Re Leaking Worse Than ‘Roids:

The uncharitable among us might ask something like this:

Would you buy a used car from Bud Selig?

Craig,

What was the point of quoting that ridiculous post implying that Sosa’s leak was somehow a result of Obama’s White Sox fandom?  I read the full article/post, and it didn’t seem to be satire.

Craig,

I skimmed over the update section, where the author says he’s just kidding Sox fans and Obama, so there’s that.  However, the tone still led me to believe that there was some truth to what the author was saying, at least in his eyes.

Or perhaps my satire-detector is off this morning

Ok, Craig, riddle me this: if the leaking is really worse than the steroiding (I’m not sure I agree, but it’s bad enough), then how can those “responsible journalists,” who make sure the leaked info is published and thus does the maximum harm, be blameless and admirable professionals? How can an act be wrong but the individuals who must aid, abet and complete the act for it to have any effect be seen not only as doing their jobs, but as providing a public service? The leakers could do no damage at all…in fact, they couldn’t leak!...if reporters said, “Nope, can’t print that: you aren’t supposed to reveal it, it’s confidential, and the public has no right to see sealed documents and confidential medical tests.” If you, Craig, were offered the list by an unethical, law-breaking lawyer-leaker, would you report him to the bar and the court (as the professional rules (RPC 8.3)require, or would you say, “Wow! What a great scoop for Shsterball!” I presume you’d report him, as would I. So is the publishing of the leak also worse than the steroiding?

I do feel like I’m harassing you today, but you are being especially provocative…
But Craig, doesn’t your lawyeresque answer duck the question? I know it’s not illegal to publish information like this, but it can’t be right, either. Essentially, this is information/confidence laundering, isn’t it? Again: how can the journalist that activates the harm in the leak be blameless if the leaker is, as you say, “worse than” the steroid-user?

On the reporting question, I do think your law license triggers a higher standard, but I am absolutely sure that if you went ahead and published the leak, no bar association alive would open the can of worms required to seek discipline.

But we know that’s not true. The journalist applies filters all the time. I don’t think the New York Times has to publish troop movements…it exercises discretion. Your construct only works if the journalist is acting like a public bulletin board, but he’s not. In my book, the SF Chronicle reporters should have returned the Grand Jury proceedings to the Court. We had no “right” to see them, and I feel the same way about the release of A-Rod’s and Sammy’s test results.

The press as a surrogate for the public at large is a great off-topic debate that I’d love to have some day…but not here.

But there’s a difference between troop movements and drug test results. The former, presumably, is a matter of national security and the information itself is deemed secret or top secret or some other designation.  I am not, as a matter of legal course, allowed to know where General Sherman is marching his troops (or what the spy sattelite is looking at or the launch codes to the Minuteman Missles).  This information is not not published because of discretion, it’s not published because it’s subject to legal protection.

The drug test information is only confidential because a court deemed that persons privy to the information may not disclose it.  That’s serious business as far as the persons subject to that court order, but it has no application to those who are not.

Personally, I’d rather not know the PED test results because I feel that the fact that these things are public is harmful to Sosa and A-Rod and others and it confounds the expectations they had when they took the tests. But I’m not prepared to say that it’s information that we have no right to see, as you put it.  To characterize it as such puts the onus on the citizen to close his eyes, not the government to honor its privacy obligations, and I think that’s the sort of thing that leads to perverse and potentially scary incentives.

I think that, in this case and others like it, the government can and should honor its privacy obligations. Once they fail to do so, however, it’s not our job to save them from the consequences of it.

Hate to sound jaded, but I no longer care if Sosa, Big Mac, Palmiero, A-Rod, Bonds , etc, did PED’s or whether or not they are HoF worthy. Fergie Jenkins—convicted of trafficking, HoF
Willie McCovey—convicted tax evasion or fraud, HoF, same with Duke Snider. If there is reason to pursue an investigation, turn it over to a Grand Jury and law enforcement, opinions and hearsay are, in my opinion, piss pore efforts to boost ratings or reporter stature. We the fans are guitly as well, we just want the excitement and the great numbers, be honest, we all suspected the above, but we paid for the performance. Rose is a slimeball, but the 4256 were clean. Vote them in, put “1st in steroid era to break Maris’ 61 recors” on the plaque. Now let’s move on and enjoy the great seasons we are seeing from Halladay, Greinke, Mauer, the Dodgers(gag) and grieve the continued downfall of my Braves.

If Sammy wants to clear his name, he’s free to bring a defamation suit against the reporters who broke the story. As Craig says, there’s no reason for the reporters to respect the gag order, as they’re not parties to it.

Sosa hit over 600 home runs in the major leagues. Suppose ‘roids added 50 of those. Does anyone seriously think that he isn’t a Hall of Fame talent because of that?

Congrats, Kurt, that’s one of my three least favorite rationalizations for cheating. Yet somehow, when it turns out that a high-priced professor, executive or judge has fabricated credentials, honors or jobs on the CV (e.g. “cheated”), he or she gets canned in disgrace, and nobody says, “But look: they were still really smart, accomplished and talented!” And when a Nobel prize candidate admits he fabricated his research results, nobody says, “Well, but he’s obviously brilliant anyway: do you doubt that he could have done the study without fabricating results?” What is it about the concept of having consequences for cheating that is so difficult to grasp? You don’t find ways to extract the results of cheating, so there’s a “good” record after the dishonest stuff is removed. If you could do that, then there would never be any downside to cheating…either you get away with it, or you get credit for what you would have done without the cheating anyway. Such a deal!