The Atlantic's Jeffrey Goldberg on MSNBC: OK fine, it's not good enough to rely on anonymous sources

Now he tells us.

Jeffrey Goldberg is the editor in chief of The Atlantic, and is the one responsible for the anonymously sourced claim that Trump refused to visit a European cemetery because he thought American war dead were “losers” and “suckers.”

This story has been disputed on the record by at least 12 people who were there, and have attached their names to their accounts. Goldberg didn’t interview any of them. He based his account on four people who insisted on remaining anonymous, which means there is no way for us to assess their credibility apart from just taking Jeffrey Goldberg’s word for it.

On Monday we discussed at length the problems with relying on anonymous sources. Now someone else acknowledges the problem with relying on anonymous sources, and that person is Jeffrey Goldberg. The crucial portion starts at about 4:45:

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He knows he’s got a problem relying on anonymous sources. But he doesn’t blame it on the weakness of his own reporting. No, of course, he blames it on Donald Trump. Why, if everyone wasn’t so afraid of Trump, they’d let their names be used!

Let’s consider that. If you work in the executive branch, you might be hesitant to publicly malign Donald Trump because he’s your boss. That’s not because Donald Trump is especially scary. It’s because people always get in trouble when they publicly malign their bosses. This is why we said in Monday’s piece that anonymous sources are liars by definition. They are either betraying the journalist by giving them false information, or they’re betraying their own employer by giving out information they’ve made a commitment not to share.

If this was really Trump’s fault, then it would stand to reason that Trump would be the first president ever to be widely attacked by anonymous sources in the media. He is clearly not. He is probably the one who’s had to suffer through it the most, but every administration sees backstabbers run to the media to anonymously push their own personal agendas.

Here’s a question for Jeffrey Goldberg: We were always taught in journalism classes to get all sides of the story. Why didn’t Goldberg talk to any of the White House staff who were present at the event, and were willing to put their names to the information? I’m talking about the people who have been all over Twitter since Saturday disputing every word Goldberg wrote. Why didn’t he contact them as part of his reporting?

The answer is obvious. He didn’t want to hear what they had to say. He only wanted the narrative his anonymous sources were pushing, and if he interviewed someone more credible who disputed that narrative, he would have had no story.

He realizes the weakness in his own reporting. But that’s what you get when you’re only open to one version of events, because an agenda is driving your reporting.