In a recent interview with Democracy Now[1] Greenwald talked about the status of his relationship with the Guardian at the time he went to Hong Kong to meet Snowden, and it made me view his move to create The Intercept in a very different light. Here's a quote:
"I had only worked with them for eight months. My deal with The Guardian was I write whatever I want, and I post it directly to the Internet, and you don’t interfere in any way in what I’m writing. So I had barely worked with any Guardian editors at all, let alone on a story of this size."
Here's a quote from a recent interview he gave to the Guardian:
> The move [to create his own journalistic enterprise] was audacious and bold, but when I raise it with him he's in a surprisingly reflective mood. He's had some feelings, if not of regret, then perhaps of a little guilt at having left the Guardian at a time when the NSA disclosures were still blazing. "I don't want to say betrayal, that's too strong, but a lack of loyalty ..."
That's beside the point though. What matters are the disclosures. Not who makes them and not the newspaper where they appear. The disclosures are all that matter.
Not only that, The Intercept (or actually, First Look Media) has hoovered quite a lot of high-grade journalists.
I'm slightly miffed because they got Matt Taibbi to leave Rolling Stone.[1] And I'm still waiting for his first piece with FLM. Man must be wading neck-deep in documents and politics to keep him from writing.
