In a political system where retaliation rules, you can’t expose corruption or misdeeds by depending entirely on those willing to allow use of their names. Without anonymous sources, the truth about Watergate would never have emerged. The Pulitzer Prize for investigative reporting most often goes to a newspaper story or series of stories that depends heavily on use of anonymous sources.
The first journalism award I won, a Feature Writing First Place from The Virginia Press Association in 1967, came from a story about an anonymous teenager in Roanoke who obtained an abortion that was illegal at the time. I’ve won more than 30 journalism awards over the last 38 years and about half of them for stories that depended heavily on anonymous sources.
We put our reputation on the line every time we publish a story that depends on information from anonymous sources. Sometimes we get burned and when we do we admit it publicly, take our well-deserved lumps, and move on.
We were the first news outlet to identify the names of women who claimed sexual abuse by Bill Clinton when he was attorney general and later governor of Arkansas. We were the first news outlet to report on the ethical problems of many members of Congress in our series: America’s Criminal Class: The Congress of the United States. And we were the first to report on the abuse of underage girls on teen model web sites. Links to all of these award-winning stories can be found on our home page.
That doesn’t mean you should take everything we print as gospel. Never do that with us or any other news source. Do your own research and reach your own conclusions. And consider the record of the sources you use for news and information. We’ve published more than 25,000 stories since going online on October 1, 1994, and we’ve had to retract two of them. That’s a record I’m willing to stand on.
My bio can be found on this link. I put my name on everything I write. And I stand behind what I write.
http://www.capitolhillblue.com/artma...cle_7779.shtml
written by Doug Thompson