Ask The Post

Byline: Larry Roberts

This Week: Larry Roberts , deputy assistant managing editor for investigations, was online Wednesday, August 3 at Noon ET to field your questions about The Post's investigative reporting.

The transcript follows.

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Larry Roberts: Hello and welcome to this edition of Ask the Post. I'm looking forward to your questions so let's get started.

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Rockville, Md.: I assume you have comparatively few reporters dedicated to full-time investigative work at The Post. At the same time there are probably thousands of bloggers doing their own brand of investigating all over the Web. Think about the CBS/Dan Rather story. Be honest -- don't you think blogs will someday overshadow the kind of work you do, if for no other reason than they outnumber you?

Larry Roberts: The jury's still out on blogs. Are they the media flavor of the month, or a revolutionary invention, something that will morph into an important source of original information and journalism? Right now, almost everything I see on blogs is opinion or analysis, and usually goes off on something that's banging around in the mainstream media. I've long been able to get all the extra opinion and analysis I need, from magazines, cable TV and talk radio. So that doesn't seem especially revolutionary, not yet. Of the good investigative work that's been done by some bloggers -- you mention the CBS affair -- much of that has been reporting on the media itself. Worthy watchdog role, but only a tiny slice of what the press does. Newspapers have invested a century figuring out how to do investigative journalism, and the big ones spend major time and money on traveling, gathering information, editing it, checking with lawyers, and so on. That seems hard to duplicate in a small Web operation. Still, there are a lot of smart and talented people out there who aren't connected with the media establishment. They may well figure out methods and styles that will make them tough competition. Good. Bring it on!

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Washington, D.C.: Do you think the jailing of Ms. Miller (NY Times) will have a chilling effect on the willingness of reporters to investigate issues that cross into intelligence or national security areas?

Larry Roberts: It's a excellent question. It's always been The Post's policy to go after the stories that need to be told, to publish them and then deal with the consequences. And the top editors here have made it clear that won't change. I think that's true of most major news organizations. It's possible that the Miller case might have an effect on the willingness of sources to work with the press, at least temporarily. But I hope not.

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Washington, D.C.: Mr. Roberts, in the wake of Jayson Blair and others, what's the most important thing aspiring journalism students should know about anonymous sources? Also, is Post policy on the use of anonymous sources spelled out anywhere for readers to see?

Thanks.

Larry Roberts: Good question. There's a difference between a routine anonymous source -- someone who doesn't want to be identified by name in a routine story on, say, a baseball player trade deal -- and a confidential source who is risking his or her livelihood by coming forward with critical information. We try to minimize our use of the former by trying hard to get people to speak on the record. The second case comes up a lot less often and it's a careful process that involves reporters and editors. I do believe the Post's policy has been published somewhere, though not by us, to my knowledge. But the basic elements are not secret. We try not to use anonymous sources unless absolutely necessary. An editor must know the identity of every anonymous source used by a reporter. Those are a few of the key points.

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Silver Spring, Md.: Thanks for taking questions.

A political investigation will help either the right wing or the left wing. At The Post, right wing investigations - Whitewater, Vince Foster, Swift Boats, Dan Rather, etc., seen to get much more coverage than left wing investigations - WMD, Downing Street Memo, senior level administration involvement in abuses at Guantanamo Abu Ghraib, and Rovegate. In the case of both WMD and Rovegate, the President used a successful strategy of stonewalling tactics to prevent inquiry by the press until enough time passed and the investigation itself became essentially irrelevant.

How does the political slant of an investigation determine how much energy is invested? Is their an institutional presumption of administration credibility, while dismissing investigations of the administration as wild eyed "conspiracy" theories.

Larry Roberts: One of the hardest things to explain to people outside the newspaper is the lack of a political agenda in the kind of investigations we tackle. The Post's goal is to explore and explain topics that have a key importance to public policy, to act as a watchdog on government and other institutions. What we choose to investigate isn't based on who's in power at the time or the efforts they undertake to block our work.

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Washington, D.C.: Do tipsters ever compel you to launch an investigation? If so, how do people contact you anonymously? Any story examples?

Larry Roberts: Yes, tipsters are certainly one important way we find out about something worthy of examination. I wouldn't want to cite examples, since we protect those people. Hey, tipsters: my email address is robertsl@washpost.com.

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Anonymous: All I hear people complain about is someone getting arrested on the Metro for eating and drinking and how stupid it is then the contradictions come flying when they complain about the trains being dirty. Has or would The Post taken the time and do an investigation on how Metro is handling this problem? I know security is priority number one, but a clean and comfortable Metro ride should come in a close second.

Larry Roberts: Our metro reporters recently published an excellent series on the Washington Metro system that should still be available on our web site. It may not deal specifically with the passenger rules but it describes the transit system's overall problems with maintenance and funding.

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Washington, D.C.: Your comments about the challenges facing blogs is very consistent with my analysis of how freedom of expression is expanding and collapsing simultaneously. Since bloggers don't have the money to dig up the big dirt, they're limited in the impact they can have. In fact, were there a blogosphere during the days of Watergate, then the scandal may have become a third rate burglary that launched a hundred thousand different views on presidential campaigning in the 70's. No one is reading off the same sheet of paper or viewing the same web page or electronic broadcast anymore. So how does public opinion move itself toward any conclusion on any subject worth investigating?

Larry Roberts: You pose the question very well. On the one hand, letting a thousand flowers bloom in the media world often shakes things up and leads to a stronger press. Witness the alternative newspaper movement in the 1960's that energized the mainstream press, even though many of those alternative papers went away. On the other hand, the more splintered the audience, the less agreement there is on what are the trusted sources of news and information. That can make it harder to get general agreement on the objective facts, which muddies the debate on any issue.

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Washington, D.C.: What is your assessment of the level of investigative journalism at The Post on the subject of Bush administration claims of Iraqi WMD prior to the Iraq war?

How about the Bush administration's ongoing manipulation of intelligence since the Iraq war? And what about Bush's highly suspicious deals with Harken, the Saudis, and the bin Ladens? In the 90's we saw a ton of investigative journalism into Whitewater, but virtually nothing on Bush. Why?

Larry Roberts: On the pre-war WMD matter, Howie Kurtz and others have done good reporting on the gaps in our work. The paper published some good stories at the time, given the difficulty of reporting on such sensitive subjects, but we wish we'd done more and deeper work. On your other point, I don't agree that Bush has gotten a free ride, and our many conservative critics certainly don't see it that way.

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Arlington, Va.: How do you handle situations where you are interviewing a government official about a story and they indicate that the information is or should be kept confidential in the name of "national security"? How are these dilemmas actually resolved in practice?

Larry Roberts: Over the years the newspaper has faced this situation many times. Typically the top editors listen to the arguments of government officials and make the decision about whether to keep something out of an article. I couldn't say how often it happens but after considered discussion we certainly have withheld details that could potentially pose a problem for American troops or other aspects of national security.

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Alexandria, Va.: Face it--for all the high-minded talk about public service, aren't you mostly just interested in winning journalism prizes? Doesn't ego and self-interest drive this kind of coverage? It must--you make such a big deal about it in the paper every time one of your people wins some journalism contest. If public service is your goal, why not forgo entering prize competitions altogether as evidence that the public weal, and not individual journalist's egos, are driving investigative coverage?

Larry Roberts: Fair question. Reporters and editors are like everyone else; we have multiple motives. If ego and self-interest were the main ones, though, I think they could be found more easily in other lines of work. Most of the people I know in this business are motivated by a sense of public service. But sure... they enjoy recognition from their peers that they've done outstanding work. Still, your idea about contests is interesting.

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Washington, D.C.: What type of story regarding public figures is newsworthy enough to warrant serious investigative efforts? Obviously, items dealing with corruption or illegal activities warrant investigation, and we have seen investigative reporting regarding ethics lapses. But, are "private" matters for individuals off-limits in all cases? I could easily see how some "private" matters could affect public perceptions about an individual or reveal hypocrisy in a public figure's public comments and private life. To this end, is it ever acceptable to investigate, for example, somewhat reliable rumors of philandering, substance abuse, discontent within a family, etc. if they are not tied directly to someone's public life?

Larry Roberts: It's a tough call sometimes. The Gary Hart story in the 1980's opened the debate on such stories. Private matters involving private people, if they don't involve crimes, should only be news stories in the most extraordinary cases. But when it comes to public figures it's often harder to judge when such things become relevant to their public roles. Hard to answer in the abstract.

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Astoria, N.Y.: I start my day by reading The Post, the NY Times and the LA Times. I figure between the three I have a full understanding of what is going on. I imagine papers collaborate within a company, my question is do competing companies ever collaborate on investigations? I salivate at what the three institutions I mentioned could discover with combined resources. I find some of the most interesting non-traditional news sources to be those that compile information and bringing together the resources of say The Post and the Times would prove a tremendous force.

Larry Roberts: Interesting idea. But vigorous competition might get at least as good results as collaboration, don't you think?

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Fairfax, Va.: Since you assert that The Post has not given Bush a "free ride" when it comes to investigative reporting, can you back that statement up with several examples of investigative reporting The Post has done in the last few years or that you are working on now regarding Bush's mendacity or is everything you regret missing just water under the bridge?

Larry Roberts: Well, without commenting on your characterization of President Bush... As always the paper has committed a lot of daily and investigative resources to the important stories of the day. Just one example: the national, foreign and investigative staffs produced many stories about the war itself and about Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo. As far as the future goes, our reporters never like me to talk about what they're working on, for some reason.

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Washington, D.C.: What is journalism? Would The Washington Post consider it "journalism" if a Post writer just wrote what he/she was told by a single administration source without corroboration or cross referencing by others, the approach made memorable by Woodward and Bernstein 30 years ago? Would The Post retain such a writer on its staff after he/she admitted that was his/her standard approach, or is today's professional standard merely not making stuff up?

Larry Roberts: I don't agree with the premise of your question. The Watergate coverage wasn't based on a single source, but rather was a classic investigation that involved many months of shoe leather, document work and interviews. Deep Throat was an important source and a source for guidance, but not the only source, as Woodward has said.

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Larry Roberts: Man, what a lot of great questions. We're out of time. Sorry I couldn't get to them all. Thanks for participating and hope to see some of you back next time.

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