BROOKE GLADSTONE: The perennial journalistic issue of anonymous sources was in full bloom this week. Wired News, after an examination of 700 stories written by freelancer Michelle DeLeo, retracted two of her stories, because it couldn't confirm her anonymously-sourced quotes. The Sacramento Bee saw the resignation of columnist Dianna Griego Erwin when some of her sources could not be authenticated. Veteran Pentagon reporter Tom Squitieri resigned from USA Today after he was found lifting quotes from other newspapers without proper attribution. Al Neuharth is a long-time critic of the use of anonymous sources. When he founded USA Today in 1982, anonymous quotes were banned from its pages. Over time, that policy changed, but Neuharth remains true to his belief that journalism can exist without the off-the-record source. Al Neuharth, welcome to OTM.

AL NEUHARTH: Thank you.

BROOKE GLADSTONE: You once wrote that most anonymous sources often tell more than they know. Reporters who are allowed to use such sources sometimes write more than they hear. Editors, too often, let them get away with it. Result: fiction gets mixed with fact.

AL NEUHARTH: Well, I think that's a great quote, particularly since you're quoting me. [LAUGHTER] Now, I would add to that that it's been my experience - [LAUGHS] I started as a reporter 60 years ago - I think most anonymous sources are cowards. They really don't have the courage to tell you what they know or believe to know if they're going to be held accountable for it, and I just don't think that we can afford to trust or use cowards to disseminate information to the public.

BROOKE GLADSTONE: Recently there have been a number of columnists reprimanded. One was from the Sacramento Bee - Diana Griego Erwin - because they couldn't confirm that some of the people who populated her commentaries actually existed. Is this the mixing fiction with fact that you're worried about? 'Cause she stands by her reporting.

AL NEUHARTH: Well, I'm worried about that, but I think it's the job of the editors in charge and the top editor to make sure that what is disseminated to the public is fair and accurate. I think it's unfortunate that there have been at least a half dozen or more reporters who've lost their jobs in recent years, including a very good reporter at USA Today, at our newspaper, Jack Kelly, who if he had had more strict supervision, I think would have grown up to be a very good reporter.

BROOKE GLADSTONE: Any journeyman reporter knows not to do what Jack Kelly did - complete fabrications.

AL NEUHARTH: Well, that's [LAUGHS] one of the basic things that reporters are taught, but you know the temptation is there, just as the temptation for cowardly sources is there to exaggerate or to pedal information that is not absolutely accurate if they're not held accountable for it.

BROOKE GLADSTONE: But surely you know that there are certain stories that cannot be reported without anonymous sources. When you banned them from your paper, back in 1982, you basically prevented any USA Today reporter from ever reporting, say, a Watergate.

AL NEUHARTH: I think perhaps Watergate might not have developed as it did if the Washington Post had not used anonymous sources. I say I think that may be the case. I'm not absolutely certain. I think when you press public officials who have some information that they want to get disseminated, if you really press them, they'll generally end up agreeing to be quoted, if in fact the information they're giving you is correct. I think even in Watergate a good bit of that might happen. I'll just tell you a brief incident the first week that we published USA Today in 1982, one of our star reporters, Ann Devroy, now deceased, called us from California with an exclusive story that Maureen Reagan, the daughter of then-President Ronald Reagan, would be named the next day to the Republican National Committee, but she couldn't identify the source. And we told her that it was a, a really good story - high interest - we'd strip it across the top of page one - if she could identify the source, and if she could not, we wouldn't use it. So she went back to the same bar where she and Maureen Reagan had had their drink and talked about it earlier. She called us back in 30 minutes and said it's okay - Maureen has agreed, and her dad has agreed that it's okay to use her as the source, so-

BROOKE GLADSTONE: But, but Maureen Reagan had, had an interest in having that story reported.

AL NEUHARTH: Of course.

BROOKE GLADSTONE: A lot of people say in the Watergate investigation, not to keep harping on that, came from the mid- and lower-levels of government where they could suffer grievously if they were proved to be a source.

AL NEUHARTH: I think if a lower level source in the government were to have an exclusive of some wrongdoing and then were fired for it, there'd probably be many others who would hire that person for his or her honesty and integrity, if he or she were identified.

BROOKE GLADSTONE: All right. Al Neuharth, thank you very much.

AL NEUHARTH: You're very welcome. Good luck.

BROOKE GLADSTONE: Al Neuharth is the founder of USA Today and the Freedom Forum. [MUSIC]