JEFF ROSEN DISSES PATRICK FITZGERALD:

On both ends of the political spectrum, however, there has been wide praise of Fitzgerald’s restraint and professionalism in focusing on a relatively clear-cut case of false statements rather than indicting officials or reporters for disclosing official secrets.

But it’s important for journalists (including me) who vigorously opposed the Kenneth Starr investigation to state the obvious: The Fitzgerald indictments are an embarrassing confirmation of the old Washington rule that, when special prosecutors can’t prove a crime, they indict the target for obstructing the investigation. Far from being typical behavior, indicting suspects for nothing more than false statements or perjury is a vice largely restricted to special prosecutors and independent counsels. And, although Libby’s alleged lies to protect his boss may appear more serious than Bill Clinton’s self-interested lies about sex, neither Clinton nor Libby prevented the special prosecutor from proving an underlying crime. In fact, there’s strong reason to conclude that no underlying crime was committed. Unlike the Starr investigation, moreover, the Fitzgerald investigation represents a disaster for the First Amendment and may do long-lasting damage to political discourse in Washington.

Rosen is right about that. We’ve set a precedent — egged on by the editorialists at the New York Times and those who follow their lead — that leaking classified material to journalists should be prosecutable. If I were the Bush Administration, I’d be sorely tempted to start subpoenaing journalists right and left when they reported on classified information. You want it? You got it.

Some people are worried about that, which is why there’s some support for a shield law. But those damned bloggers are complicating things:

Steven Clymer, a law professor at Cornell University, shared Rosenberg’s concerns, according to the draft transcript. Clymer warned that a federal shield law “would signal that illegal disclosures of classified or otherwise sensitive information … are immune from criminal prosecution as long as they are made to a recipient who could qualify as a reporter under the privilege.” And he added that the pending bill is so broad that it could apply to “a disclosure of sensitive or classified information to an Internet blogger.”

When quizzed by Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, about the bill’s application to blogs, Clymer said courts ultimately would have to decide the issue if the current language becomes law. “They may decide that you cannot favor one group of media over another group of media,” Clymer said. “And so if you are going to give the privilege to The New York Times, you necessarily have to give it to the Internet blogger as well.”

Sen. John Cornyn disagrees: “”Internet bloggers, and perhaps others, don’t observe the same professional ethics and have the same review by editors and others that are trying to make sure that they are performing their job in a responsible and accurate sort of way.”

Rosen makes pretty much the same point, adding the suggestion that it’s only “vanity” that makes bloggers care. (I’m resisting the temptation to invoke RatherGate and Stephen Glass here). Yet putting the many famous cases of journalistic breakdown aside, bloggers don’t presume to tell us important things about national security on a “trust me” basis very much. You find those unnamed anonymous sources with hidden agendas in the work of mainstream journalists, for the most part, not bloggers — remember how this whole thing got started? — and the point of shield laws is to let them continue. How exactly does this serve the public interest?

UPDATE: Reader Michael Gebert emails:

So basically, The New York Times screwed up the old arrangement between government secrecy and the press for short-term partisan reasons, and now it wants a new arrangement limited to journalistic institutions like itself because, unlike the rabble of bloggers, they can be counted on to be responsibly non-partisan?

Pretty much.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Heh: “you can very clearly see where the makers had optimistically put ‘shield law’ but then had to cover it up with ‘denim.'”

MORE: Dave Johnston:

So let me get this straight…

We’ve got White House staff now doing conference calls with bloggers, and at the same time Senator John Cornyn (R-Texas) still feels the need to drop an al Jazeera-comparison to make his point that we should be fearful of “a certain irresponsibility” that apparently occurs when bloggers exercise their freedoms.

Do I really need to point out how ridiculous this all sounds?

Not really.

Interestingly, this Wall Street Journal story on environmentally-conscious Google founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page’s purchase of an enormous Boeing jet for personal use includes this credit:

Mr. Page wouldn’t say whether or not the Qantas plane was the one they bought. The 767 purchase was first brought to public attention by a blog written by Silicon Valley venture capitalist Jeffrey Nolan.

This kind of thing happens all the time now, and yet people pretend bloggers don’t do reporting.

FINALLY: Good news and bad news for Karl Rove.