Inside the Globe - tabloid newspaper reporting

Washington Monthly, June, 1999 by Jeffrey Scott Shapiro

Of course, the Globe could still try to sue me for violating the confidentiality contract I signed. But my guess is that they don't want to hear Frost's words played back in a courtroom. Nor would they relish hearing the other 75-odd hours of tapes, which reveal a great deal about the tabloids' methods of information-gathering.

For the moment, protected behind those electronic key card doors and surveillance cameras in a concrete fortress, Frost still reigns over the Globe. Sometimes I wonder if he's right about the world being a place where no one is really trustworthy, where honesty and honor are illusions. But I suspect that those words do apply to the world of the tabloids. And as for that world, I hope Frost was being prophetic when he told me. "We're finished ... all of us ... every single last one of us."

JEFFREY SCOTT SHAPIRO worked for the Globe from 1997 to 1999. He is currently working on a documentary about tabloids.