Phil Taubman
Dean Baquet Returns to the Times as D.C. Bureau Chief
Colleagues:
After guiding The Times through toxic storms and rebuilding our bureau into a dominant force in Washington coverage, Phil Taubman is returning to his first love, the correspondent's life. Phil has chosen a new mission that capitalizes on his deep experience as a foreign correspondent, investigative reporter, military historian and editor.
He will be taking on a special reporting assignment in the area of national security; we've decided to be a little secretive about the details for now for competitive reasons. He will be based in California. He will also be promoted to Associate Editor--a title previously worn by one Times journalist, Johnny Apple. It signifies both Phil's stature as a counselor to the masthead and our expectation that he will return to senior management in the future.
When Phil accepted my invitation to leave the Editorial Page masthead three and a half years ago and take over our largest bureau, he can hardly have imagined what a roller coaster ride awaited him. In the years that followed he helped the paper deal with the imprisonment of a reporter, the murder of a revered colleague, the faceoff with a hostile administration (including one tense session with the President), vilification by partisan critics, and the general anxiety of an industry in transition. His tenure also saw a succession of journalistic triumphs that shook the country and brought a shower of awards. Over the past year Phil presided over a period of ambitious rebuilding and still more ambitious journalism. He leaves behind a bureau in which a cadre of world-class bylines has been enriched by excellent new hires. He leaves behind a great editing team. And he leaves behind a bureau that has taken to heart a mandate for incisive, original, hard-hitting coverage.
And the new chief of that high-octane bureau will be Dean Baquet. Back in 2005, when Dean moved into the top job in Los Angeles, I described him as "a world-class investigator, an inspiring editor and a barrel of fun." It was hard to miss the subtext: "And I miss him."
Since then he has demonstrated that, in addition to being all of those things, he is a charismatic leader, an unflinching advocate of the value and values of professional journalism, and a cool character under fire. It's nice to have him back where he belongs, at a paper where he can devote his talents and enthusiasm fully to the practice of journalism, in a bureau that can rise to all of his expectations.
The many of you who worked with Dean before he left us in the year 2000 know what to expect from a bureau under his leadership:tough-minded, aggressive, fearless reporting, original insights, great craftsmanship and the thrill of competition. He reminds you why you got into this business, and why it matters.
Dean will take over March 5, allowing time for transition and for a little celebration of two great journalists. He will be an Assistant Managing Editor, reflecting both the depth of his experience in the upper echelons of our profession and the cross-departmental importance of the bureau.
There are undoubtedly other consequences that will follow from all of this, and I can't begin to say what they are. But here's one: Felicity Barringer, Phil's accomplice in journalism and in just about everything else, will be taking her intrepid and prescient environmental reporting and beat to California -- which happens to be a kind of national laboratory for environmental policy.
Cheers, Bill
Phillips Back in Times D.C. Bureau
"I'm just glad to be back," Phillips said by phone March 2. Washington bureau chief Phil Taubman sent Phillips flowers welcoming her back to the bureau, according to two sources. In December, Phillips departed the Washington editorship after only 11 months. In January, the Times disolved the position of Washington editor and split the duties among three deputies. --Gabriel Sherman
Times Dissolves Washington Editor Position
Taubman's memo follows:
I'm pleased to announce or knowing the reporting standards you set for yourselves, to confirm the appointment of three deputy bureau chiefs: Rebecca Corbett for enterprise, Doug Jehl for national security coverage and Dick Stevenson for domestic and economic affairs and politics.
They need little introduction.
Rebecca is an exceptionally talented editor, great at unconventional thinking, working with reporters, refining complex stories and developing cooperative relationships with colleagues here and in New York. Those who have worked with her know that, and several of you have told me that you think Rebecca is the best editor you've ever worked with. More of you will have the chance to discover that in the months ahead. The Baltimore Sun won two Pulitzer Prizes for reporting projects she directed. In recent months, she has worked closely with Jim Risen and Eric Lichtblau on their groundbreaking coverage of the National Security Agency's warrantless eavesdropping program.
Doug has set the standard for intelligence coverage in Washington since taking over the beat two years ago. I know that not only as one of his editors and readers, but because his competitors at The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, The Wall Street Journal and other news organizations have told me so. With his background as a White House correspondent and Cairo bureau chief, and stints at the Pentagon, Doug is fully conversant with the full array of national security issues. He has been a prolific generator of ideas across that arena, has a knack for identifying and framing stories and has worked in productive partnerships with many reporters in the bureau.
Dick is a polymath on domestic, economic and political affairs. And he's no slouch on other issues. The breadth and depth of Dick's knowledge, combined with his precise reporting and lucid writing, have long given his stories a sense of authority and won him the respect of the Washington press corps. He can now put his keen intellect and package of journalism skills, and his gift for collaboration, to work across the bureau and the paper. Before moving over to the White House, Dick was the chief economic correspondent and earlier in his career he was a correspondent in London and Los Angeles. Dick, among his other duties, will direct coverage of the mid-term elections this year.
Working in concert with me and the bureau's band of accomplished editors, Rebecca, Doug and Dick will give the Washington report a lift and a new look.
The objectives of the management realignment are simple to describe but will require the collective effort of the bureau to achieve. We want to sustain the strong daily coverage and world-class exclusives that the bureau has long provided while increasing the number of high-impact enterprise/investigative stories and illuminating explanatory pieces. We aim to bear down on critical domestic and national security issues with aggressive, searching reporting that breaks news and explores government policies and actions that have escaped close scrutiny. And we hope to expand our coverage of the culture, mores and personalities of Washington.
The appointments come with an expectation by Bill, Jill, John and me that the bureau will raise its game to a new level and with a commitment by the masthead to provide the bureau with additional resources to help make that happen. There will soon be good news to report on that front. The bureau has lost a lot of reporting power through retirements and departures, and we are picking our own pocket by shifting Doug and Dick to editing jobs. To enhance the bureau's work, Susan Chira, Suzanne Daley, Matt Purdy and I have agreed to marshal the resources of our departments in a more coordinated way and to make the bureau the pivot point for coverage of cross-departmental issues like Federal health care programs and post 9/11 national security policies. Matt will visit the bureau frequently to ensure that we are all on the same page on enterprise and investigative projects and I plan to get together with Matt, Susan and Suzanne in New York at least once a month. We will confer as a group by phone every week.
Bill and Jill will be here on Tuesday to discuss all this at lunch. I'm sure you will have questions, suggestions and observations about the changes. Feel free to raise them with me and other editors.
This week will be a transition period, as Dick and Doug disengage from reporting and take up their new responsibilities. Everyone should be in place by next Monday, just in time for the State of the Union and the return of Congress. read more »
Phil
Off the Record
Off the Record
Times Washington Editor Phillips Out
Bureau chief Phil Taubman is scheduled to hold a brown-bag lunch meeting today to address the staff about Phillips' departure.
"There's a lot of confusion about what happened," a bureau member said. "People are upset."
Phillips was appointed to the position in October 2004, replacing Rick Berke, who moved to New York to become an associate managing editor. Bureau sources said that Phillips had clashed with Taubman in recent months. read more »
According to bureau sources, the Times is seeking to reorganize the bureau, which has taken heat from New York in recent months for falling behind on stories such as the Washington Post's expose of "black sites" where the United States keeps detainees abroad.
--Gabriel ShermanKeller Scrubs D.C. Trip, Stays in New York on Miller Business
Keller Memo: Editor Didn't Know Miller Was Receiving Leaks
Revisiting his go-slow approach to cleaning up after the WMD-reporting mess, Keller writes that "we fostered an impression that The Times put a higher premium on protecting its reporters than on coming clean with its readers." read more »
Keller then sets about fostering the opposite impression. He concedes that in Miller's contempt case, he didn't know--and that the lawyers did know--"the substance of the confidential interviews, the notes." And he suggests that, in dealing with Miller, he probably ought to have:Until Fitzgerald came after her, I didn't know that Judy had been one of the reporters on the receiving end of the anti-Wilson whisper campaign. I should have wondered why I was learning this from the special counsel, a year after the fact. (In November of 2003 Phil Taubman tried to ascertain whether any of our correspondents had been offered similar leaks. As we reported last Sunday, Judy seems to have misled Phil Taubman about the extent of her involvement.)
