A number of media reporters have now followed up with reports about the Times switcheroo. And the answer from the Times is that it was part of the normal editing process and the preference for on-the-record quotes over blind quotes. The specific response we got from Eileen Murphy, spokesperson for the Times, reads as follows …
As reporting went on during the day yesterday, we were able to flesh out the story, add more context and get more sources on the record, which is obviously what we prefer. Having said that, we stand by the reporting in all versions of the story.
Peter Baker, who replaced David Sanger as the lead byline, told Buzzfeed, “It’s just normal journalism — as more reporting comes in, you improve the story. On the record Republican criticism beats anonymous Republican criticism.”
But this is a weak answer which at least dodges what I see as the key question about the piece.
On the record quotes are always to be preferred to blind or background quotes. But the real issue is the utility of the quote in question. One quote in the original Times piece had some former Bush advisor willing to crap on Romney with a good quote. That doesn’t add that much really since lots of people were willing to crap on him yesterday. And it’s always easy to snark behind a blind quote. So there may be some rationale for revising out that quote.
But that’s not the big change in my opinion.
The original piece included a quote from someone the Times called “one of Mr. Romney’s senior advisers” explaining their rationale for their broadside Tuesday night. This wasn’t a critic with a blind quote. It was the Romney campaign itself, seemingly someone very high up in the organization, explaining their actions.
“We’ve had this consistent critique and narrative on Obama’s foreign policy, and we felt this was a situation that met our critique, that Obama really has been pretty weak in a number of ways on foreign policy, especially if you look at his dealings with the Arab Spring and its aftermath,” one of Mr. Romney’s senior advisers said on Wednesday. “I think the reality is that while there may be a difference of opinion regarding issues of timing, I think everyone stands behind the critique of the administration, which we believe has conducted its foreign policy in a feckless manner.”
The first part of that quote makes the advisor seem callow, frivolous, and shabby. We’ve had the critique out there, “this was a situation that met our critique”, and that was good enough for us. We just let fly.
That sounds like the Romney campaign describing itself pretty much as its critics described it through yesterday. That had a standing critique, a crisis blew up that seemed like it could fit, and well … that was good enough for them, without any sense of whether they should go full-bore attack during an international crisis, get the facts straight or find out what had actually happened.
In other words, in addition to falsifying key facts they appeared to react to the crisis with a purely political calculus.
In the edited version of the Times piece, as Politico’s Dylan Byers notes, that quote is replaced by an on-the-record quote from policy director Lanhee Chen …
Mr. Romney’s camp was surprised by the blowback. “While there may be differences of opinion regarding issues of timing,” Mr. Chen said, “I think everyone stands behind the critique of the administration, which we believe has conducted its foreign policy in a feckless manner.”
As you can see, the second portion is identical. So it really sounds like the blind quote was from Chen as well.
Regardless, though, replacing a revealing off-the-record quote from the campaign with a self-serving on-the-record quote does not amount to good journalism.
I think the totality of the edit merits that verdict as well. But this particular revision makes that very clear.
[ed.note: After writing this, several readers have pointed out that the aforementioned crapping former Bush foreign policy advisor was identified as also being a current Romney advisor. So that does make his or her criticism at least somewhat more relevant. And presumably his or her position as a Romney advisor would make dumping on him on the record rather difficult.]
