No Conscience Award For Judith Miller

Posted on August 5, 2005

Jailed New York Times reporter Judith Miller has been eating prison food while her husband cavorted on a luxury cruise (when they bought the tickets they didn't realize she'd be doing time and unable to go). That had to have been a bummer. But it gets worse. Editor and Publisher reports that the American Society of Journalists and Authors ("ASJA") voted unanimously not to endorse its earlier decision to give Miller a Conscience in Media award for going to jail to protect her sources in the Plamegate scandal.

E&P says ASJA group's president, Jack El-Hai posted two other reasons for the unanimous vote:

"A feeling that Miller's career, taken as a whole, did not make her the best candidate for the award."
Divided opinions on the board over whether her recent actions merit the award."

Rumors are swirling in Washington that the reason that Miller won't name her source in Plamegate is because she doesn't have one: that she is actually the person that told Karl Rove that Valerie Plame was a CIA agent. But that's just a rumor. Unless Special Prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald gets an indictment from the Grand Jury and then a criminal trial, we may never know who Miller's source was. In any event, she's not having a great summer, that's for sure.