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Today's
Stories
May
4, 2004
Kurt
Nimmo
The CIA Privatized Torture
May
3, 2004
Virginia
Tilley
Let the Wall of Silence Fall
May
1 / 2, 2004
Patrick
Cockburn
An Army in Disgrace, a Policy
in Tatters, the Real Prospect of Defeat
Robert
Fisk
"Good Guys" Who Can Do No
Wrong
Alexander
Cockburn
Watching Niagara: Stupid Leaders,
Useless Spies, Angry World
Heather
Williams
Gringo, We're Going Home: Latin
American Troops Flee Iraq
Diane
Rejman
An Army Vet on Torture in Iraq:
Abu Ghraib as My Lai?
Diane
Christian
Blood Spilling: Osama, Bush and
Sharon Speak the Same Language
Patrick
Cockburn
Seems Like Old Times in Fallujah
Dave
Lindorff
Bush's Torturous Logic: Shocked,
Shocked, Shocked
Chris
Floyd
Suicide Bomber: Neocons, Nihilists
and Annihilation
April
29 / 30, 2004
Dave
Zirin
A Pawn in Their Game: the Unlonesome
Death of Pat Tillman
Kathy
Kelly
The Warden's Tour
Greg
Weiher
Fallujah and the Warsaw Ghetto: the
Banality of Evil
Michael
S. Ladah
Terrorism and Assassination: the
Ultimate Depception
Patrick
Cockburn
The Fallujah Mutinies
April
28, 2004
April
28, 2004
Christopher
Brauchli
Meet Congressman Know-Nothing:
Tom Tancredo
Wendy
Brinker
The Politics of the Numb
Faisal
Kutty
The Dirty Work of Canadian Intelligence
John
Chuckman
Seeking the Evil One
Mike
Whitney
Flag-Draped Coffins and the Seattle Times
Tom
Mountain
Rwanda and the F***** Word
Graeme
Greenback
The Iraqi Alamo: a CNN/CIA Production
Tracy
McLellan
The War Comes Home
M.
Junaid Alam
We are the Barbarians
William
Loren Katz
Iraq, the US and an Old Lesson
April 27, 2004
James
Davis
The Colombia 3 Acquitted
Dave
Lindorff
Chalabi as Prosecutor
Bruce
Schneier
Terrorist Threats and Political
Gain
Cockburn
/ Sengupta
British Generals Resist Calls for
More Troops to Aid Americans in Iraq
Walt
Brasch
Presidential Letters: The Day I
Was Asked to Feed an Elephant
Saul
Landau
The Empire in Denial and the Denial
of Empire
April 26, 2004
Patrick
Cockburn
Crossing the Shia Line: US Troops
Prepare to Enter Najaf
Wayne
Madsen
Trading Places: Will the US Go the Way of the USSR?
Grover
Furr
Protest, Rebellion, Commitment
Elaine
Cassel
Lies About the Patriot Act
Mickey
Z.
Inspired by Pat Tillman?
Greg
Moses
Bremer's De-De-Ba'athjfication Gambit
Gila
Svirsky
Anarchy in Our Souls
Uri
Avnery
Vanunu and the Terrible Secret
April 24 / 25, 2004
William
A. Cook
Tweedledee and Tweedledum: Kerry
and Bush Melt into One
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Stryking Out: a General, GM and the Army's Latest Tank
Brandy
Baker
A Revitalized Women's Movement? Let's Hope So
Robert
Fisk
A Warning to Those Who Dare Criticize Israel in the Land of Free
Speech
Ben
Tripp
October Surmise: a Case of Worst Scenarios
Nelson
Valdés
"Submit or Die": Iraq and the American Borg
Lucson
Pierre-Charles
Haiti's Return to the Future
Kurt
Nimmo
The CIA Killed Pat Tillman
Mark
Scaramella
Does Anybody Know Anything?
Patrick
Cockburn
The Return of Saddam's Generals
Gary
Engler
Welcome to La Paz: a Vacation in Tear Gas
Col.
Dan Smith
Whistling in the Dark: Israel, Palestine and Bush
Greg
Weiher
Iraq is Utterly Unlike Vietnam...
Elaine
Cassel
Life on the Outside: a Review
Vanessa
Jones
Letter from Australia: Why an Independent Won Sydney
Jim
French
Agriculture's Bullied Market
Hammond
Guthrie
Al Aronowitz, Bob Dylan and The Beatles
Poets'
Basement
Jones, Holt, Albert, LaMorticella
April 23, 2004
Ron
Jacobs
The Only Solution is Immediate Withdrawal
Dave
Lindorff
Imagination Deficit Disorder
Mokhiber
/ Weissman
Contractors and Mercenaries: the Rising Corporate Military Monster
Norman
Solomon
Country Joe Band, 2004: "What Are We Fighting For?"
Cynthia
McKinney
All Things Are Not Equal: the Perils of Globalization
CounterPunch
Wire
A Bitch Called Wanda
Karyn
Strickler
Sierra Club, Inc.
Hammond
Guthrie
Yellow Caked in the Face
Paul
de Rooij
Graveyard of Justifications: Glossary
of the Iraqi Occupation
April 22, 2004
Patrick
Cockburn
When Terror Came to Basra: "I
Saw a Minibus of Children on Fire"
Tanya
Reinhart
The Wall Behind Disengagement
Lance
Selfa
Why is Kucinich Still in the Race?
Josh
Frank
Street Fighting Man? Kucinich's Pulled Punches
Sen.
Robert Byrd
Bush Owes America Answers on Iraq
William
S. Lind
Why We Get It Wrong
Mickey
Z.
Undoing the Latches
Robert
Jensen
Why They Fast: Remembering the Victims of the World Bank
John
L. Hess
The New York Times from 30,000 Feet
April
21, 2004
Gary
Leupp
Yeats on Iraq
Alfredo
Castro
Colombia's Forgotten Prisoners
Dr.
Susan Block
Bush's Taliban Drug Deal
William
A. Cook
George 1 to George 2
Jack
Random
Iraq and Vietnam
Jean-Guy
Allard
Alarcon Meets the Editors
Mike
Whitney
Charade in the Desert
Bill
Christison
Only Major Policies Changes Can
Help Washington Now
April 20, 2004
Dave
Lindorff
Bush and Kerry Share a Problem
Stan
Cox
Wal-Mart's Magic Numbers
Bruce
Anderson
On Listening to Air America
Joseph
Kalvoda
Czech Mate for Condi
Greg
Moses
Yesterday's Intelligence
Stan
Goff
The Democrats and Iraq
Website
of the Day
Santorum Happens
April 19, 2004
Kurt
Nimmo
The "Central Hand" of the
Resistance
Mike
Whitney
Bob Woodward's Imperial Trifles
Douglas
Valentine
52 Pick-Up and the 100-to-1
Rule
John
Chuckman
The Sharon Annex: Evil Does Often
Triumph
Doug
Giebel
Welcome to the Club
Rahul
Mahajan
Hospital Closings and War Crimes
April
16 / 18, 2004
Robert
Fisk
Bush Legitimizes Terror
Saul
Landau
Subverting Brazil and Cuba
Dave
Lindorff
Paying for War: $2,150 per Family
and Counting
Brandy
Baker
Fallujah's Collateral Damage
Mickey
Z.
The Left Attacks from the Right
Bruce
Jackson
The Bush Press Conference: Gott Mit
Uns
Norman
Solomon
How the "NewsHour" Changed
History
Alexander
Cockburn
Bush, Kerry and Empire
April
15, 2004
Greg
Moses
Follow the Families, Not the Script
Virginia
Tilley
The Carnage According to Gen. Kimmitt:
Just Change the Channel
Ron
Jacobs
They Coulda Been Champions of the
World: Hurricane Carter and Ron Kovic
Michael
Neumann
A Happy Compromise: Hate Crimes
Reporting in the Toronto Globe and Mail
April
14, 2004
Tom
Reeves
Return to Haiti: an American Learning
Zone
Reza
Fiyouzat
Japan and Iraq
Ron
Jacobs
What Bush Really Said
Diane
Christian
The Real Passion
Hot Stories
Alexander Cockburn
Behold,
the Head of a Neo-Con!
Subcomandante
Marcos
The
Death Train of the WTO
Norman Finkelstein
Hitchens
as Model Apostate
Steve Niva
Israel's
Assassination Policy: the Trigger for Suicide Bombings?
Dardagan,
Slobodo and Williams
CounterPunch Exclusive:
20,000 Wounded Iraqi Civilians
Steve
J.B.
Prison Bitch
Sheldon
Rampton and John Stauber
True Lies: the Use of Propaganda
in the Iraq War
Wendell
Berry
Small Destructions Add Up
CounterPunch
Wire
WMD: Who Said What When
Cindy
Corrie
A Mother's Day Talk: the Daughter
I Can't Hear From
Gore Vidal
The
Erosion of the American Dream
Francis Boyle
Impeach
Bush: A Draft Resolution
Click
Here for More Stories.
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May
4, 2004
Self-Censorship
and Torture
Abu Ghraib,
CBS and American Power
By DAVID PETERSON
Right before the close of last Wednesday's
60 Minutes II segment about the torture and abuse of Iraqis
at the hands of the American military personnel in control of
the Abu Ghraib prison near Baghdad, the program's host Dan Rather
added a "postscript" ("Court Martial in Iraq;
US Army soldiers face court martials for actions at Baghdad's
Abu Ghraib Prison," 60 Minutes II, CBS TV, April 28, 2004):
RATHER: A postscript. Two weeks
ago, we received an appeal from the Defense Department, and
eventually from the chairman of the military Joint Chiefs of
Staff, General Richard Myers, to delay this broadcast given
the danger and tension on the ground in Iraq. We decided to
honor that request while pressing for the Defense Department
to add its perspective to the incidents at Abu Ghraib Prison.
This week, with the photos beginning to circulate elsewhere
and with other journalists about to publish their versions of
the story, the Defense Department agreed to cooperate in our
report.
Today, Tuesday, May 4, marks
the sixth day since this program and these words first aired
on CBS TV. And yet this appalling confession on the part of
CBS TV's news department---that, based on a request from the
American state to delay the broadcast of its Abu Ghraib report,
CBS agreed, and only changed course when Seymour Hersh's article
on the same for the New Yorker was set to be published (i.e.,
"Torture at Abu Ghraib," May 10)---has received next-to-zero
coverage in the U.S. media, let alone expressions of the monumental
outrage that it deserves.(Note that Hersh's report was first
posted to the New Yorker's website on April 30---that is, two
days after the 60 Minutes II report first aired.)
Thus, on the nearly-unstomachable
Sunday morning TV program The Week with George Stephanopoulos
(ABC TV, May 2), the following exercise in journalistic minimalism
went out over the airwaves:
GEORGE WILL: (Off Camera) When
CBS was prepared to air these pictures, you asked them to delay
and they did delay, and you asked them on the grounds that this
was a particularly tense and volatile moment in Iraq. When did
you expect that moment of high tension to end?
GENERAL RICHARD MYERS: Well,
I think as we work our way through Fallujah and Najaf, as we
find solutions to those problems, that tensions would go down,
as we get Iraqis involved in those operations. That's when we
thought, you know, the tensions might be, but, you know, you
can't keep this out of the news, clearly, but I thought it was,
would be particularly inflammatory at that time.
This, as far as I've been able
to determine through the present moment, constitutes the one
and only instance since April 28 that a MAJOR American television
or radio program has mentioned CBS TV's willing complicity with
the American state to suppress the evidence it possessed of
torture and abuse at the Abu Ghraib prison, and, in particular,
to air those self-evidently damning images. (Should anyone be
aware of additional instances, please show me that I'm mistaken.)
The same day, Sunday, May 2,
Gen. Myers appeared on CBS TV's Face The Nation--no questions
were asked. And the General appeared on the Fox News cable channel's
Fox News Sunday--but no questions were asked.
In point of fact, all that
I've been able to find in the way of reporting on CBS TV's disgraceful
collaboration with the American state are (1) DavidBauder, "CBS
News says it held off on prisoner abuse story for two weeks,"
Associated Press, May 3; (2) the same AP wire service report
picked up by the Washington Post and published this morning
("CBS Delayed Abuse Report At the Request Of Gen. Myers,"
May 4); and (3) John Cook, "CBS Delayed Airing Story on
Iraq Prisoner Abuse at General's Request," Chicago Tribune,
May 4. (See below for the AP and Chicago Tribune reports.)
But that's it.
So, I guess the questions of
the moment---at least three of them---ought to be: What does
CBS TV's collaboration with the American state tell us about
the journalistic values at CBS TV? Second, what does the rest
of the American news media's lack of interest in this act of
collaboration tell us about the journalistic values of the American
news media? Third, do you suppose we should be shocked by any
of this?
FYA ("For your archive"):
Am depositing here the two reports that I've discovered-to-date
on the collaboration between CBS TV and the American state to
delay broadcast of the eventual 60 Minutes II report on Abu
Ghraib prison.
The Associated Press
May 3, 2004, Monday, BC
cycle
HEADLINE:CBS News says it held
off on prisoner abuse story for two weeks BYLINE: By DAVID BAUDER,
AP Television Writer DATELINE:NEW YORK
CBS News delayed reporting
for two weeks about U.S. soldiers' alleged abuse of Iraqi prisoners,
following a personal request from the chairman of the joint
chiefs of staff.
Gen. Richard B. Myers called
CBS anchor Dan Rather eight days before the report was to air,
asking for extra time, said Jeff Fager, executive producer of
"60 Minutes II."
Myers cited the safety of American
hostages and tension surrounding the Iraqi city of Fallujah,Fager
said, adding that he held off as long as he believed possible
given it was a competitive story.
With The New Yorker magazine
preparing to run a detailed report on the alleged abuses, CBS
finally broadcast its report last Wednesday, including images
taken last year allegedly showing Iraqis stripped naked, hooded
and being tormented by U.S. captors at the Abu Ghraib prison
near Baghdad.
Fager said he felt "terrible"
being asked to delay the broadcast.
"News is a delicate thing,"
he said. "It's hard to just make those kinds of decisions.
It's not natural for us; the natural thing is to put it on the
air. But the circumstances were quite unusual and I think you
have to consider that."
Bob Steele, a journalism values
scholar at the Poynter Institute for Media Studies, said there
should be an "exceptional principle and argument"
to justify withholding news of such magnitude.
"You'd have to be convinced
that these other American lives are truly on the line,"
he said. "I would want to have a very specific and short
time period (to withhold the news). If CBSbelieves it was justified,
to hold back two weeks seems like an awful long time. Perhaps
a day or two. But two weeks is a long time, particularly with
the nature of the allegations in the video."
Rather revealed the two-week
delay in a postscript to viewers at the end of Wednesday's broadcast.
Fager said he believed the
story was better because of the delay; CBS was able to interview
Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt about the alleged incidents because
the network waited.
Myers, speaking on ABC's "This
Week" on Sunday, confirmed that he asked CBS for the delay.
"You can't keep this out
of the news, clearly," Myers said. "But I thought
it would be particularly inflammatory at the time."
Fager knew that CBS had to
consider safety issues in deciding when to run the story. "We
can't just be acting in a void," he said. "There's
a war going on and Americans are at risk, especially the ones
that are being held hostage. It concerns us."
Although one American hostage
recently escaped and others may have been killed, at least one
hostage is still believed held in Iraq.
Steele pointed out that Iraqi
prisoners could have been at risk, too.
"Allegations of this nature,
the violation of the rights of the enemy prisoners, should not
be taken lightly in the slightest," he said. "It's
possible that their lives could be in jeopardy as well. ...
it's not impossible to consider that at least their health,
if not their lives, were at risk."
Chicago Tribune
May 4, 2004, Tuesday
HEADLINE:CBS Delayed Airing
Story on Iraq Prisoner Abuse at General's Request BYLINE: By
John Cook
CBS News was prepared as early
as mid-April to report details of abuse of Iraqi prisoners at
the hands of American troops, but held off on the broadcast
for two weeks at the request of Gen. Richard B. Myers,chairman
of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
The delay, which was disclosed
by correspondent Dan Rather at the end of Wednesday's broadcast
on "60 Minutes II," raised questions about whether
CBS News was cooperating with the government in managing the
timing of a highly embarrassing story.
It is not uncommon for news
organizations to withhold sensitive information for reasons
of national security. In this instance, Rather said CBS News
delayed its report because of "the danger and tension on
the ground in Iraq."
Jeffrey Fager, executive producer
of "60 Minutes II," said Myers warned that the story,
including photographs of U.S. troops abusing Iraqi prisoners,
could incite Iraqi groups to injure American hostages.
"The first thing they
brought up was the hostage situation," Fager said. "I
took it pretty seriously. I can just imagine one of those pictures
showing up around a soldier's neck."
CBS News informed the Pentagon
last week that the story would air Wednesday because the New
Yorker magazine was going to publish a similar story, and Brig.
Gen. Mark Kimmitt eventually agreed to sit for a satellite interview
with Rather.
"Bad P.R. for the Pentagon
is probably not a good reason to delay a story," said Tom
Rosenstiel, director of the Project for Excellence in Journalism.
"Even if it could inflame the situation and put soldiers
at risk, that's not very compelling -- it's hard to prove the
effect" a broadcast will have. Nonetheless, Rosenstiel
said, if holding the story secured the cooperation of the Pentagon,
it probably meant a more balanced story for the viewers.
Weekend Edition
Features for April 24 / 25, 2004
William
A. Cook
Tweedledee and Tweedledum: Kerry
and Bush Melt into One
Jeffrey
St. Clair
Stryking Out: a General, GM and the Army's Latest Tank
Brandy
Baker
A Revitalized Women's Movement? Let's Hope So
Robert
Fisk
A Warning to Those Who Dare Criticize Israel in the Land of Free
Speech
Ben
Tripp
October Surmise: a Case of Worst Scenarios
Nelson
Valdés
"Submit or Die": Iraq and the American Borg
Lucson
Pierre-Charles
Haiti's Return to the Future
Kurt
Nimmo
The CIA Killed Pat Tillman
Mark
Scaramella
Does Anybody Know Anything?
Patrick
Cockburn
The Return of Saddam's Generals
Gary
Engler
Welcome to La Paz: a Vacation in Tear Gas
Col.
Dan Smith
Whistling in the Dark: Israel, Palestine and Bush
Greg
Weiher
Iraq is Utterly Unlike Vietnam...
Elaine
Cassel
Life on the Outside: a Review
Vanessa
Jones
Letter from Australia: Why an Independent Won Sydney
Jim
French
Agriculture's Bullied Market
Hammond
Guthrie
Al Aronowitz, Bob Dylan and The Beatles
Poets'
Basement
Jones, Holt, Albert, LaMorticella
|