Supporters of the bill think that argument goes two ways, with the chilling effect extending to reporters’ inclinations to uncover information that contributes to the public good. They commonly cite the incident involving former New York Times journalist Judith Miller, who served twelve weeks in jail time after refusing to name the person who told her Valerie Plame Wilson was a covert Central Intelligence Agency officer.
“Confidential sources give us things like Watergate and Enron, and journalists don't like knowing that the iron-clad agreements they make with sources can be pried open by federal courts with threats of imprisonment, or actual prison time,” wrote journalist Chris Good in The Atlantic.
But difficulty in determining who qualifies as a journalist is only one of the many issues in determining what information deserves to be protected, said Gattuso.
“There are some very serious practical problems with how such a [journalistic] privilege would operate,” he said. “It would either operate in a very arbitrary unfair discriminatory manner that would privilege some members of the press to the exclusion of some members of the new press, or it could apply to anyone with a webcam or a cell phone.”
“Every citizen has to be prepared to give evidence when called, or subpoenaed.”