In exchange for power, influence, command and a place in history, a president gives up the bulk of his privacy.

But the time has come for journalists to acknowledge that a zone of privacy does exist.

For decades, the journalistic norm had been that the private lives of public officials remained private unless that life impinged on public performance.

The relationship between press and politician - protected by the Constitution and designed to be happily adversarial - becomes sour, raw and confrontational.

The written tone and the spoken tone change and the reporters' disbelief in the veracity of the government spreads to the readers and the viewers.

In exchange for power, influence, command and a place in history, a president gives up the bulk of his privacy.

And what it depends on, of course, is whether the story itself is worth the ethical compromise it requires and whether the competition is onto the story.