Spiegel: Attacking the messengers: [View all]

[Luminous Animal]

Snowden Backlash: US Media Get Personal
By Marc Pitzke
As the mainstream American press goes after NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden and Guardian journalist Glenn Greenwald, the leakers' revelations are becoming an afterthought.

A recent Post editorial, that may as well have been written by the White House, argued that Snowden's leak harms "efforts to fight terrorism" and "legitimate intelligence operations." The leaks must immediately end, it argued -- a strange conclusion from the grandmother of leak journalism. Columnist Richard Cohen didn't hold back either: Snowden is "narcissistic," Greenwald is "vainglorious."

He wasn't alone. In the New York Times David Brooks accused Snowden of having "betrayed honesty and integrity." Roger Simon, chief political columnist at the website Politico, referred to Snowden as "the slacker who came in from the cold." Jeffrey Toobin, a New Yorker essayist, called him a "narcissist who deserves to be in prison." And Melissa Harris-Perry, from the otherwise progressive cable channel MSNBC, critized Snowden's behavior as "compromising national security."

In The Huffington Post, media critic Jeff Cohen called MSNBC the "official network of the Obama White House" -- a White House which, under president Obama, has famously declared war on whistleblowers.

Guardian's American Triumph

There's another reason for the united media front: The Guardian is becoming a competitive threat for American media outlets. The first Snowden video interview received almost seven million clicks on the newspaper's US website. "They set the US news agenda today," Associated Press star reporter Matt Apuzzo tweeted enviously.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/nsa-spying-scandal-focus-on-edward-snowden-by-us-media-a-911185.html