|
REPORTING FOR THE ENEMY (from the Wash. Post - really!)
Via All Things Political (hat tip: Robert Prather)The video only lasts four minutes or so â gruesome scenes of torture from the days when Saddam Husseinâs thugs ruled Abu Ghraib prison. I couldnât bear to watch, so I walked out until it was over. Some who stayed wished they hadnât. They told of savage scenes of decapitation, fingers chopped off one by one, tongues hacked out with a razor blade â all while victims shriek in pain and the thugs chant Saddamâs praises. Saddamâs henchmen took the videos as newsreels to document their deeds in honor of their leader. But these awful images didnât show up on American TV news. In fact, just four or five reporters showed up for the screening at the American Enterprise Institute think tank, which says it got the video via the Pentagon. Fewer wrote about it. No surprise, since no newscast would air the videos of Nick Berg and Wall Street Journal reporter Danny Pearl getting decapitated, or of U.S. contractors in Fallujah getting torn limb from limb by al Qaeda operatives. But every TV network has endlessly shown photos of the humiliation of Iraqi prisoners by U.S. troops at Abu Ghraib. Why? Three guesses & the first two donât count. "Because most [journalists] want Bush to lose," says AEI scholar Michael Ledeen, who helped host the screening of the Saddam video. No shit, Sherlock. Got it in one. Former Pentagon official Richard Perle raps "faint hearts in the administration," saying theyâve bought into the idea that itâs "politically incorrect" to show the horrors of Saddamâs regime. But he also faults the media â after all, AEIâs briefings on Iraq have been standing-room-only, but the room was half empty for the screening of the Saddam torture video. But part of the issue is simply that Saddamâs tortures, like al Qaedas tactics, are so awful that theyâre unbearable to watch. If I couldnât watch them myself, Iâm hardly arguing that others should have to. Yet it raises a very complex problem in the War on Terror. Itâs worse than creating moral equivalence between Saddamâs tortures and prisoner abuse by U.S. troops. Itâs that we do far more to highlight our own wrongdoings precisely because they are less appalling. And because you hope you can bring down the Republican Administration that the empty-headed Americans stupidly elected. In this era, a photo is everything. We highlight U.S. prisoner abuse because the photos arenât too offensive to show. We downplay Saddamâs abuse precisely because itâs far worse â so we canât use the photos. And that sets the stage for remarks like Sen. Ted Kennedyâs claim that Saddamâs torture chambers have reopened under "U.S. management." That and your silence; where was the outcry from the "press" when he spewed out that monstrous load of oral diarrhea? Media analysts like Washington Post ombudsman Michael Getler admit it sounds "sanctimonious" to justify publishing prison abuse photos â but not al Qaeda beheading videos â in the name of showing "the reality of war." But that is just what he did. The WaPo sounding sanctimonious? Iâm shocked! AEI spokeswoman Veronique Rodman, puzzled by the minimal interest in the Saddam torture video, is sure that if it was a video of equally horrific torture committed by U.S. troops, the press would find ways to show or report it. You bet your sweet ass they would - over and over and over.... Reporters have to face up to the fact that right now, if we highlight the wrongs that Americans commit but not â out of squeamishness â the far worse horrors committed by others, we become propaganda tools for the other side. You mean LIKE YOU ALREADY ARE? Wonder what precipitated such a "come to Jesus" moment for that liberal rag? Wonder if theyâll follow through? Posted by: Barbara Skolaut 2004-06-16 |
| http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=35672 |