-- [applause] i would like to thank our national press club staff including the institute for organizing today's event. you can find more information about the national press club on our website. if you would like to get a copy of the program please check out our website at >> at conversation about journalism. than a forum on regulating technology and innovation. now the annual polk seminar at long island university. the awards are conferred annually to honor special achievement in the journalism. it is a panel discussion with some of the 2012 winners. the moderator is former "the new york times"correspondent john

darnton. this is about an hour and 40 minutes. >> good evening, ladies and gentlemen. my name is david steinberg and i am president of long island university. i am privileged to welcome all of you to what is the beginning days of the 63rd george polk award. it is extraordinary that this award has gained in strength and stature over the last decade. this remarkable man who was pursuing the story and murdered because of it. then of course there was a complicated second half of an investigation launched into who

killed george polk, leading to some of america's most distinguished journalists participating at the very beginning of the cold war. we are proud and privileged to keep his memory alive and celebrate him. iis evening's activity -- think we started, we were discussing whether it was 21 or 20 years ago. i think it is 21. what we suddenly realized was that at a lunch which will take place tomorrow where everyone is allowed a minute or so to speak. some obey, some not. there is a sense of russia. so we decided we would create -- sense of rush. so we decided we would create a

seminar for students, members of the working press and others interested in the topic. to invite several of the award winners to have a chance to talk about what they did, why they did it, how they did it, what happened as a result of what they did. this has grown handsomely and i mentioned to ralph, this is the campus-based part of the program. we have students throughout the room. hopefully they will take heed from you good people and do some of the things you have done. ralph just received the award for lifetime scholarly achievement. his most recent book is on fred friendly. we have a major program in the

journalism. it is separate from the george polk award but intertwined. so i welcome you. i am thrilled you are here. it is now my privilege to introduce the curator of the polk awards. a man of himself extraordinary achievement, holding two polks and a pulitzer. you had been editor of a virtually every section known to humanity over the years of "the new york times," including some that did not succeed but that is another discussion. ladies and gentlemen, let me turn it over to our good friend john darnton. [applause] >> thank you very much. welcome to you all. this is a seminar titled " getting the ungettable story."

i want to thank harvey simp son who is here and very passionate about investigative report -- reporting. a donor to the program. my colleague, ralph. i see some judges here. we have our lifetime award winner in the audience. [applause] the executive director of al jazeera english has flown over, john blair. he is here somewhere. i am sure i am forgetting some people so please forgive me for that. as most reporters can tell you, some stories are just simply hard to get. and they may be hard to get because the very institution you are covering is premised on

secrecy or because let's say you are covering the crackdown of an outdoor tank -- authoritarian government and it wants to keep your footage off the air. or maybe you are a war correspondent in the middle of libya or afghanistan. as winston churchill remarked, i think he said something about in war, the truth is precious. she must be surrounded by bodyguards of lies. finally, what if you have come with a wonderful, horrible scandal that involve revered people and people do not want to pay attention? we will be talking about these and other case histories today. we have a very strong panel. let me introduce them and get the discussion going. to my left, jane mayer.

one of the country's most preeminent investigative reporters. for the past 17 years, she has been on the staff of "the new yorker,"specializing in politics and national security. she went to school in new york. graduated from yale university. studied at oxford. then decided to go straight and worked for some small weekly newspapers in vermont. she worked 12 years at "the wall street journal" where she was the first female white house correspondent. she has also been a foreign correspondent and war correspondent. she found the time to call off their two books. one of the nomination of clarence thomas to the supreme court. feel free to ask for any supreme court questions later. the other on ronald reagan's second term. yorker" -- she is

known for exposing practices on the war on terror. torture, detention at guantanamo, the so-called rendition flights to countries that torture people. the surge in the cia -- search in the cia for legal justification for what president bush used to call enhanced interrogation. all these things and more she examined in her best-selling books of 2008, "the darlk side." to her left is may ying welsh, the staff camerawoman, journalist and filmmaker for al jazeera english.

she has worked for the pan arab news agency off and on since about 2003. she has ventured into dangerous parts of the world as a one- woman -- she has reported on the u.s. bombing and invasion of iraq, the rebel camps in darfur, mass killing in southern sudan and insurgency in northern yemen. in san francisco where she was raised, her mother was a documentary filmmaker. her works, among other things, dealt with the tangent and military service of japanese- americans in world war ii. her father, here tonight, has a fascinating background. he is a retired postal worker

and at one point was a reporter for ramparts magazine. she studied classical arabic at berkeley. and later at the american university in cairo. she has worked out of the rome bureau of cnn and beijing as a freelance editor and camerawoman, covering everything -- the seize of chechnya, the earthquake in turkey in 1999. to her left, c.j. chivers of "the new york times." he is the war correspondent's war correspondent. he is known for his courage, resourcefulness on the battlefield, knowledge of tactics and strategy and finally for his expertise in weaponry, in particular,

ubiquitous ak47 about which he has written a definitive biography. a fascinating and a portable called simply, -- book called simply, "the gun." after graduating from cornell university, he joined the current -- the marine corps serving in the gulf war. he was honorably discharged as captain in 1994, went to columbia graduate school of journalism, worked at the providence journal in rhode island and joined the "new york times" in 1999. part of his legend there is that on september 11, he sprinted from police headquarters to ground zero, remaining at the site day in and day out for two

weeks. abroad, he has had numerous assignments, including a four year stint as a moscow correspondent. and a specialist in war zones. to his left, sara ganim. at the age of 24, she won acclaim for breaking the story of the penn state sex abuse case revolving around assistant football coach jerry sandusy. and for staying ahead when the story spiraled into a national scandal. she was born in detroit what race in fort lauderdale. she went -- but raised in fort lauderdale. she went to high school there and fell in love with journalism. she went to penn state and majored in journalism, graduating in 2008.

she worked for the local paper and state college -- a dentist a college, pennsylvania. while there, she began to hear rumors about jerry sandusky's behavior. but it was not until she moved on at the "patriot news" that she was able to gather enough evidence for a first page story in march. then a strange thing happened. not much of anything. for the most part, the story was ignored. it was not until november when she wrote about an indictment that was imminent that the outside world began to grasp the scope of the accusations against jerry sandusky and the university's failure to act upon them. thank you all for coming here. i apologize for my voice. you may have to talk amongst

yourselves for a while. i will like to start with you, jane. did you tell us about your story involving thomas street, a high official in the national security agency who ran into trouble? >> first i also want to say i am really honored to be here with the rest of these guys. when the reporting on this story, the only threat was the high calories from the diners were i was interviewing people. tom drake was somebody who work inside the nsa, totally secret national-security agency. he had become a whistle-blower. he had seen things that he was really upset about -- huge waste

of money. billions. he was very concerned that he thought the agency was violating civil liberties in a huge program. he understood because he was a computer expert. but the time i got to this situation, he had been charged for leaking supposedly to a reporter at "the baltimore sun" his concerns. he was being charged under the espionage act and facing the possibility of life in prison. so it was a moment that basically any reporter knows, the lawyer for this man was saying what ever you do, do not talk to a lawyer. reporter. and he had not talked to anybody at least on the record. my mission was to see if i could somehow get him to speak to me.

it turned out he was not alone. he had a small group of friends who had also become disgruntled together. and they had all been rated by the fbi at gunpoint in the most incredible circumstances and were all certain they were being spied on by the nsa and that their e-mail was being looked at. they were afraid to make phone calls. so i felt like i was dealing with the super paranoid. these guys really had enemies. one of the puzzles was to me was to figure out how to communicate with them. >> did he talk >> how did you get him to open up? what happened was i had help. there was somebody who i had introduced literally eight years earlier. i had stood on her doorstep and she was not home but i left a

note. she is a lawyer in the justice department who was also it was a lawyer in the john walker lindh case. she ran a center for whistleblowers and have been working with tom drake. by the time he had been prosecuted, president obama was president. we were supposed to be interesting -- entering a new regime of a president who was a constitutional law professor. i was curious about whether some of the people who had been whistle-blowers' during the bush years about the abuse of government -- and uses of government would be dealt with differently under president obama. >> may, your documentary which is really chilling, you can see it all on youtube -- "shouting

in the dark." we have a segment of it. let's give you the flavor of it. [clip] >> by rain. and i linking them with the shia muslim majority -- bahrain. where in the shia muslim are a majority. only to find themselves alone uncrossed. -- and crushed. this is their story and al jazeera is the witness. to follow their journey of hope. with the carnage that followed. this is the arab revolution that was abandoned by the arabs.

and forgotten by the world. >> i encourage you all to seek it out on youtube. how did you manage to get into bahrain? you went in on a tourist visa. what are the conditions like? >> at the beginning we were allowed to come in as tourists. we started filming in following the protests going on. there was a revolution in full swing. we started following a round the protesters. everything was pretty normal and then the crackdown started. it came in waves. it would crack down on protesters the pullback. -- then pull back.

then there was the final crackdown when saudia arabia was invited into bahrain by the ruling family of bahrain. they started arresting everyone who ever associated with the democracy protests and torturing them. some of them were tortured to death. with that phase happen, that is when it became very difficult to work there. >> how do you do it with the cameras? do you hawaii the camera? but in the beginning, -- did you hide the camera? >> in the beginning, we had the camera out. then we had to start putting it into a purse and going around wearing a hijab. i want to recognize my colleague in the audience tonight. he is a bahrainian journalist.

[applause] he risked his life and freedom to work on this film. he basically help me move in this environment which was nothing but checkpoints. you cannot get from point a to b without going through checkpoints. you could be arrested, did your equipment arrested -- taken. -- get your equipment taken. we have to hide from authorities. we were staying in a hotel. then at a certain point, we -- the regime came looking for us at the hotel. so he warned me that they were in the hotel. so we moved to an apartment building. we were there for a few days and the police came looking for us when we were not there.

we had to grab all our stuff and pack it in five minutes. i moved to an abandoned office space. the regime in bahrain attract journalists and anyone they need to monitor to the mobile phones. we were basically after march 25 or so on the run from the government. >> and you were the only journalist there? >> journalists came and went. see an end came for a few days. then lost interest -- cnn king for a few days, then lost interest. we were the only channel that state. became early and did not basically leave until the crackdown was so deep in complete that it was not possible to work anymore. >> chris, he spent most of the

past year in libya afghanistan. i am interested especially in libya. you went in mr. rough -- went into miserata. how did you get there and did you have an escape plan? what was a situation like there with the gadhafi forces all- around? >> it was surrounded on three sides. the fourth side was water so the only way in was by boat. when they started going, we got on one. we went in for about a week. it was a full on siege. the people had swords and stones . by the time we got there, they

captured some weapons from the gadhafi forces and figured out how to fight. perhaps because their circumstances were such that it was truly fight or die. a lot of the libyan fighters could run away in other parts of the country but here they did not have that alternative. through the school of experience, they began to not just stop the gadhafi forces were they penetrated the city but beginning to turn them back. but you could not quite tell that. the city was being randomly shelved. you could not step into some of the streets because of the snipers. the people were essentially alone. there were very few journalists getting the story out. we did about a week. we left. other journalists came in. then it was a mass exodus after

two were killed. we decided this is the kind of story you train your whole -- whole life for. we stayed until the seat broke. only three or four journalists were there. -- seige broke. only three or four journalists were there. >> is it true you have a disguise? >> there was no way to rely on ships to get you out. there were fishing boats doing some smuggling and tugboats as well. but they were pretty closely held coming and going. the bay had a very high sea conditions. and the city was strong on long -- strung along the coast line. the port was at the far east. we went to far west. so at the road to get cut, we

would not reach the port anyhow. i decided i was reasonably fit and had an understanding of these guys. if the road gets cut, they are not going to surrender so i would just go with them. i will change into local close. -- clothes. i thought this particular group of rebels with a fight. they turned out to be some of the toughest rebels in libya. i thought if the door gets closed behind us, we would just stay. >> sara ganim, how did you first hear about the jerry sandusky scandal? how long did it take you to pin it down? how many resources did you have for your story? i first heard about it right after i graduated from penn state. i had been a part-time reporter

and a small paper. there were seven and a half reporters there. i was that half. when i graduated, they had a full-time position for me but they were going to split it up. until they found someone to take the other half, i said i could have a seat until we find something. i really wanted to prove to them that i could have the entire beat. it consumed my entire life. i was really trying to create a story -- my main focus was to build a good source base. i think that would be the way to get that story that would prove to my boss that i could do this. i got into this habit of asking people after every conversation,

no matter what it was, i would say what else is going on. tell me what else you know. what else should i be working on right now? a lot of times it led to my trash pickup is not regular or my son's soccer coach does not play him enough. ridiculous stuff. this is small-town pennsylvania. but occasionally it lead to something good. it was probably 11:00 at night. i was working on a story on related and asked a source at the end of the conversation what else is going on. this person told me well, actually, jerry sandusky has been accused of molesting a child from a charity. to be honest with you at the time, he was 10 years out of retirement from football program where he was mostly known for the charity -- but he was mostly known for the charity.

i vaguely remembered jotting his name down on a note, putting it on my computer screen and say i will look tomorrow. because it was late at night. that is how i first heard about it. i tried to follow up. >> was that a police officer are somebody who was knowledgeable about the grand jury? or can you say? but i really do not want to. -- >> i really do not want to. that person they call me back six days later and said that thing i told you, forget it. it did not turn out to be anything. >> the ultimate confirmation. >> exactly. i really could not get anywhere for a good amount of time. brick walls. it was not until a couple of months later at the annual golf tournament for that of that, that charity, and jerry sandusky is not there. and he is always a big speaker

there. i asked somebody where he was and they said he has family issues so he is not here this year. then i asked somebody else and they said he has health problems. so that was really when the story took off at that point. how many sources -- it took, i think we counted somewhere around 25 people i talked to. some of them for one or two minor details, others for 5 1/6 different interviews. -- 5 or 6 different in terviews. we only had one person on the record who gave us something sough -- substantive. we set a high standard for how many unnamed sources we were going to need before we went with it. we landed on five. but independent people we felt would not know each other otherwise. >> you were very confident by

the time -- >> at 4:00 -- strange take away from this. i was teaching a journalism class at the time at penn state. this thing breaks in the morning. i went in for four hours and got on the road, drove up to state colleges. , clasper when i left commentary said as he had put out a statement through his attorney -- and when i left my class, jerry sandusky had put out a statement through his attorney saying he was innocent. we knew. >> let's talk about sources. jane, how to cover such a secret organization? are other people in who descend on policies -- dissent on

policies to are willing to top off the record? or are these people you have known for years to trust you? >> in this case, one of the sources was somebody you i had formed a bond with eight years earlier. you never put out a phone number. it does become much harder in washington when you are writing about national security to get people to talk to. because of the kind of prosecution of people who are sources, which is what whistle- blowers' often are. i have had a number of sources who had been investigated by the fbi. the legal term is it chills things. and, boy, is that not a metaphor. it is for real. when you are a reporter, you

cannot get people on the phone suddenly. they are aware that their own cars -- phone calls are being monitored and they may be prosecuted just for talking to us. so it has been increasingly difficult in some ways to do so. syria and the figuring out other ways to meet people. -- so you end up figuring out other ways to meet people. i have not gone to underground restaurant -- underground garages but some really bad restaurant. i have had people over to my house. he was so wound up that he came at like 9:00 in the morning and left at 9:00 at night. my daughter was upstairs and finally said to me afterwards, is he okay? he looked a little bit nuts. but people when they're about to

be prosecuted for something that might put them for life -- away for life, do have that kind of look to them. and that became -- i had one moment of doubt. i was interviewing officials at the nsa trying to knock the story down. they wanted to kill it. there was one especially affect official, a woman, who basically said -- i feel so bad for him. he is just not well. and she went into this whole thing about he has family problems, it is a recurrence in his life. but the time i left i was thinking, maybe he is not 30. -- sturdy. it was a rashomon thing for a

bit. but with the help of this was a lawyer lawyer and his colleagues -- whistle-blower lawyer and his colleagues, able to confirm the story. but that kind of insidious "i feel so bad about him" was tough. >> major charges against him were dropped after your story. >> that was incredible. i cannot take credit for it. but it was unbelievable to see the case of rubble. i think the judge did not buy it. -- case unravel. i think the judge did not buy it. it went from 35 years possibly to him and pleading to a misdemeanor. in order to get this thing over with. he had refused to plea-bargain all the way through because he

absolutely would not be -- can see to something he did not do. everybody wanted him to cut a deal. at some point he was on the phone with me, crying. literally. you'd not want to become a participant in the story and he was saying what should i do? i was not likely to -- i cannot give an opinion on this thing. but anyway, it was incredibly gratifying to get the case exposed for the fraud it was. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] >> where his now? >> he works at local apple store . i feel so lucky. i have someone else to [unintelligible] >> may, your sources -- i am thinking about the doctors at that abbas hospital. some of them paid a price.

>> right. almost every single source we had was arrested and tortured. every person that spoke to us. so can you imagine the chill that puts on thigns? ngs? nobody wants to talk to you after they see that everybody who talked to you before is in the prison and being beaten and forced to drink urine, etc. stuff that leads you scarred for life and makes you question whether you should have ever stood up and say -- stood up and say i would like democracy or ask for anything. basically what we had to do after that chill was being which drivearaihrain to people's houses unannounced. i cannot call on the phone because there all monitored.

i would wear a hijab with my camera in the back and offered to talk to them with a silhouette interview or filling nly their hands. - -- filming their hands. some people were so scared that they were afraid their silhouette would be recognized for their hands would be recognized. or that the furniture in their house would be recognized. people were so afraid. but there were some very brave people that were so determined to get the truth out there that day were willing to take risk and continue to talk to us. >> were some of the workers at a the hospital also tortured? >> yes. the doctors, nurses, medical staff. one medical staff person who was

not arrested but tortured -- he was always calling me continuously. people have this need to get the truth out there. because al jazeera was the only channel that was always there. people felt that no one was paying attention to their story. they felt really alone. the world paid a lot of attention to egypt and tunisia and at that point was paying a lot of attention to libya yet somehow bahrain wasn't registering. it did not matter. so they were really -- this one guy who was a medical staff worker at a hospital was taken down to the market by the police and the army -- the morgue. he was tortured. they do a lot of humiliation stuff to people, forcing them to say things that are embarrassing.

he came and told me they were doing this stuff and i was begging him please stop talking to me. and they told him you have been talking to a journalist, haven't you? that was the main theme of his torture session. the journalist he had been talking to was me. but that also makes it hard for you because there is possible guilt. >> of course. i was telling him, let's stop this now. we do not need to keep going. then other people would send me an sms sein thank you for your concerns, please never talk to me again -- saying thank you for your concern, please never talk to me again. and pray for me. >> do you think the fact that you are a former marine captain helps you in situations where you deal with the military? do they seem to trust the more because of that? what is your secret? i know you what a lot of trails

with guys living their life as they do day in and day out. does that help you get a sense? >> being a former marine and infantry officer, i used to lead in trade for patrols. it cuts both ways. it does help. but it also hurts. people often expect you to enjoy and circulate the prevailing narrative, even when it is false. sometimes you are on patrols and you see things happening that are much different than the way they should be happening. as a journalist, you cannot speak up. you cannot be direct the patrol. >> even if it is going into a dangerous situation? >> you are there not to lead the patrol. you are a journalist. the patrol is perhaps an essential thing on the military level but terrible on this human

thing. at any moment, any of these people can be killed. you do not want to influence that in any way. you are just there to document. t it. that can be very difficult for it i went on a patrol where someone got shot through the spine. i did not speak up beforehand. there is a reason you cannot speak up. >> if you saw somebody was -- >> it had to do with some particular military reasons, some drills that you go through. you take contact at certain ranges. the patrol put itself i thought on the wrong side of a canal. there was a threat on the other side of michigan and on that side. they took fire and could have lived through it. this would have had to stay there in the wide open. i almost said something like are you sure you want to go this way? i did not.

they went that way and they came under fire and got shot. but had i said something and they had gone to the other side and someone got shot, that casualty would have been on me. and i never could have gone out again. but it is to not just with the military. with the libyans as well. you would be around them all the time and there is this prevailing narrative, everybody wanted to celebrate the heritage of the uprising. but they were dangerous and their commanders were often staying way back from the front. these young libyans were getting killed foolishly. and killing flawlessly. -- foolishly. this is not a popular narrative at all. it needed to be told. sources were not sources in the traditional sense. i would collect the battlefield

debris, witnessed the stuff myself. i would identify the weapons being used, who they were being used by a report what the facts showed without going to someone to confirm it. because i had been there. >> rerecording if it was critical? >> i would not try to write a story that would redefine -- i thought my job was to write a chip by chip account of what i could document. it was kind of like a creeping tight, not like one big way. -- tide, not like one big wave. >> you want it -- one of the prevailing narratives was the bombs were meticulous and not leading to many civilian casualties. >> it was that it led to zero

casualty's and that was easy to document. >> what did you do in that it to wishing? what there were a few different steps. they dropped a bomb beside me and that was a helpful experience to see their statements on something i had an intimate experience with. they tried to say it did not happen and they gave a bunch of statements. the was another occasion where they bombed a group of the anti gadhafi fighters and they killed 13 of them and they denied that. they deny that for six or seven months. they issued statements saying we have looked at this closely which is why we are delaying our answer but we want to be sure of the facts. i cannot go out to it that day. i waited in went out later and i collected all the bomb debris,

identified interested right back. i spent a lot of time going to different sites, documenting who was killed, gathering death certificates, retrieving bomb debris from the rubble. simple forensics. figuring out where it had been manufactured, what it was. making very clear that it was only nato inventory. nothing that was in the gadhafi inventory. we had in the end about 27 pages of facts and mammals, pictures -- facts and memos, pictures. nato was not interested in receiving them. b. presented this to them and give them several weeks to reply we presented this to them

and gave them several weeks to reply. they did not contest. what did they change the policy at all? >> it is hard to tell. nato is an unusual organization that stands for on the surface transparency, civilian control of the military. yet when you go to nato and sable like to talk to about this particular event, there is anonymity whereby each country that participates in nato on the operational level announced -- anonymously. you do not know which country dropped the bomb. so each country and its public, the nation itself does not necessarily know. so when you go to nato they will say you have to talk to the host

participating nations about this. the nation's say you have to talk to nato. at the end of the day while the campaign was mostly for size, there were a number of mistakes. >> is it true that you discovered a spanish cluster in addition that had not been used before in war? but there is a type of spanish bomb that had never been used and no one knew it had been sold to the gadhafi forces. i had a strong hunch of what it was. but you do not want to say this is a spanish cluster on a hunch. there were no available open source photographs of this thing. there had been a number of

casualties. you could observe them being used. i gathered up a lot of the debris. i had friends in the community that disabled bombs so i took these images over night and sent them to friends out of the military. these guys are for guys and they were able to go into some publication they have and they came up with the identification of what exactly this was. we were able to establish that -- we were able to say that very clearly. they later denied it. i found the export licenses and was able to show that they had been transferred into libya. >> sara ganim, your story appeared at the end of march.

it was not widely picked up. why do you think that is? but i have tried not to guess at the answer. the things that i heard from other reporters was that because our story was sourced, 90% sourced by people they could not verify because they were not named, there was a good degree of skepticism that it was correct. what baffles me about that was that even after jerry sandusky said are facts were correct, he was innocent, there was still a lot of reporters with and pennsylvania -- within pennsylvania that said we would never run that story if we had that. people told that to me, my boss. they were very clear.

they said you have ruined that guy's life if he is not charged. our response is always, we did not say he was guilty. he said he is under investigation. and if it does not lead to charges, we will write that as well but this is a fact, a truth. it is under investigation. and more than one alleged victim has come forward. but still, i love the news organizations did not want to touch it. -- a lot of news organizations did not want to cut it. i do understand on a more national scale -- espn picked it up. ap did a rewrite. i can see organizations saying who is "the patriot-news?" >> it might have been different had you worked for a major national paper or something? >> i do not know the answer. >> maybe they were not able to

mask your sources. picked it up./ >> they probably attributed it to "the patriot-news." >> some of that, yes. i did not hear much feedback. but i think what was disheartening was to hear it from other local reporters. >> then suddenly in november when the indictment came, everyone rushed in and it became a major story across the country. >> at that point the story was a lot different. there were days where i counted only one day -- i had 86 interview requests. from reporters.

>> so they felt comfortable that there was a paper charging the man? >> yes. also at that point, there were things we could anticipate what we did not feel comfortable clothing -- putting out there before the charges. it was not publicly known that this was going to engulf the university, a charity, the governor essentially. we had a pretty good grasp from where it could go. even for us, i would like to think that we knew as well as anybody -- i was completely shocked when joe paterno was fired. i just did not see that coming. i did not see even the firing of the penn state president coming. i do not know that answers your

question but i think it really took on a life of its own very quickly. but there were demonstrations in favor of joe fraternal. did people -- joe paterno. did people turn on you? >> things working at a rapid speed. because of the rioting in protest on the campus, i would go into an interview for an hour and i would miss three events that were breaking. there was one time that i did get a little nervous. these are 500 or so drunk college kids. and they are wririoting. i was going to 1 and of the compass to another. i found myself and a

photographer -- i cannot even tell you where we were. but it was clear that we were media and they started screaming obscenities and threatening that they would come after us. i thought they are probably not but it really take just 118-yeaa good idea -- 18 year old to think that is a good idea and come after us. a couple nights later, they turned over a news van. at that point i got a couple of e-mails saying we wished " you were in the newsstand. -- you were in the news van. >> katar is a part of the gulf cooperation council. what kind of reaction did your

piece get from the authorities in bahrain? >> there was tremendous pressure to remove the film from the air. this film was a huge scandal in the gulf. this was a very embarrassing thing for the bahrain regime to have the things they did exposed -- the tortures, killing, disappearances, archer a writ -- arrests -- arbitray arresrts. and for qatar -- there is a firewall. whenever a country like saudia arabia or kuwait doesn't like something on al jazeera, the

protest to qatar. the first thing that happened when the phone went on -- the film went on the air, within minutes of it being over, the former minister of bahrain sent out tweets criticizing the film. they are relatives of the bahrain family and they did not understand this was an independent film by al jazeera. there was a diplomatic protest letter and peeper insiople insir that hated the film. the was a lot of pressure from

people saying how dare you hear this pack of lies against our brothers -- air this pack of lies against our brothers. instead of removing it from the air which would have been a disaster, al jazeera created some extra programming around the film to give the regime in bahrain a chance to give people an opportunity to debate. people were attacking members of the ruling family over social media. >> it was broadcast in english but not arabic. >> right. then somebody in bahrain translated it and put it up on you too. it got half a million hits in english and arabic. >> so many people there have

seen it. but everybody in barain have seen the film. also saudia arabia and kuwait, united emirates -- arab emirate. it is the only real document of the arab revolution that happened in the gulf council state. there is not another comprehensive document that shows exactly what happened. people wanted to see this thing they had not been allowed to see. >> sees a right at the very beginning -- you say right at the very beginning -- by the way, she shot, edited, wrote and narrated it, but you say at the very outset there is a sunni shiite split.

that must be almost inflammatory for many of the royal family is in that region for which that is also true. was that an item that caught their attention? >> it is just a fact that they are majority in bahrain but even hearing that fact spoken out loud makes people very angry. the proximity of iran to the loud makes people angry. the proximity of the air and to the gulf coast makes it extra sensitive. yes, to an american auditory western audience, this film is, i don't know, some of -- somewhat explosive.

for a community of people that don't talk about these things publicly, this film was a bomb. >> you're dealing with a lot of hidden issues. jane, you mentioned that most of the previous work had been about abuses under the bush administration and obama came to office with promises of transparency. but he has had more prosecutions of governmental whistleblowers in his administration than any of his predecessors. he has not been able to close guantanamo. do you think the situation in which this country is, with the sense of threat, is one that is

leading to a notion of civil liberties? i worry that it is. the national security community has become so entrenched and powerful in washington. it is very hard to push it back. politically, it is hard to push back in congress. some of not closing on, now -- not close in guantanamo is some of the opposition obama got

before tried to do. they did not get very far. i don't think they did a priority. with the drone program and prosecution of those who are critics of these programs to reporters, i think it is a big worry. i don't see it as necessarily over. there is a lot of turmoil in this. there is a big role for the press to play. >> chris, what you think of the drone program and reactions to that when you're on the ground. , when you get into the mind of a pakistan who sees a drone coming overhead?

what about the american fighting man? you documented some of the frustration they felt. this was in october, not long before the major incidents. what is it like on the ground? >> for the average person that is fighting the war, that is not an issue. drones are politically potent. impact not especially will. they do not have a heavy payload. the typical infantry platoon is much more concerned about what is going on a few miles around it and that will be inside afghanistan, unless they're a border unit. so you deny hear a lot of discussion about -- so you do

not hear a lot of discussion about the rounds. it is a much larger issue when you get next to the border. when you get next to the border, the current generation of troops who have been -- who have essentially inherited real estate that was occupied and developed in a military sense by units years ago, the local occupation and the local fighters, where the bases can see and where they cannot say, the current generation of fighters or there are in many ways like sitting ducks. it is such a hot war around them. i have been to firefights were

people turn to me and say, hey, can you tell my congressman about this because i cannot. >> how do you answer that? you say i am writing the story. >> that is why we're here. that is why we what are you walk. for a lot of the troops out there now, they are there for institutional and personal reasons. i do not think that, in the rank-and-file, there is a lot of hope. that they will be will to reorder afghanistan the way that there were told when they joined that they might be able to. in a lot of respects, they are out of ideas. >> is the u.s. losing the war? >> losing and winning -- how would you define it? there is this broad list of tasks that was set out to do

after 9/11. will the u.s. succeed in bringing women's rights to afghanistan? will the u.s. have an effective strategy over a -- in a governmenttreating that is moderately what it is supposed to be? the answer to all of these questions is of course not. the list of task is a long -- is so long. it is not a matter of winning or losing. it is a matter of acceptinreachn acceptable level from which to withdraw. >> since 1 of the reasons that we went into afghanistan in the

first place was to protect the united states against allocate at and terrorism, -- against all al qaeda and terrorism, is there at least that to? >> i am hesitant to answer that question. the question if afghanistan is safe now or a breeding ground, you can say, in some ways, it is less so.

the threat has migrated. is that success? is that value? is the price of blood and time and the credibility of the nation -- i ask people on the and d, let's draw a line and say we are trying to bring water to this village. we can do that. to beingonnect that safer in a shopping mall in cleveland? no. >> if you have a question , there is a microphone.

i would like to ask a larger question about sex abuse cases. you heard when there was this strange epidemic of charges against nursery schools, one in california, one in boston, one recently in new jersey. workers who were prosecuted and were in some cases sent to jail who were led by people who believe strongly that there was satanic ritual. it was a very strange period in the history of american psychological epidemics. it is a very touchy issue, but said. you have covered other sex abuse

cases. what is the best way to oppose this as a problem? should we have websites with the names of sexual predators'? have you balance -- had you get to the truth of a case? had you ensure that people are not accused unjustly or not allowed to continue if they are in fact guilty? >> i try not to have a silver bullet answer to a question like that. but i can say that really the only rewarding thing about this experience for me has been the amount of people who are talking about sex abuse, not just child sex abuse, but all six abuse. very early, after the charges were brought, the psychologist for one of the alleged victims said to me, you know, this boy,

who was 17 at the time, had seen that coming ford was a good thing because the allegation -- coming forward was a good thing because the allegation was in syracuse. child sex abuse victims who were then adults, because of these people, i will tell my story, too. i think that is the biggest problem. we don't talk about it so we don't educate ourselves about it. i know that there is now this push for the sex abuse registry and a lot of states are deciding not to comply with it because of the way that it was set up. there were strings and the cost of it and the personnel that it takes to run something like that. i don't know what the answer is on that level.

but i never interviewed a victim who said to me later on i wish i would have kept this to myself. i have never had that. i have always admired the strength of victims who are talking to me. i imagine it is a very difficult thing to do. i think that is a situation where it is incredibly difficult to make that decision and i do think that talking about it is important and not just for the victims, but for those of us who don't understand it. that is how we educate the next generation. it is incredibly important. if you have a question, just step right up to the microphone.

>> my name is edward hershey. chris, you're no longer an infantry captain. you're a journalist. you put yourself in danger. who do you speak to about, if at all, the risk-reward aspects? do you touch your editor? to your loved ones? to yourself? >> why we do what we do is pretty easy to answer. i get afraid on sundays, very afraid. but a lot -- i get afraid some days, very afraid. i had a conversation with somebody very close to me, with my wife not too long ago.

i said, i don't know how many of these firefights we have done. we lost track a long time ago. and sometimes you're not afraid. and she said, well, you know. i am your wife and these are your kids and we are terrified. so why do i still go out? i have been going up all these years? the answer is, when you take that measure, sometimes used a back -- and the answer is that it is for the readers. it is not for me. if there is something i don't know and i am still trying to find it, i will keep going out. if there is something to learn out there and i think there is, there is good news reason, i will show you the risk. if there is no news reason -- my 's father isrtner in the audience. sometimes we will sit and want

to do something and we will say to each other, hey, if this one goes bad, what does the guy who does not get hurt tell the family? was there a reason for what we are about to do, a news reason? is there something here that the readers in the united states and beyond the united states understanding this more fully? if not, we're just repeating this experience. we need to back up. we need to do not our families at risk and not hurt ourselves. it comes down to all of these issues that you mention. if i got on this one, cannot justify it? if you can not, you might die.

story thatelling a simply would not be told and you have the courage to do, sometimes, the stories are not quite like that. sometimes the stories are a little more familiar. and there are days where i say i will not do this one. i might come away with a set of notes. we will sit this one out. inelastic, there have been many days like that. -- in the last decade, there have been many days like that. >> a good question. >> i am an adjunct professor at nyu. there are stories of teachers and the school system having affairs with some other

students. do you think there's a difference when the alleged perpetrator is a male or female in a way that it is reported? >> that is a good question. i would like to think not. i know this question came up a lot in the beginning of this scandal unfolding. several people said to me -- and i was at a panel on penn state a week after it happened -- if the eight alleged victims had been girls instead of boys, would we be here? would we be talking about this? with the reactions have been the same? that i can know answer that. but i do know that in central pennsylvania, there's definitely a reaction -- let me back up. i think the reaction to hearing

the rumors was different in this case in central pennsylvania then there would have been if they had been girls, it the rumors were that jury sandusky had been accused of abusing little girls. i think that the reaction in a town like that would have been different. but obviously, i don't have any proof that it would have changed. either the course of the investigation or his career or if he had left. i have no indication. >> thank you. >> hello, my name is nancy. i am a regular citizen who believes in the importance of good journalism and want to congratulate all of you for a rally where the profession that you have chosen and that you have done. my question is to john and jane.

john, you had mentioned that, in the obama administration there is more prosecution of whistleblowers, i was very surprised and disturbed to hear that and i would like to hear you or jane speak to that as to why that might be. >> we're talking about government will whistleblowers. we are up to six. the highest it had been before was 3. it has roughly doubled. as to the reason, as jane for the easy part of the question. [laughter] >> i think it represents a mind- set in washington, which is that we are still ostensibly in a state of war, the war on terror,

and it is global. his starkly, in american history, -- historically, in american history, these stories have been loaded. i went to an off the record conference with some of the top people in the legal advisers at the cia and others in the intelligence community. some of them are political appointees in the obama administration. they really don't like the press. i thought it would be different somehow in a democratic administration. but they really think that we are weakening the country by writing about some of these issues. what is troubling to me is that there is a very fine line between writing about things that might be national security

concerns and writing stories that may be embarrassing to them politically. like everybody else on the stage here, i think the bottom line for all of us is really that we really believe that telling the truth and getting it to the american public so they can make large decisions about their own democracy. that is what we are all here for. we really believe in getting that information out there. i can tell you that it is not a unanimously held position at the top of the national security community. >> my name is matt. i am working journalists. the doctors that appeared in your phone, they stated that they were -- in your film, they stated that they were working objectively. but others said that they were

working with the protesters. why were the doctors targeted? was it because they were speaking with you? did you see any evidence of their activities? >> the doctors and nurses, the first thing they did that upset the government was that they were assisting the protesters who had been beaten or shot by a regime and they allow that to be filmed and documented. they let me come in and fill all that stuff, which was incredibly -- and film all of that stuff, which was incredibly embarrassing. the other thing they did was defied the government. the government was told them no ambulances. we will send our military ambulances. we decide who gets help and when.

and some of the hospital staff defied the orders and sent an ambulance anyway. another thing that a set them is that some of those doctors and nurses were politically opposed to the regime. some did protest in their off hours. in general, there was a mood in bahrain, a revolutionary mood, where everyone was hoping the protesters, except for some regime loyalists. the hospital became a safe space for the protesters and that upset the government. at one point, the charges were set against the doctors. thatf the charges was they had created injuries in the

protesters and invited the journalists to document that. that is the level on which the government was dealing with the doctors and nurses. >> i am the chief editor of my high school newspaper. last year, when i saw it, the crowd was cheering and i wondered why. they were cheering the death of osama bin laden. me, as a person, personally, do not think that humans should be celebrating the death of another man. what is your take as journalist who sees the turmoil that terrorists because society? [laughter]

>> i had this conversation with my daughter. she was in high school last year, too. she was out as a crew member on the potomac river and cannons were being shot off to celebrate. she went to a quaker school and she was very disturbed about this. what can i say? first of all, as a reporter, i feel uncomfortable in some ways opining about things anyway. i don't take great pleasure in anybody's death. but i thought that -- it was not something i wanted to jump up in the streets about. but i sort of thing, and i told her, that it was a justified

death. >> as journalists, i think my reaction to that would be trying to cover the people that were covering osama bin laden's death and figure out why they were celebrating his death and look more deeply into why did they think that way. what are the values that america represents that are different from osama bin laden? i would more investigate it as a journalist and use it to understand and help others understand. >> where did you say you heard this cheering? >> a baseball game. >> so it was a crowd reaction. people were already assembled. there may be some mob element to it. but i think there is irrelevant response to that. but think you'd have to take the very wide survey.

i was in his rodham -- i was in misrata in the middle of a firefight. i woke up and we were sleeping on the side of the building. we figured out where many of the shells are coming from and we put ourselves on the far side of the building where we thought we could take a direct hit from some of their fertility and survive it. food supplies were still ok. but there were worries about fuel. there are worries about getting a lot of laborers out and a whole mess of tactical and humanitarian problems. i woke up and my colleague said

some choice words and said that osama bin laden was dead. and i thought, we're busy. this places busy. i have seen 9/11. i have seen the costs of 9/11 parent and the cost of western reaction to 9/11. i have seen the world get up and did -- but ended -- up ended. i was struck by where was that of thed the irrelevance sa information. >> my observation that there was that i found, in the city where i was living and from reading of

a people's coverage, a lot of those people were young. i think what chris was saying about mob mentality might play a little bit into it. but you have to remember that i am that age. so those young people were old enough when it happened to remember a world before 9/11 and also young enough to see that their lives going forward will be tremendously changed by that. i think that plays into it. i think that they feel, even if they had no -- i am sure every american feels personally attacked. but the point of view when you are young -- i think if you asked some of those people who went out that night and cheered in 25 years if you do that again, they might say no. when i covered the riots after

the joe paterno firing, i asked people why are you out there? they would say, because my friends are here. because it is a historic night. i was on his front lawn.. about 20 kids were on his front lawn just staring at his house. you could hear the roar downtown of the street fights coming down and the riot that was happening. there were 5000 kids downtown and there were 25 on his front lawn. i asked what made you come to his house instead of going downtown? they said i'm going to downtown next. i just wanted to come here first. it may have something to do with youth. >> we are in overtime. we have time for a two quick questions. >> great panel.

it would be wonderful to ask you all questions. but i will ask one. you work for an interesting hybrid beasts. could you explain how that works? could you explain who aljazeera english is and who aljazeera is and what the overlap is? what is this beast? >> al jazeera started out as an arabic channel. in 2006, it launched english. they have two separate buildings and have separate staffs. i think the editorial decisions they make are more for an arabic-speaking audience. and for the english channel, it is more what is of interest -- i don't want to say a western audience because we do have

viewers in india and others. >> it is astonishing what you can do on al jazeera english cannot be played for the interested parties in the arab world. anyway. -- in a way. >> i don't work for the channel anymore. i cannot speak to their decisions at this time. i can only talk about the editorial decisions on the english channel. bahrain in the dark was only aired on the english channel. >> my name is harvey simpson. i am a world war ii and korean veteran. when we won in germany, we put

our military colonels and captains in charge in every town and village. the germans cooperated in all cases. now you have a situation where religion is involved in this war in iraq. there have been fighting each other for a thousand years. do you think anything we have done theire be successful? i feel like everything we have done there has been a complete waste. i have one more question about afghanistan. we have been in afghanistan for good reason. we defeated the taliban and have them on the run. now we leave 10,000 men and concentrated on iraq. how do you feel about that? had we