Will Bunch deserves one for this open letter to David Broder:

… The night I became angry came in March 2003, the night that your friends and colleagues in the White House press room took a dive at a nationally televised press conference, and refused to challenge the president’s specious grounds for war. I was furious over what my profession — the one where you had once inspired me a generation ago — had now become. And frankly, a lot of people on the left side became angry, too — because, frankly, nobody was listening when they were nice. Protest marches of half a million got inside-the-A-section type coverage; at least a little vitriol finally got your attention, Mr. Broder.

And this was all before so much else happened — the made-up terror alerts, the chucking of the Geneva Convention and the torture and abuse that followed, the illegal spying, the willful defiance of laws enacted by Congress, the ignoring of the fundamental right of habeas corpus. I won’t waste a lot of space chronicling it all, because you know it all. You know it all… and yet you have done nothing.

That’s because your cynicism is degenerative disease, and it leads to paralysis. You were the dean overseeing the Great Game of American politics, and then some bad guys came along and changed all the rules, and you tried so very hard not to notice. Now that the unlawful nature of this presidency is becoming recognized by a majority, you are praying for a deus ex machina, this fictional “independence party” that will not just save America but most importantly save you, save you from having to make a choice.

It’s too late for that now, Mr. Broder. I do not blame you; I did not want to make this choice either; it chose me. I would have been much happier, frankly, spending my 40s the way that you spent your 40s, fighting for a Pulitzer Prize instead of fighting to preserve the basics of a democracy and a free press, the things that you and I and America were able to take for granted for so long. Nor do I expect you to join us; frankly, if that happens, it would probably would not happen until America has already fallen into the abyss, and I hope and pray that it does not come to that.

In the meantime, this journalist will use every weapon in his arsenal to preserve the values that allowed our craft to flourish in America — including the weapon of anger. That may offend you from time to time; I guess on some level I hope that it doesn’t.

Either way, don’t expect me to apologize for it.

Because I won’t.

I have so many mixed feelings about my former profession - not just because of the beancounters in charge, but because the practitioners have such a mixed bag of motivations. For far too many of them, it’s a matter of prestige, convenience and a paycheck. (And we won’t even get into how many of them have an inflated view of their own talent.) They’re generally lazy and far too susceptible to flattery.

Will’s not one of those people. He’s passionate, creative and driven to make a difference, and he has the ability to back it up. So let’s have a standing ovation for this one member of a very select group: journalists who will always make a difference.

And thank God they still exist.