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With efforts to block media access in full swing under the orders of the president here, news came out of the U.S. on Saturday involving the media and a government official.

In a congratulatory address to the graduating class of the U.S. Naval Academy, Defense Secretary Robert Gates advised the new ensigns on four virtues they should keep in mind while serving as officers. Gates pointed out the important role of the media in a democratic society, saying, “Remember the importance of two pillars of our freedom under the Constitution: the Congress and the press. Both surely try our patience from time to time, but they are the surest guarantees of the liberty of the American people.”

Referring to one recent report about the shoddy treatment wounded soldiers from Iraq were receiving at one hospital, Gates said, “When it (the press) identifies a problem...the response of senior leaders should be to find out if the allegations are true,...then act to remedy the problem. The press is not the enemy, and to treat it as such is self-defeating.” He added, “As the Founding Fathers wisely understood, the Congress and a free press, as with a non-political military, assure a free country.”

It is typical of the U.S. media to stubbornly press their president to answer questions regarding an embarrassing scandal, even as the leader is standing side by side with the head of another nation holding a joint press conference. There were U.S. presidents, like Richard Nixon, who showed an acute level of paranoia toward the media. But even Nixon did not use a New Year’s address to criticize his country’s media 20 different times as the Korean president did. If Nixon had, his mental health would have been in question and he would not have been able to survive the public’s scrutiny.

If the president of the United States had blamed almost all of his policy failures on the media, prohibited government officials from speaking to media critical of his administration, forbade them from contributing writings and giving ads and cooperating in joint projects with them, his Cabinet members, like Gates, would not have sat still. But the reality facing Korea and the Korean media is that Gates’ comments, which point out basic principles of any democratic society, sound very distant.