Touché! I can totally see the parallel you're making between 1. the political-marketing talking points that spokeslizards for the military-industrial complex regularly insert (for free!) into "news" articles and 2. intimate conversations over phone, text, email, etc. among family and friends.
Wait, no I can't. Those two speech acts are in no way alike. Only the former is even claiming to be "anonymous"; as for the latter, when my brother calls me, I know it's him even though the conversation is (or should be) private. In the sentence you quote, I wasn't talking about privacy. I was referring specifically to the value that society gets from journalists' reporting of anonymous speech. When the anonymous speaker has a unique point of view that is rarely heard, anonymity is quite valuable. When instead, as is usually the case, the anonymity is that of a well-heeled lobbyist for a wealthy industry, who has his arms run up 27 other reporters' asses in addition to this one's, anonymity only serves corrupt purposes. This article is an example of that.
Wait, no I can't. Those two speech acts are in no way alike. Only the former is even claiming to be "anonymous"; as for the latter, when my brother calls me, I know it's him even though the conversation is (or should be) private. In the sentence you quote, I wasn't talking about privacy. I was referring specifically to the value that society gets from journalists' reporting of anonymous speech. When the anonymous speaker has a unique point of view that is rarely heard, anonymity is quite valuable. When instead, as is usually the case, the anonymity is that of a well-heeled lobbyist for a wealthy industry, who has his arms run up 27 other reporters' asses in addition to this one's, anonymity only serves corrupt purposes. This article is an example of that.