Hugh Hewitt 1, NYT -4

This morning on his blog, Hugh Hewitt thoroughly dismantles the arguments by New York Times Editor Bill Keller over his paper's publication of information on the government's use of banking information to track terrorists. It's fairly long, but it's good to read the whole thing in order to see the arrogance and misleading arguments that Keller uses to defend the indefensible.

As Hewitt says at one point about Keller's argument that "while it is too early to tell, the initial signs are that our article is not generating a banker backlash against the program" (emphasis mine):

He doesn't know how the financial community will react, but he can be assured that the terrorist network is working hard on figuring out new ways to transfer money now that they know with certainty and particularity how we were tracing the old transfers. Further, allies across the globe must now know that no matter how legal the level of cooperation extended us in our hunt for terrorists, there is no guarantee of secrecy because the New York Times will publish anything and everything they can discover under the standard articulated here.

It's too bad that Mr. Keller refuses to submit to an interview with Hewitt, as any claim of objectivity would be thrown out the window and he would be revealed for the biased hack he is. But then, he knows that. It's why he won't answer direct questions about it, while holding the media above the law.

Keller concludes:

I can appreciate that other conscientious people could have gone through the process I've outlined above and come to a different conclusion. But nobody should think that we made this decision casually, with any animus toward the current Administration, or without fully weighing the issues.

And Hewitt responds:

I don't believe him, and there is no reason to believe him. The paper has been waging a war on the war and on the Adminsitration for years, so it has no credibility when it comes to arguing its good intentions.

What matters though is the statement that "other conscientious people" could have reached a different decision. In fact, they did. The Congresses and the presidents of the past have passsed laws about what is classified and who can release it. They didn't include the editor of the New York Times in the group that can make national security decisions. Mr. Keller decided he would risk the national security of the United States and the lives of its citizens. He has done so before and will no doubt do so again.

Again, read the whole thing. And do it while imagining what this information does to the effort to track down the people who want to kill your neighbor's son in Iraq, or blow up the Sears Tower, or pump poisonous gas into a subway tunnel.