THE EVENTS of this week show that there are at least two things you should be careful about when you’re looking for the truth - wiretapping journalists and buying Pravda (The Truth).
Listening-in to journalists’ phone calls can tell you who their sources are, what information they have, and how they use it. But that’s not a plus. That’s the problem. One that Defence Minister Ľubomír Galko should have realised regardless of why he allowed the wiretapping to happen.
That is not to mention that the number of people monitored by the military secret service seems to be growing every day, feeding suspicions that Galko was becoming entangled in a web of conspiracies he himself wove. But given that revelations, both old and new, show that previous governments were involved as well in dubious spying, it would be unfair to blame Galko alone.
Nor is it the case that politicians and spooks are the only ones with a problem. The taps have revealed that some journalists have a closer-than-healthy relationship with politicians who may even have direct influence over editorial decisions. So far it’s only Pravda that faces a problem. But who knows what will come next?
Politicians, spies, journalists: none of them can be sure at the moment who might be the next target of a smear campaign and what that could reveal. And those are not good conditions when looking for sound policies and justice – or the truth.
