or whether it (whatever IT is) happened, as Dennis Cooper portrays it? Some may, especially Mr. Tukey. However, the people we have heard from in the Annex, who are not particularly rabid Tukey supporters, seem to care little about the event, if they even are aware of it. For these folks, and perhaps others, ultimately the burning questions will be these: what does whatever happened, if it happened, in Miami on some date almost seven years ago have to do with what is happening NOW with TAMPOA? And, how, if at all, does it affect the job (yes, volunteer or not, it is a job) he does or must do in the future as TAMPOA's President? Until those questions get aired and answered, the whole event, even if it produces an abundance of back-porch-cocktail-hour tongue-wagging among the power elite at the Annex and sells a lot of newspapers, is a yawn.
The real lesson that is lost on the tongue-wagging-cocktail-set is that the story would have been a non-event, even for Key West The Newspaper, had some in the Florida justice system not tried to cover it up. That's the trouble with improper secrecy in government. The fallout is always worse than the initial event.
Labels: Secrecy, Sunshine Laws
posted by Conchette at 1:06 PM
4 Comments:
I did not work in criminal justice but I had a job for many years where we had to comply with government policies on the retention of records. I read Cooper's article and it said that the official record said that the file was "destroyed". That made sense to me because this was a situation where the court declined to prosecute. For cases where the court decides not to prosecute, it would not make sense to keep the files forever. Old files on cases where there was no prosecution would be routinely destroyed after some period of time. Our judicial system contains a presumption of innocence and it would be unnecessary to keep a file where there had been no prosecution. It was only Cooper who went on to speculate in his article that maybe the file was "sealed" and not destroyed. I do not see any government conspiracy or cover-up here. I think the file was destroyed in accordance with some government policy on how long you are required to keep files if there has been no prosecution.
Sorry Conchette but I don't see the Secrecy you mention. KWTN is always very careful so it can't be sued. Dennis is careful to write that the official record says that the file is destroyed. Dennis then says that his anonymous source says that the file is sealed. Dennis is careful NOT to say that he has actual facts or that he has seen any information himself to say that it's sealed.
Official record vs. Anonymous source...I think the file was destroyed because it was old and nothing ever happened in court.
Fascinating how you attempt to apologize and rationalize this example of yellow journalism in our "blue paper". Dennis Cooper needs to sign you up.
This story about Tukey in the Blue newspaper is relevant because it shows the need that Tukey resign as president of the Board of Tampoa. He and the Board have misused our funds in the past, Tukey has had bad judgment in regards to his cat case -- what else will Tukey and the Board do?
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