Romenesko comments

I just sent the following email to Romenesko regarding this

Is anyone else a bit disturbed by Chattanooga Times Free Press
reporter Lee Pitts’ self-congratulatory email? He thinks one of his best day as a journalist is inserting himself in a news event aimed at embarrassing the secretary of defense? Isn’t staging news events strictly verboten for reporters? Why couldn’t these soldiers come up with these questions on their own?

Now, it may be that the lack of armor is horribly inexcusable and Pitts’ action saved lives; I’m certainly not qualified to say. But he’s incorrect to say Wednesday was one of his “best days as a journalist” because he was acting as something entirely different.

UPDATE: Here is a second letter I’ve sent to Romenesko, answering some of the responses to my first letter:

To answer my critics… Lucy Quinlivan: I think Lee Pitts did indeed insert himself into the story. He wasn’t content to let the news event unfold naturally — he seems to have coached the soldier on what tosay, and certainly took steps to make sure that soldier was called upon by the presenter.

He took steps to “spice up” a news event, and then wrote about it without disclosing his role in the affair. It’s a little like Edward Keating, the NYT photographer who had a kid pose with a toy gun on the streets of Lackawanna. It’s fine to pose a picture, but you can’t pass it off as a candid.

Dan Mitchell: Rumsfeld does in fact take questions from the press fairly frequently (This week, on Monday and Thursday). But even if we grant that Pitts thought his question was sufficiently urgent that he needed it answered that very moment, he needed to be honest and up-front about that. He could have had the soldier say, “This is a question from newsman Lee Pitts…” for example.

If Pitts indeed coached the soldier on what to say, the “Rush Limbaughs of the world,” as Mitchell puts it, were indeed correct: the event *was* staged. The essence of this news story — what gave it its oomph — was the idea of an enlisted man confronting the secretary of defense. If we had known the soldier was put up to it, it wouldn’t have been nearly as juicy a story.

Here is a the full text of the question to Rumsfeld and his response. It’s worth reading not just the question but the answer. I don’t want to carry anyone’s water here, but let’s not be starry-eyed either: just because some guy asked a question doesn’t necessarily mean anyone’s life is going to be saved.

Q: Yes, Mr. Secretary. My question is more logistical. We’ve had troops in Iraq for coming up on three years and we’ve always staged here out of Kuwait. Now why do we soldiers have to dig through local landfills for pieces of scrap metal and compromise ballistic glass to up-armor our vehicles and why don’t we have those resources readily available to us? [Applause]

SEC. RUMSFELD: I missed the first part of your question. And could you repeat it for me?

Q: Yes, Mr. Secretary. Our soldiers have been fighting in Iraq for coming up on three years. A lot of us are getting ready to move north relatively soon. Our vehicles are not armored. We’re digging pieces of rusted scrap metal and compromised ballistic glass that’s already been shot up, dropped, busted, picking the best out of this scrap to put on our vehicles to take into combat. We do not have proper armament vehicles to carry with us north.

SEC. RUMSFELD: I talked to the General coming out here about the pace at which the vehicles are being armored. They have been brought from all over the world, wherever they’re not needed, to a place here where they are needed. I’m told that they are being – the Army is – I think it’s something like 400 a month are being done. And it’s essentially a matter of physics. It isn’t a matter of money. It isn’t a matter on the part of the Army of desire. It’s a matter of production and capability of doing it.

There’s also the text of a briefing here from yesterday on the armor issue.