Author: jp

Eric “What Liberal Media?” Alterman‘s favorite whipping boy, Howard “I was on K Street!” Kurtz at the Washington Post, writes today about a movement that is underway to revoke a 1932 Pulitzer Prize awarded to Walter Duranty of the New York Times.
According to Kurtz’s piece in the Post (notably, the Times’ chief competitor in the annual race for Pulitzers), the paper of record’s new executive editor, Bill Keller, yesterday acknowledged that Duranty’s reporting on Joseph Stalin and the Soviet Union in the early 1930s was egregiously in violation of journalistic standards and
“pretty dreadful . . . . It was a parroting of propaganda.”
After a review conducted by a history professor, Keller said, the Times essentially told the board in a letter that “it’s up to you to decide whether to take it back. We can’t unaward it. Here’s our assessment of the guy’s work: His work was clearly not prizeworthy.”
Columbia University professor Mark von Hagen said he found that the Moscow correspondent’s 1931 work “was a disgrace to the New York Times. There’s no one there who disagrees with me. They acknowledged that his is some of the worst journalism they ever published.”
Good to hear it. Duranty’s defense — if not outright praise — of Stalin’s gulag (one of the most shameful events of the past century, though Howard Kurtz doesn’t actually invoke it by name) was inexcusable, and perhaps indirectly led to the propagation of these forced labor camps and detention centers.
So, if the Times is looking to clean house and rid itself of potentially disgraceful awards given to those who “parrot propaganda,” we humbly look forward to the revocation of op-ed columnist Thomas L. Friedman‘s 2002 award. Friedman, after all, received his award based largely on his passionate writing on the events of September 11th, and more specifically, his defense of the present administration’s War on Terror™. Friedman’s most recent book, Longitudes and Attitudes (2002), is a compendium of these award-winning columns, and includes his twice-weekly musings on topics as diverse as why the bombing of Afghanistan was a just act, to why the bombing of Iraq was a just act, to…well, you get the idea. If the Bush administration wanted a viewpoint put forward, Friedman spent the past year providing justification for their actions.

When then-Governor George W. Bush would canvas the Southwestern U.S. for votes during the 2000 Presidential Election, it was often noted that he would sprinkle Spanish aphorisms into his stump speeches when facing crowds that had any significant Latino presence.
Rest assured that that sort of pandering hasn’t come to an end. In his visit to Australia yesterday (before he was effectively chased off the continent by unruly hecklers and protesters), President Bush spoke to the nation’s joint houses of Parliament to express his gratitude for Prime Minister John Howard’s support during the invasion of Iraq:
“Five months ago, your prime minister was a distinguished visitor of ours in Crawford, Texas, at our ranch. You might remember that I called him a man of steel,” Mr Bush said.
“That’s Texan for fair dinkum.
“Prime Minister John Howard is a leader of exceptional courage, who exemplifies the finest qualities of one of the world’s great democracies. I’m proud to call him friend.”
If you’re as baffled by that expression of praise as most non-Aussies are, the phrase apparently conveys a sense of being “the real deal” or some such cliched colloquialism. Of course, as Bush’s speechwriters must have told him before writing his script, “fair dinkum” sounds so much cooler.

After yet another volley in the sadly commonplace back-and-forth of Israeli-versus-Palestinian violence, the New York Times has thrown together a rather slapdash “analysis” of the most recent round of deaths, and more specifically, the reporting and documentation thereof by the two respective sides.
How does author James Bennet conclude the piece? With this simple paragraph consisting of one short sentence:
“Hamas vowed to retaliate for the Israeli air strike.”
He may as well have written, “Tune in tomorrow as our story continues.” And to think that I’d always wondered what happened to the serial novels of generations past.

This week’s Newsweek takes a look at Bush’s new P.R. tactics, including the much-discussed new reliance on local TV reporters as disseminators of the adminstration’s policies. Of note, however, is a mention of a newfound sort of stonewalling of which even the inestimable Ari Fleischer might have proven incapable.
According to the article, on October 9th, one day after 13 American servicemen were injured by an Iraqi grenade attack, White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan’s daily press briefing made no mention of these developments.
“Pushed by reporters, U.S. officials would only say the incident was under investigation. It was as if the ambush, and the casualties, had never happened.
In Baghdad, official control over the news is getting tighter. Journalists used to walk freely into the city’s hospitals and the morgue to keep count of the day’s dead and wounded. Now the hospitals have been declared off-limits and morgue officials turn away reporters who aren’t accompanied by a Coalition escort. Iraqi police refer reporters’ questions to American forces; the Americans refer them back to the Iraqis.”
Here’s hoping for a return to more politically expedient coverage of soldiers’ woes. How is Jessica Lynch doing, anyway? I bet she can’t wait to return to teaching kindergarteners from impoverished families again.

For the past month, residents of the Austrian capital city of Vienna have noticed a large contraption erected in the center of Karlsplatz, one of the city’s historic plazas. Translucent but sturdy, and appearing to have originated from the mind of Stanley Kubrick’s set designer, the two-story structure was prominently billed as the Nike Infobox, a “high-tech multipurpose container acting as display stand, open office, and lounge.” In addition to featuring two Nike-clad staffers inside and being prominently adorned with the familiar “Swoosh” logo, information was printed on the structure’s sides that proclaimed, “Nikeplatz (formerly Karlsplatz): This square will soon be called NikePlatz”, as well as including an instructional phone number and URL, www.nikeground.com, presumably so that interested (or more likely, highly concerned) citizens could gather more information about the mysterious co-opting of the city’s history and public space.
And what did they learn? “Nike is introducing its legendary brand into squares, streets, parks and boulevards: Nikesquare, Nikestreet, Piazzanike, Plazanike or Nikestrasse will appear in major world capitals over the coming years!” Furthermore, curious onlookers were promised, the square would soon feature a giant 36- by 18-meter monumental Nike Swoosh, coated in “special steel covered with a revolutionary red resin made from recycled sneaker soles.”

Thanks to the well-meaning (but completely idiotic) three-star Lt. Gen. William G. “Jerry” Boykin, we’re all going to hell, which is pretty ironic, given what the guy did. Or rather, said.
Lt. Gen. Boykin has been a frequent guest lecturer on behalf of his evangelical Christian faith, where, as a military commander active in the search for Saddam Hussein and Osama Bin Laden, he is invited to speak — in uniform — to church audiences, presumably to inspire them to serve their country through means other than paying higher income taxes.
News organizations have been having a field day detailing the full rancor of his remarks, including comments stating that “President Bush ‘is in the White House because God put him there,’ and that ‘we in the army of God . . . have been raised for such a time as this.'”
Furthermore, Boykin said — aloud — that Islamic fundamentalists hate the U.S. “because ‘we’re a Christian nation’ and added that our ‘spiritual enemy will only be defeated if we come against them in the name of Jesus.'” Oh, and let’s not leave out his thoughts on the Prince of Darkness, who may or may not be more evil than Muslims: “The battle that we’re in is a spiritual battle. Satan wants to destroy this nation, he wants to destroy us as a nation, and he wants to destroy us as a Christian army.”
Where do I sign up??!! Because we’re nothing but hellbound with Boykin’s framing of this “clash of civilizations” and the foolhardy perpetuating of this War on Terror™. And he’s not even Mormon.

The FAA has embarked in a sweeping review of its security procedures and has ordered new inspections of the more than 7,000 aircraft in the nation’s commercial airline fleet, officials announced today.
This is in response to a mechanical crew’s discovery on Thursday evening of a small bag containing boxcutters and other potentially dangerous paraphernalia found on two different Southwest Airlines flights. Also included in each bag were notes that made clear that the bag’s purpose was to highlight weaknesses in the current system of searching passengers before they board planes, and to show that weapons could still be brought onto commercial aircraft.
“In addition to the box cutters and notes, the bags contained bleach and modeling clay, according to a senior law enforcement official speaking on condition of anonymity. The clay was formed to mimic a plastic explosive, while the bleach could have been used to demonstrate how a dangerous liquid could be smuggled aboard an aircraft. It could also be thrown in a person’s eyes to temporarily blind them.
The notes also included the exact date and location the items were placed on board the planes, the official said.”
Following the description of the bag’s contents above, a completely unnecessary (and very asinine) concluding element in the New York Times’ reporting of this incident attempted to stave off fears of renewed terrorism:
“Government officials played down the possibility of a terrorist connection, though FBI spokeswoman Susan Whitson said members of the bureau’s joint terrorism task forces are involved in the investigation.
Harbin said Southwest does not believe the items found were connected to a plot to hijack the airplanes.”
Who would ever, in their right mind, suspect that this was anything but the work of someone clearly trying to help by revealing errors in the way we’ve been combatting terrorism, much like the unique breed of benevolent hackers who break into government websites and then alert site administrators of their security weaknesses?
It’s reassuring to know that members of the FBI’s terrorism task force are involved in finding whomever planted this terrorist “go bag”. Let’s hope this concerned citizen gets life in Gitmo.