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The resolution sponsored by Sen. Russ Feingold (D-WI) drew the support of 10 other senators across both sides of the aisle, from elder statesmen like Sens. Richard Lugar (R-IN) and Patrick Leahy (D-VT) to the freshman Sen. Ted Kaufman (D-DE). Representing constituents from the Great Lakes to the North Atlantic to the Okefenokee swamplands, they and other senators came together to not only celebrate and evaluate press freedom around the globe, but to also, in the words of the resolution that they co-sponsored in honor of World Press Freedom Day on Sunday, "defend the media from attacks on the independence of the media, and to pay tribute to journalists who have lost their lives in the line of duty."
The
resolution passed by unanimous consent late Thursday night on the Senate floor,
and it quoted several press freedom monitors and other groups: "[A]t least 109
journalists and other media workers were killed in 2008," according to the International
Federation of Journalists,
the Brussels-based global trade union federation; "nearly 3 out of 4
journalists killed in the line of duty are murdered, and the killers go
unpunished in nearly 9 out of 10 cases," according to CPJ, an entirely independently funded nongovernmental organization; "in 2008, 673
journalists were arrested, 929 journalists were physically attacked or
threatened, and 29 journalists were kidnapped," according to the Paris-based
monitoring group Reporters Without
Borders; and "press freedom
has been declining during recent years in both authoritarian countries and
established democracies," according to Freedom House, which is based in Washington. The
bipartisan Senate statement further "calls on the President and the Secretary
of State to develop means by which the
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