James Risen, old-line reporter for The New York Times, thought the world changed in 2009. Like nearly everyone else at The New York Times (where he worked) and similar papers, he expected Barack Hussein Obama to change the world. Now at least a President would not only respect confidential sources but also take down the apparatus of State secrets. How wrong he was!

James Risen might now go to prison to protect his source. But before he goes, he has a message for Barack Obama: Thanks a lot! For nothing. Thanks for sounding the hollow crack of broken promises. Or as James Risen put it: Barack Obama is “the greatest enemy to press freedom in a generation.”

How did things get to this pass? The answer involves Iran, the Central Intelligence Agency, a failed secret mission, and the concept of civilian control of the government and what that means.

James Risen and the CIA

The trouble began toward the end of 2005. James Risen wrote a book, State of War. (New York: Simon and Schuster, 2006) The CIA tried to stop the nuclear program in Iran. (To learn exactly how, read the book.) But something went wrong. Someone in the CIA told James Risen all about it, with trimmings. But he told it under the usual condition: don’t mention his name.

On New Year’s Eve, 2005, the Bush (Jr.) White House called the general counsel at the CIA. Can’t you call Sumner Redstone, head of Viacom (who owns Simon and Schuster), and tell him to pull the book off the shelves? Too late. The CIA head lawyer knew then: even trying it would be worse than silly.

Why this should have embarrassed the Bush administration is hard to say. After all, this operation happened in 1997, during the Clinton administration, not the Bush. Still, the Bush White House attitude seems to have been: what the CIA does, is a secret because the CIA is doing it. So the Bush Justice Department slapped Risen with a subpoena to make him tell who the leak was at the CIA. Risen refused.

In 2009 the subpoena ran out. James Risen thought that was the end of it. Wrong.

James Risen and Obama

The New York Times, November 11, 1918. Photo: New York Times Archive.

James Risen still can’t seem to believe it. The Obama Justice Department renewed the subpoena in 2010. He started fighting almost at once. But now he’s lost the fight. Court after court refused his motions to quash the subpoena.

Finally he appealed (or to be technical, “petitioned for certiorari”) to the Supreme Court. In June, the Supreme Court “denied cert.” That was his last challenge.

In February, before the Court refused him, James Risen told the Sources and Secrets Conference what he thought of Obama. It wasn’t pretty, according to The Daily Caller. Obama, he said, wanted to set rules for “acceptable” reporting. And he threatened to punish any reporter who crossed the line. That, said Risen, would give America an “Official Secrets Act,” like the one in the United Kingdom, in all but name.

The chill was already in the air. Jeff Toobin of The New Yorker told that same conference the First Amendment had no clear privilege. And an Obama administration lawyer compared James Risen’s kind of reportage to drunk driving.

Anyone would understand the attitude, if James Risen got anyone killed with his book. But no one even alleges that, or anything close.

Jamie Weinstein at The Daily Caller quotes a profile of James Risen in the Times. Risen does not mince words. “[This isn’t] a game or signal or spin,” he says.

They don’t want to believe that Obama wants to crack down on the press and whistle-blowers. But he does.

Or maybe Attorney General Eric Holder is playing chicken with Risen. For in May he said,

As long as I’m attorney general, no reporter who is doing his job is going to go to jail.

All right then, General Holder! Don’t send this one to jail! But Holder might do it anyway. Because his boss has caught himself neatly between the “spooks” and the leftist press. He told them they were his and he was theirs. But to whom does he really belong? Or: does Obama act more like an abusive “significant other,” whose partner still sticks with him no matter how many foul blows he lands? (And he’s landed plenty. McClatchy, a year ago, described Obama’s “Insider Threat Program.” This reads more like the White House Plumbers’ Unit during the Nixon administration!)

Lyndon Baines Johnson, after Walter Cronkite characterized the Battle of Tet as a defeat for America in Vietnam, said,

If I’ve lost Walter Cronkite I’ve lost America.

That might have prompted him not to run for office again.

Now it’s worth asking: has Obama lost The New York Times? And with it, the leftist America that re-elected him twice?

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