The Art of Leaking

Gerald Ford summed up how many U.S. presidents must feel about leaks: They're a "real pain." They might throw off your timing and frame issues in a way that is not of your choosing. They might narrow the number of people from whom you seek advice and force you to hurry actions in order to maintain surprise. Barack Obama, just now heading into Year Two, has already had an unpleasant taste of how anonymous sources can cause headaches, most notably in the run-up to his decision to send more troops to Afghanistan, as unnamed advocates and opponents of a "surge" duked it out in the press, and in the wake of the Christmas Day bombing attempt, as agencies rushed to blame one another for the security lapse.

But Obama hasn't seen anything yet. In Year One, new appointees like to think of themselves as on the same team and may even like each other, and Obama's people have an above-average record in this regard. In Year Two, expect to see a sharp uptick in the blame game, and other perilous intragovernment sports. The weapon of choice? You guessed it: the leak.

In any administration, it takes a little time for fault lines to appear, both in policy and personality terms. None of the famous rivalries of yore -- Henry Kissinger and William P. Rogers, Zbigniew Brzezinski and Cyrus Vance, George Shultz and Caspar Weinberger -- were apparent immediately. But appear they did -- and will again. The upper reaches of an administration are never wanting for personal clashes. And, of course, blame increases in direct proportion with actions taken or not taken.

An assistant secretary of state, Langhorne A. Motley, once defined a leak as a "premature unauthorized partial disclosure." This distinguishes it from the "premature authorized disclosure," which is a plant and is part of a president's own bag of tricks for floating potentially controversial policies and gauging public reaction.

Leaks are different. They're rogue. They rarely come from a press office, even though this seems like a logical place to look. Press secretaries have a need to appear evenhanded. Playing favorites with reporters can have unpleasant long-term consequences in trying to maintain the respect of the press corps.

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