(Newswire.net — January 30, 2015) — The executive editor of The New York Times, Dean Baquet, believes his newspaper didn’t ask the right questions after 9/11.
In an interview with the German news magazine Der Spiegel, Dean Baquet, the executive editor of The New York Times, said he agrees with the criticism originally made by a NYTimes reporter, James Risen, who said The NYTimes along with other mainstream media failed their audiences after 9/11.
“The mainstream press was not aggressive enough after 9/11, was not aggressive enough in asking questions about a decision to go to war in Iraq, was not aggressive enough in asking the hard questions about the war on terror. I accept that for The Los Angeles Times and The New York Times,” Barquet told Der Spiegel.
Baquet, mentioned The LATimes because he was editor-in-chief of The LATimes before he became The NYTimes editor in May 2014. Baquet also spoke about the NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden having chosen to tell his story to The Guardian.
On a question “How painful was it as an institution that Edward Snowden didn’t approach The New York Times?” Baquet replied that it hurt a lot because someone with a big story didn’t approach The NYTimes, but The Guardian and The Washington Post which are considered smaller news companies. The real reason for Snowden’s decision of whom to approach is not quite known, however, Baquet thinks It was because The NYTimes had refused to publish the initial research about the NSA’s bulk collection in 2004.
Asked whether it was a mistake to have held back on that reporting, Baquet pointed out, reasonably enough, that he wasn’t working at The NYTimes at the time.
While The New York Times relies heavily on print, digital rivals are seriously close, Baquet said.
“I always thought that digital first was a simplistic notion, and I am not even sure quite what it means. It should be stories first,” Baquet said.
Taking a Charlie Hebdo story as a example, Barquet said, digital media is faster, however with less responsibility than printed ones.
“When you approach your print deadline, you have to do two things. You have to polish those stories that are online because print is less forgiving of mistakes,” Barquet said.