Rein in Murdoch, not the press

Rein in Murdoch, not the press

Los Angeles Times: It is beginning to look as if respectable British newspapers might be collateral damage in the backlash against Rupert Murdoch and his sleazy underlings at the News of the World. Prime Minister David Cameron predicted that a special panel studying the tabloid phone-hacking scandal would make recommendations for “a new, more effective way of regulating the press.”

The possibility of new restrictions on the press is only one of the reactions to the scandal in which Murdoch’s reporters hacked into the telephones of an array of unsuspecting people. But it’s the most ominous.

No one, journalists included, should defend the hackers. Their behavior — including the now-infamous deletion of messages from the cellphone of a missing 13-year-old girl — was unforgivable, unethical and most likely illegal. But, even tabloid reporters and editors shouldn’t be supervised or second-guessed by government. If laws were broken, the lawbreakers should, of course, be prosecuted, but new restrictions on the freedom of legitimate journalists to do their jobs are uncalled for.

Granted, the press in Britain long has had a more intimate relationship with government than its American counterpart. There is no British equivalent of the 1st Amendment, and government there — including the courts — is less protective of press freedom than in the United States. But that is no excuse for intrusive state monitoring of the workings of a newspaper. For example, Cameron wants to keep track of the “contacts made, and discussions had, between national newspapers and politicians.” That sort of “regulation” goes far beyond the hacking scandal and intrudes on one of the most basic functions of journalism. Why should Cameron’s government be informed each time a British reporter talks to one of the prime minister’s political opponents?

The hacking scandal and its aftermath have made for a delicious drama. But regardless of what one thinks of the 80-year-old Murdoch and his out-of-control employees, his newspapers should enjoy the same freedom to gather the news as others, within the limits of the law. “Regulation” of the press — on either side of the Atlantic — is incompatible with a free society.