OPINION
Off The Record
Continued from preceding page
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Commercial
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Franklin Bank
NBD
Manufacturers
Mich. National
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Per
Deposit
Item
Per
Deposit
Slip
Per
Account
Statement
Per
Check
Drawn
Per
ATM
Deposit
-0-
-0-
$1.10
$1.00
$0.90
$0.95
$10.00
$16.00
$15.00
$14.00
$15.00
-0-
-0-
$1.00
$0.90
$1.00
$0.95
.10t
.104
.104
.1 OC
.231
.244
.234
.234
*As of March 1, 1992
Franklin
Bank
N.A.
358-5170
FDIC INSURED
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THE JEWISH NEWS
he wanted to make a corn,'
ment off the record, he had
to indicate that preference
prior to his remark, not
afterward.
"Since you didn't do that,"
the reporter advised the El
senator, "I fully intend tor:,)
use that quote."
The senator, a normally,,
soft-spoken and composed
man, blew up. He shouted
that in all of his years in
public office, this had never --
happened to him and that c
this journalistic behavior
was an outrage. Then,
turned directly to me and
asked, his voice rising, "Are
you planning to use that
quote, too?"
I'll never forget the sink-
ing feeling because I knew':
that, no matter what I said, I
was dead meat.
If I agreed not to use the
quote because, whether or I
not the senator said the
right words at the right '
time, his intentions were°
clear, and if he saw the quote
appear he would feel '21
betrayed, then my more ex- J
perienced colleague would
conclude that I'd wimped
out, caved in to pressure
from an angry U.S. senator,
and become a blot on our
profession.
But if I agreed with the
Sun reporter, the senatoir—'1
would probably have a
stroke on the spot or, worse,
throttle me right there in
front of the rabbi and my
professional colleagues.
As I mumbled something
about needing to first reflect
on the context of the situa-
tion, I realized that while <
the Sun reporter was cor-
rect, technically, he was
wrong, ultimately.
Because any relationship
between a reporter and his
subject is based on trust,
once that trust — however
vague or ill-defined — is
broken, the journalist has
lost.
rJ
There are no easy answers fl
So much depends on the
cumstances. But in general,
you rely on your instincts —
and you can usually tell
when you are stepping over if,
the line, from helping the !
reader to betraying the'
interviewee.
People being interviewed
need to understand that
when journalists dig for in-
formation, they are only do-
ing their jobs. But jour-
nalists have a responsibility,c
when interviewing people, to
spell out the ground rules up ID'
front, so there are no sur-
prises later. After all, the
only thing we have going for
us is credibility, and once we
lose that, we're finished.
And that, dear reader, is
on the record. [i]