Woodward has a long career dealing with creeps in politics, including Richard Nixon's CREEP (Committee to Re-Elect the President), so he's definitely been threatened before. He knows it when he sees it.
He says he was threatened, and since his reportage is known for its accuracy, we do best to believe it.
From CNN on February 27:
Veteran journalist Bob Woodward says he was threatened by a senior Obama administration official following his reporting on the White House's handling of the forced federal spending cuts set to take effect on Friday. "They're not happy at all," he said on CNN's "The Situation Room," adding that an e-mail from a senior administration official - who he would not name - communicated a message which caused him great concern.
"It was said very clearly, you will regret doing this," he said Wednesday.
According to a Democrat aware of the situation, it was Gene Sperling, director of the National Economic Council, who sent the email Woodward cited.
Woodward and Sperling have known one another for decades, dating back to the time Sperling served as a top economic adviser in various posts during the Clinton administration. Former Obama adviser David Axelrod, however, tweeted Thursday that the e-mails were "cordial."
This is like Gino and Vito paying a 'cordial' visit to the local butcher or baker in a Chicago neighborhood, cordially reminding him he needs to pay local fire insurance premiums, and local security guard service. After all, there are arsonists out there, and his three children attending these schools and that parish, playing on those soccer teams, playing with their friends in those other schools...why someone could target them, you know. All nice and 'cordial'-like.
These people make Haldemann, Erlichmann, The Plumbers, John Mitchell and Spiro Agnew look like rank amateurs.
Since Woodward 'outed' the threat, the tactic has changed: David Pflouffe, (2008 Obama Campaign Manager. White House Senior Advisor) is tweeting such gems as:
Watching Woodward last 2 days is like imagining my idol Mike Schmidt
facing live pitching again. Perfection gained once is rarely repeated.
In other words, we can't threaten him and get away with it, so let's just create the impression that he's senile, over-the-hill, not credible. Pflouffe's book is entitled The Audacity to Win, which is chillingly apropo. Truth be damned, people's lives be damned. Just win, every battle, every time. That's the only rule in life.
The sainted Mrs. OS saw the report on TV about Woodward's experience, and said, 'All those things you've been telling me about those people are right. It's all about power, once they get there.'
Thank you, Mr. Woodward, for telling the simple truth about these creeps.
It's up to the rest of us to to protect him; to push back, firmly, gently, politely, non-violently, every day. Otherwise, in short order, we will find ourselves living in a land like Argentina, once a gem of civilization, where journalists and citizens who dare tell the truth disappear in the dead of night.
