Reporters and media protection latest BushCo ‘security threat’

I guess a media shield law will give al Qaida “aid, hope and comfort,” or some other stupidity.

First, we have the Subtler, Suaver Alberto Gonzales™, Attorney General Mike Mukasey, claiming a shield law now wending its way through the Senate, defines a journalist too broadly.

Of course, this is the same AG Mukasey who cut blog/online news source Talking Points Memo off the list of daily e-mail media recipients from the Department of Justice.

And, doorknob bless Patrick Fitzgerald for prosecuting Scooter Libby, but he’s just wrong in claiming a shield law isn’t needed.

Dismissing notions that media subpoenas would dampen investigative reporting, Fitzgerald said, “Journalists have been saying the sky is falling since 1972 ... and that suddenly the stories will dry up. But I'm not seeing big blank spaces on the front page.”

Uh, Pat, the worry isn’t what has happened since 1972, but what has happened since 2001. Get a clue. Or else admit that you’re spinning a line here.