Posted by
On the Right on Wednesday, October 11, 2006 10:17:17 PM
Be sure to click on the "hot air" link and listen to the video of Ted Turner.
Ted Turner-itis: allergic to patriotism
My column on North Korea's favorite media mogul and Fox Derangement Syndrome. A snippet:
CNN founder Ted Turner opened his mouth this week at the
National Press Club, and promptly demonstrated why America needs Fox
News Channel now more than ever.
Three years after the invasion of Iraq, Turner is still pouting
about public displays of patriotism on American airwaves: "I mean, I
just really wonder during the, during the last war, you know, what
business did it have in the news sets to have the American flag flying
in the background. Uh, I mean, it was like the news media covered the
Iraq war, at least at the beginning of it, almost as like it was a
football game with us versus them."
Funny, I can't recall Turner getting his undergarments in a bunch when
CNN chose Saddam Hussein's side and former CNN executive Eason Jordan
admitted the global news network had withheld reporting on Baathist
atrocities in exchange for inside access and protection of its Baghdad
staff. Recall Jordan's confession published in the New York Times after
America toppled Saddam's regime in April 2003:
"I came to know several Iraqi officials well enough that they confided
in me that Saddam Hussein was a maniac who had to be removed. One
Foreign Ministry officer told me of a colleague who, finding out his
brother had been executed by the regime, was forced, as a test of
loyalty, to write a letter of congratulations on the act to Saddam
Hussein. An aide to Uday once told me why he had no front teeth:
henchmen had ripped them out with pliers and told him never to wear
dentures, so he would always remember the price to be paid for
upsetting his boss. Again, we could not broadcast anything these men
said to us."
It's fine and dandy for CNN to wave Saddam's flag and carry his
blood-stained water. But when Fox News sticks a two-postage-stamp-sized
American flag on its screen? Only then will Ted Turner declare that journalism and reportorial objectivity have gone to [hades.]
Vid here. And more to come at Hot Air.