Fitzwater opens up to student reporters

by Caitlyn Blood
The Presidency and Press

“Good things do happen. That’s a good way to end this right?” said Marlin Fitzwater, former White house Press Secretary when he spoke to student journalists Tuesday.

The Presidency and Press group was given the chance to interview Fitzwater today in smaller groups. Fitzwater arrived and greeted the student reporters with a short introduction of himself.

He spoke about growing up in Kansas as a farm boy and working on school papers. When asked about his transition from print journalism to politics, Fitzwater said, “By the time I’d graduated college, I had already worked at four newspapers. I wanted to go to Washington, to the big time.”

Fitzwater told the students they could ask him anything in the group interviews.

One question was brought up about the change in technology in journalism. “The biggest change in journalism came from satellite and internet,” said Fitzwater. “The satellite allowed us to have pictures anytime. The information on the Internet is so vast. We’ve become a society that’s so tuned in to tweeters that they won’t take time to read newspapers. There’s an industry in the internet.”

Questions of security leaks to the press came up. “I never found much reason to get excited at leaks,” he said. “I started off thinking I was opposed to [publicized leaks in security], but now that it’s happened, there hasn’t been any harm with it. People have a right to be embarrassed if they do dumb things. People have the right to know what their government is doing.”

Fitzwater ended reminiscing of his days as Press Secretary. “Some nights I would go home and think, ‘I helped my country today. I helped my president today.’”

He also mentioned his proudest moment – meeting Ted Williams and Joe DiMaggio.

“There’s nothing better than to be recognized by your heroes,” said Fitzwater.