The history of American politics is littered with bodies of people who took so pure a position that they had no clout at all.

National security is a really big problem for journalists, because no journalist worth his salt wants to endanger the national security, but the law talks about anyone who endangers the security of the United States is going to go to jail. So, here you are, especially in the Pentagon. Some guy tells you something. He says that's a national security matter. Well, you're supposed to tremble and get scared and it never, almost never means the security of the national government. More likely to mean the security or the personal happiness of the guy who is telling you something.

Hire people smarter than you are and encourage them to bloom.

The first rough draft of history.

It's very hard to stand up to the government which is saying that publication will threaten national security. People don't seem to realize that reporters and editors know something about national security and care deeply about it.

You never monkey with the truth.

I do worry about how newspapers respond to falling circulation figures. I'm not sure that the answer is for newspapers to try to cater to whatever seems to be the fad of the day.