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The controversy surrounding Harry Reidâs remarks has occupied the nationâs political press since they broke late Friday
night.
But a second controversy lurks behind: did John Heilemann and Mark Halperin, the authors of Game Change, the book reporting the comments, âburnâ Senator Reid by reporting his analysis of how candidate Obamaâs electoral chances might be affected by being âlight-skinnedâ and bereft of âNegro-dialectâ?
Itâs a complicated argumentâmade no clearer by missing information from all of the main participantsâstemming from confusion about the terms. While the authors have so far declined to state that their source for the quote was Reid himself, the senatorâs office has said thatâs the case.
Halperin and Heilemann insist they havenât âburnedâ anybody. Further more, they outlined a definition of âdeep backgroundâ in their authorâs note, and suggested those were the terms of all the bookâs
interviews.
But it seems that Reid has been telling people he feels like he was âburnedâ by the authors, perhaps because he never had the terms of the interview explained properly to him. While thereâs evidence suggesting some of the fault lies with his staff, even at the highest levels of politics, how far should journalists go to make the terms of their conversations clear to their sources? And what would be the consequences if reporters were more explicit in this regard?
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