The media pundit's pundit. Written by NYC insider Jeff Jarvis, BuzzMachine covers news, media, journalism, and politics.
CNN and the Iraqi hug
: FoxNews just showed tape of now-ex U.N. ambassador Mohamed al-Douri leaving the Iraqi consulate in New York after taking down the official portrait of Saddam Hussein.
Then Fox showed juicier tape: al-Douri greeting the CNN reporter by name and coming back to give him a hug.
: See Glenn Reynolds for many links to the CNN/Iraq hubbub today.
I’m not quite sure how the “hug” was “juicier tape”. Is it so shocking that Roth, as the CNN UN reporter, would have some sort of relationship with Al Douri who apparently was well-respected by others in the UN? The guy was an academic stuck working for a rotten-to-the-core government.
I don’t get it — why does he want to go back to the Middle East? He certainly can’t go back to Iraq, given the mood. I’m not sure how many countries are going to want to let in a high profile former-Baath party bigwig, either. Or, an even better question, why are we letting him go back to the Middle East? He’s a high-ranking Hussein official, who probably has good information on the (former) regime. I would think there would be a good chance he was complicit in its crimes.
I just blogged an initiative for an IRAQI NATIONAL RECONCILIATION Committee. It’s in my Fri-Sat, April 12 entry. (I don’t fully trust the permalink.) I posted the Jordon topic just preceding this which pushed me over the edge to start this thing going. Maybe to some people this is a new and unique issue, but it’s not a first to others. All the hand-wringing and soul-searching about who’s got blood on their hands, complicity, betrayal, degrees of guilt, two bad choices, etc.– what is all the self-flagellation going to accomplish. None of us is pure? Didn’t we already know that?
http://eclectchap.blogspot.com
I watched both the FNC version and the CNN version.
definitley the CNN version wins hands down for the love fest version between these two.
I’ve got to admit that I actually feel some sympathy for al-Douri: he’s far too bright to actually believe a lot of the things he was asked to spout. Now, he’s leaving New York for Bagdad, apparently (according to Fox a day or so ago) at least in part because he hasn’t heard from his family since the war started. And the news people won’t cut him a break.