Here’s one true journalist I admire: Ben Bradlee, the vice president and former executive editor of The Washington Post. His career reached the top when secret Pentagon Papers were published and also when Watergate affair was finally cleared out. Ben Bradlee decided to bring out government papers concerning The Vetnam War and also authorized Post staff reporters Bernstein and Woodward to work on Watergate story. Hailing from Boston, Massachusetts, reporter Bradlee became close friend with Senator John F. Kennedy. In 1961, the journalist was promoted senior editor and then managing editor at The Washington Post. Nowadays he’s retired as executive editor, but continues to serve as vice president of the paper.
On the other hand, no one says that a great career is made only from achievements. Bradlee had his own moments of doubts. In 1981, Washington Post reporter Janet Cooke won a Pulitzer Prize for “Jimmy’s World”, a tale about an eight-year old heroin addict. Cooke’s article turned out to be based on fake information which forced Ben Bradlee to present personally apologizes to Mayor Marion Barry and the Chief of Police of Washington DC for the Post’s fictitious article. Cooke was forced to resign and relinquish the Pulitzer.
Years after, in 1995, vice president of Washington Post published his autobiography: A Good Life: Newspapering and Other Adventures, confessions included in an hour-long documentary called Free Speech: Jim Lehrer and Ben Bradlee and broadcasted on PBS on June, 2006.
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