Last week the Society for Professional Journalists honored Judith Miller for protecting a source (or sources). The Society acts as though that is the foremost value, when in fact it is not. The foremost value is the reverse, connecting a source to a message -- attribution, having a source stand behind his message.
The idea behind "protecting a source" has the whistle-blower in mind, the person who is shedding light on power and the misuse of power, from the bottom up. That idea does not apply when the source is at the top in the power chain. Scooter Libby, Dick Cheney et al are the last people who should be shielded. If they believe Saddam Hussein has WMD they can proclaim it. They will have an audience (as indeed they did even without proof and without attribution).
The Society, Judith Miller, Bill Keller and the New York Times are so clueless as to valid journalism. The Society is flinging around a catch phrase (protecting your source) that is simply inapplicable to manipulative leaks from the top. Leaks from the top are not whistle-blowing, far from it. Judith Miller was nothing more than a mouthpiece for shielded power from people who should have stood up and spoken directly to the nation.
And now Keller fails to see the profound implications of leaks-based reporting, the system on which the New York Times flourishes and on which it falsely has gained the reputation as The Great Newspaper. Actually its "greatness" come from being a ready, veiled mouthpiece. It is easily used, and willingly and regularly used.
Miller was a disaster area, but she fit in with the NYT milieu. What's wrong with Miller is wrong with the paper.
And that SPJ doesn't see it suggests serious problems within the industry.