Why do you think commit a crime or run for presidency is

all the same?

People want to satisfy a gruesome need and journalists, thanks

to stars (or politicians), can supply them with what they long
for. This can be quite dangerous as what matters is circulation
and money. Truth comes second.

What matters is not the actions you are likely to do but how
offbeat, squalid, unusual they are.

Ex. the Watergate (R.Nixon)

Why can you say journalists are gumshoes?

Gumshoe=
Cop/copper=
Sleuth=
Police officer, detective=
Private eye=

Journalists have turned into police officers as they have to find

out scandals to be published. They no longer report events but
scavenge/ collect salvaging materials to be printed.

scavenge - Search for and collect (anything usable) from

discarded waste. people sell junk scavenged from the
garbage (chercher, fouiller)
salvaging - something extracted (as from rubbish) as
valuable or useful (rcuprs, sauvs)
 Muckrakers and whistle-blower
muckraker so. who seeks out and exposes scandal, esp concerning public figures;
To rack muck, mud, shite, shit
whistle-blower - one who reveals wrongdoing within an organization to the
public/the authorities (lanceur d'alerte? Informateur ? (informal) personne qui vend la
mche)
To blow the whistle dnoncer; to blow the alarm cord ( on trains)

Journalists are interested in unveiling concealed stories. They are sometimes blunt
and do not spare politicians telling a few home-truths.

concealed secret, covert, veiled

To conceal- to hide (cacher, dissimuler)
Blunt abrupt, direct, frank (direct, brusque)
Literal meaning: [blade] peu tranchant, mouss; [pencil] mal taill, point
home-truths - unpleasant facts that you learn about yourself, usually from someone
else. (vrit dsagrable)
to tell somebody a few home truths - dire ses (quatre) vrits quelqu'un
The most famous is Bob Woodward who
unveiled the Watergate scandal. He works
for the Washington Post, a liberal
newspaper.
In the UK Craig Murphy hit the headlines. He is a former
ambassador to Uzbekistan and refused to condone torture
simply because it was part of the war on terror initiated by
the Bush administration.
 MI5 and MI6
officers have to sign
the Official Secrets
Act, which means
that if they discuss
their work with
anyone, they could
be imprisoned

SIS - the British

Secret Intelligence
Service (MI6)

Richard Tomlinsson (ex SIS officer)

-was imprisoned in 1997 for giving information about his career in the Secret
Intelligence Service to an Australian publisher
- left the UK to live in exile. He published his book The Big Breach in 2001 in
Russia
 MI5 -
Military Intelligence, Section 5

David Shayler - MI5 whistleblower

- ex MI5-officer
- he was jailed for breaching the Official Secrets Act
- He claims that MI6 funded Islamist fighters to assassinate Libya's Colonel
Gaddafi
Annie Machon also ex-MI5

Annie Machon also ex-MI5 officer who left the Service at the same time as
David Shayler, her partner at the time, to help him blow the whistle.
Edward Snowden - ex NSA (National Security Agency)/CIA employee
- leaked to the media details of extensive internet and phone surveillance by
American intelligence.
The scandal broke in early June 2013 when the Guardian newspaper reported that
the US National Security Agency (NSA) was collecting the telephone records of tens
of millions of Americans.
Wiretap - mettre un tlphone sur coute
And last but not least !