Verbatim?
THOSE WHO read Nicholas Ashford's 'Bicentenary' interview with President Reagan in the Times recently may have been surprised by the unusual articulacy of the President's replies. The reason for this unwonted fluency was that the interview never took place. Instead, Mr Ashford sent several questions on a piece of paper to the President's office. He duly received care- fully worked answers to all his questions. A similar procedure was followed by Michael Binyon, then the Times's Bonn correspon- dent, in an interview with Chancellor Helmut Kohl. In both cases, the journalists met their interlocutors, but only briefly and only for a chat. It is obvious that 'interviews' of this sort are no better than any official government statement. If the Times wishes to persist with this form of journalism, perhaps it should state when it is doing so, so that the reader can pass quickly on to something else.
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