Steele is a jerk. Officers go with their units PERIOD. Harry had no more say in where his unit goes than any other officer, or enlisted man for that matter. Exposing him made him, and those around him, bigger targets than they already were.

I wonder if Mr Steele or Mr /Drudge was one of the people in Pince Harrys' unit woudld they have revealed the story and out a Target on them?? Or if they had a son ar Daughter there would they have put a Target on their Backs??

I think your ethicist is all wet. Using his logic, there's no compelling reason for any person to go to Afghanistan as an army officer. Unless, of course, royals really do count for more than the rest of us plebeians.

The real reason for him to go was to show that he doesn't value his life above that of his subjects. That's a good reason for a future leader to go to war. Would that our president have had the same courage.

As a retired newspaperman, I was somewhat surprised to see myself voting with the majority on this question. I understand Mr. Steele's position, and have taken it myself in the past. You are right, but there's more to it than that. As a member of the royal family, Harry is a special case in everything he does. This wasn't a question of national security; it was a question of personal security for everyone in his unit. Mr. Steele, consider saving your absolute stand for more important issues.

The only reason this is an issue is because the source that revealed the information. If the source was the New York Times the poll would have been 92% the other way. The British goverment was using Harry for propaganda and those that agreed were helping the effort.

Call your copy editor: "highly regarded," like all adverb phrases, does not take a hyphen. The "-ly" on the end of the word sits in for the hyphen.
At least now I know that the Times' obsession with hyphenated phrases starts at the top.

Steele may be a highly regarded journalism ethics thinker, but he is still on the side of the journalists. There is also no compelling reason for journalists to report that Prince Harry is serving in Afghanistan. The only reason they would do so is their greedy need to be the first to break a story on a man who unfortunately will never be allowed to live a normal life. Journalists who defend sensationalist reporting in the name of "free speech" and "independent press" need to rethink their own morals and the impact their actions have on real people. Prince Harry, unlike Britney Spears, did not choose to be famous. His life, once again, has been interrupted, his privacy invaded, in the name of a good story. Shame on the press.

It seems that Prof. Steele doesn't get out to live in the real world very often. In the real world, we don't think in terms of only doing something when there is a "compelling reason" for it. We just try to do what is right. Somehow, I suspect that those who judged Prof. Steele as "the most highly-regarded journalism ethics thinker in the country" are just other journalists who are as likely as he is to suffer from myopia about their profession's proper role in the world.

Finally, the fact that the secrecy DID hold for many weeks shows that many journalists ARE willing to do the right thing (even if it may hurt them professionally). We in the public should support them by focusing our opprobrium on the Drudges of the world.

Steele says Harry had no special "duty or skill that was irreplaceable," so there was no reason to send him in the first place. He apparently disregards Harry's role as a royal and national figurehead. I'm not a particular fan of aristocracy as a system, but it's stupid to discount the effect of seeing the son of your country's highest social class fighting alongside the "regulars." That is, in fact, something Harry did that was irreplaceable.

The rest of his "argument" appears to be supplanting his unilateral judgment for that of the organizations that made the agreement as to what an "appropriate" time limit would be or whether it was "worth it" in terms of journalistic principles.

Hardly the type of rigorous analysis I would hope to receive from "probably the most highly-regarded journalism ethics thinker in the country," but I guess that's the state we're in.

I have to agree with the original two posters. Even if a combat soldier isn't a member of royalty, there are overwhelming reasons to not publish who is sent on a deployment.

No matter the reason, publishing the fact that Prince Harry was in Afghanistan with his unit did nothing except deny British soldiers the services of one of their comrades for no good reason and subject them to a higher level of danger than they deserved to encounter. Likewise, it did nothing to enhance the reputation of the non-mainstream media and the fact that this agreement was adhered to by the British media and not Mr. Drudge is a tremendous feather in the MSM's cap that they will not hesitate to use in ongoing debates regarding their (and for that matter, your) relevancy in the digital personal-publishing age.

If Mr. Steele is indeed a gatekeeper of journalism ethics, then it is apparent why those discussions are even taking place.

It seems to me that the prince had a compelling reason to go to Afghanistan: To show that he didn't place himself above his subjects the way George Bush did when he was a lad. I'm sure to Harry it was a matter of personal courage and integrity. To live life as a whole person he should not have to paint a target on his back saying "shoot me."

Not a justification for the risks taken? As far as I can tell the only person taking risks was the young prince. He was simply doing what generations of royalty have done in that country - serve it. Like Lord Mountbatten, or his uncle Prince Andrew (who was a helicopter pilot in the RAF during the short but violent Falklands war). Prince Harry just has the bad luck to be living in a time when the press feels entitled to know everything regardless of who or what it hurts. To live in an era where the cult of celebrity is encouraged by a press corps that believes they have the right to access all aspects of a person's life. It is the same feeling of entitlement that killed this young man's mother. So pardon me if I find the idea of a "journalism ethics thinker" a bit silly. Because as far as I can tell he hasn't really thought about this at all.

Journalism ethics, isn't that something of an oxymoron?

Mr. Steele's comments imply that journalistic principles and an independent press trump at least the patriotism of Prince Harry if not all patriotism and at the extreme the defense of freedom; without which we have no independent press. I really believe there is a common sense compromise in there somewhere.

Your dear ethicist is nothing short of a moron. So the Good Prince elected to do what 2nd Lts do ... go to war with his unit and not send someone in his place. His job probably wasn't essential, 2nd Lts rarely are ... unless you are one of his platoon. Mr. Ethicist ... get a life and suck your head out of the dark and dreary place it now rests. Drudge not only dropped the ball ... they, in this case, invented it for their own use.
WT

Re "edit"'s post: "highly-regarded" is a compound adjective modifying a noun, and therefore should have a hyphen, or have the rules of English punctuation changed since I went to school way back when?

Speaking of journalism and ethics, where does the Seattle Times and their editor at large, Mike Fancher get off incorrectly stating; "The news organizations were holding up their end of the bargain, but the information was leaked to the Drudge Report, which posted it online last week. Seattle Times readers said that was wrong."

The truth to anyone who cares to take the time to learn the real story is that an Australina magazine, New Idea, leaked the story and the Drudge Report merely picked up and reported on that leak 2nd hand after the fact.

For the truth visit the UK's Telegraph online for the story; "How the Prince Harry blackout was broken" by Caroline Gammell and she writes, "But details of his time in combat were published in Australian magazine New Idea and picked up by the US-based website the Drudge Report after 10 weeks on the front line. New Idea first published its story on its website on January 7 and then in its subsequent magazine edition."

Before we falsely go blaming Mr. Drudge let's blame the Aussie media and our own Seattle Times for not telling us the whole truth about this whole story.