Maybe some of today’s papers have too many ‘feel-good’ features, but there is a lot of good news out there.
BEN BRADLEESo, 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 Ben Bradlee Quotes
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Our best today; better tomorrow.
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You never monkey with the truth.
BEN BRADLEE -
I don’t want to disappoint too many people, but the number of interesting political, historical conversations we had, you could stick in your ear, it wasn’t that many. We talked about friends, family and of course girls.
BEN BRADLEE -
Those [Watergate] tapes are going to take me to my grave with a huge smile on my face.
BEN BRADLEE -
I think he had a strange, passionate devotion to the truth and a horror at what he saw going on.
BEN BRADLEE -
The history of American politics is littered with bodies of people who took so pure a position that they had no clout at all.
BEN BRADLEE -
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.
BEN BRADLEE -
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.
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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.
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As long as a journalist tells the truth, in conscience and fairness, it is not his job to worry about consequences. The truth is never as dangerous as a lie in the long run. I truly believe the truth sets men free.
BEN BRADLEE -
It changes your life, the pursuit of truth, if you know that you have tried to find the truth and gone past the first apparent truth towards the real truth. It’s very, it’s very exciting.
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The biggest difference between Kennedy and Nixon, as far as the press is concerned, is simply this: Jack Kennedy really liked newspaper people and he really enjoyed sparring with journalists.
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Sure, some journalists use anonymous sources just because they’re lazy, and I think editors ought to insist on more precise identification even if they remain anonymous.
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Hire people smarter than you are and encourage them to bloom.
BEN BRADLEE -
I never believed that Nixon could fully resurrect himself. And the proof of that was in the obits.
BEN BRADLEE