A Sad Day for Democracy: NY Times Reporter Ordered Jailed

New York Times reporter Judith Miller was jailed today for refusing to divulge who told her the identity of U.S. Central Intelligence Agency operative Valerie Plame. This travesty of justice should immediately be overturned by President Bush, who, for once, should stand up for real freedom. Especially because his buddy, Karl Rove has also been implicated.

MSNBC reports:
Time Inc., surrendered emails which show that one of their reporter's sources "was White House deputy chief of staff Karl Rove, according to two lawyers who asked not to be identified because they are representing witnesses sympathetic to the White House."

"There are times when the greater good of our democracy demands an act of conscience," Arthur Sulzberger Jr., chairman of The New York Times Company and publisher of The New York Times, said in a statement. "Judy has chosen such an act in honoring her promise of confidentiality to her sources. She believes, as do we, that the free flowof information is critical to an informed citizenry."

Today will be remembered as one of the darkest days in the history of journalism, of freedom of the press, of freedom, period.

I’m not a fan of Judith Miller’s work – her coverage of the Iraq war was an embarrassment to her newspaper and to fellow journalists everywhere. But I am proud of her for refusing to relinquish her Constitutional rights, and for standing up for all of us.

I just hope she is not already too late.

This gives me the chills.