CAMILO MEJIA ON
this evening/tonight. (Depending upon the time zone you're in.)
RadioNation with Laura Flanders
Third Anniversary of the Iraq War
Three years after invading Iraq, DC Dems are running from censuring W. Even as Bush defends pre-emptive war and says Iran is next.
Saturdays & Sundays, 7-10pm ET on Air America Radio
Who says the left has no alternatives to war?
We talk to Alexander Cockburn who has no fear... and to the former director of the Peace Corps, and UNICEF President -- Carol Bellamy. Plus anti-war veterans call in from New Orleans; wounded Iraqi children describe their lives today.
And Nation author Christian Parenti on why Europeans are doing a better job than the US in Afghanistan.
A one-hour version of last weekend's live broadcast from Montana is available at http://lauraflanders-com.c.topica.com/maaeBgxabo5GAbQccDue/
It's all on RadioNation with Laura Flanders this weekend on Air America Radio.
Third Anniversary of the Iraq War
Three years after invading Iraq, DC Dems are running from censuring W. Even as Bush defends pre-emptive war and says Iran is next.
Saturdays & Sundays, 7-10pm ET on Air America Radio
Who says the left has no alternatives to war?
We talk to Alexander Cockburn who has no fear... and to the former director of the Peace Corps, and UNICEF President -- Carol Bellamy. Plus anti-war veterans call in from New Orleans; wounded Iraqi children describe their lives today.
And Nation author Christian Parenti on why Europeans are doing a better job than the US in Afghanistan.
A one-hour version of last weekend's live broadcast from Montana is available at http://lauraflanders-com.c.topica.com/maaeBgxabo5GAbQccDue/
It's all on RadioNation with Laura Flanders this weekend on Air America Radio.
but the show is on right now and Flanders stated Camilo Mejia is a guest tonight.
Mejia is a community favorite (as the e-mails on Friday's entry can attest). So you've got your heads up. The Saturday and Sunday shows are no longer archived at Air America Place. An hour version of the two broadcasts are available online. So if you miss Flanders tonight, you may miss your chance to hear Camilo Mejia.
This is your update.
Thank you to Dallas and Kat for all their help in getting entries today. (And thank you to ___ who's typing this dicated entry.) Technorati won't read the first entry of the day and Kat republished it and republished it. I told Kat I'd try to think of something but I'm out of ideas. Here's the opening of "NYT: Can't own up to mistakes, be it the paper or Michael Gordon:"
Before we deal with news of the morning (or what made it into print this morning), we're flashing back to March 25, 2003.
JAMIE MCINTYRE, CNN SENIOR PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Well, we have now learned from the U.S. Central Command that, in fact, Iraqi television and is also a key telecommution -- communications facility, as well as Baghdad's, Baghdad's satellite communications, have all been targeted, both by Tomahawk land attack cruise missiles and by ordnance dropped from the air as well.
So a number of precision-guided munitions were used to take out a group of buildings that comprise something that makes up Iraqi television and also satellite communications as well. The stated purpose of this, according to the U.S. Central Command, is simply to take away command (UNINTELLIGIBLE) control capabilities from the regime.
And again, a senior administration official here in Washington tells CNN that it was always the plan not to take out the television from day one, that it served a purpose for a while. But under the war plan, there's a sequence of events that happens in a specific order to try to create the effect of undermining the regime. And in that sequence, today was the day that Iraqi television was scheduled to be taken out, Aaron.
BROWN: Jamie, thank you very much.
The above is from CNN's rush transcript for the March 25, 2003 broadcast of CNN NEWSNIGHT AARON BROWN. We're going back to it (the above was to set up that day's event) and, yes, there is a point. Here's the New York Times' Michael Gordon on the same program.
So I think the headline really is, shift of focus in the ground attack to the south. The air is continuing to focus on the Republican Guard in the north. And, you know, it's an adaptation, and I think really a necessary one.
And personally, I think the television, based on what I've seen of Iraqi television, with Saddam Hussein presenting propaganda to his people and showing off the Apache helicopter and claiming a farmer shot it down and trying to persuade his own public that he was really in charge, when we're trying to send the exact opposite message, I think, was an appropriate target.
Gordon wasn't asked, by Brown or anyone else, according to the transcript -- read it yourself, about the bombing of Iraqi television, he brings it up himself and, above, is his full statement.
At the top of the program, the day's events are explained and they include that "a number of precision-guided munitions were used to take out a group of buildings that comprise something that makes up Iraqi television." The embed Gordon (he identifies himself that way on air), brings up the topic without prompting and states:
And personally, I think the television, based on what I've seen of Iraqi television, with Saddam Hussein presenting propaganda to his people and showing off the Apache helicopter and claiming a farmer shot it down and trying to persuade his own public that he was really in charge, when we're trying to send the exact opposite message, I think, was an appropriate target.
Now we're going to yesterday's Democracy Now! ("New York Times Chief Military Correspondent Michael Gordon Defends Pre-War Reporting on WMDs"). Here is what Juan Gonzalez asked him:
JUAN GONZALEZ: There was, of course, the bombing of Iraqi television that occurred in the early days of the war. And you were actually on CNN where you were quoted as saying, "Personally, I think that the television, based on what I've seen of Iraqi television, with Saddam Hussein presenting propaganda, that I think it was an appropriate target." And your, in retrospect, on that, that was condemned by many journalism organizations around the world, the attacking of Iraqi television. Your thoughts on it?
Now let's go through Judith Miller's former writing partner, who has now turned war pornographer, response, in full, to a direct question from Gonzalez:
MICHAEL GORDON: Well, I think when--you know, I don't know what was in General Franks' mind when he meant "media targets." I think General Franks has an odd way of talking, if you're familiar, if you've listened to him a lot or are familiar with him, and he's not always -- I don't want to cast any aspersions on him, but he's not always precise in his language. I think by "media targets" in that context, really what he meant was command-control communications.
But here was the issue: in the first war, they knocked Iraqi TV off the air. I'm not calling, and I shouldn't be interpreted as calling on the United States to bomb, you know, TV technicians--some of my best friends are TV technicians; I don't care if they're American or Iraqi. I don't want people to bomb TV stations per se, but I think that one of the problems they were had was keeping Iraqi television off the air, either through electronic jamming or by, you know, if you could hit an antenna, or, you know, hit a some sort of, you know, cable, or, you know, if there was some way of doing it.
He was asked to explain his statement saying that a civilian target, a TV station, was an appropriate target. Did Gonzalez mention Tommy Franks? No, he did not. Why Gordon brings up Franks is anyone's guess. No, Gordon didn't 'call' for a bombing of Iraqi TV, he merely justified it, after the fact, on his own, with no prompting from Aaron Brown. He brought the bombing up, on CNN in real time, on his own and justified it. Now, pressed on it yesterday, he can't admit what he did it. He can't own what he did. Why? Because it's that damn disgusting.
It goes against journalism, it goes against the rules of engagement for warfare. But he was there, in real time, to cheerlead a military attack on a civilian target. Now? He wants to act as though he was asked about Tommy Franks. By by Aaron Brown, Juan Gonzalez or his own craven ego desperate to save himself, I don't know. But he appears to think someone mentioned Tommy Franks.
(Or maybe the good embed just always pictures Franks in his head -- fully dressed or not, I wouldn't know.)
JAMIE MCINTYRE, CNN SENIOR PENTAGON CORRESPONDENT: Well, we have now learned from the U.S. Central Command that, in fact, Iraqi television and is also a key telecommution -- communications facility, as well as Baghdad's, Baghdad's satellite communications, have all been targeted, both by Tomahawk land attack cruise missiles and by ordnance dropped from the air as well.
So a number of precision-guided munitions were used to take out a group of buildings that comprise something that makes up Iraqi television and also satellite communications as well. The stated purpose of this, according to the U.S. Central Command, is simply to take away command (UNINTELLIGIBLE) control capabilities from the regime.
And again, a senior administration official here in Washington tells CNN that it was always the plan not to take out the television from day one, that it served a purpose for a while. But under the war plan, there's a sequence of events that happens in a specific order to try to create the effect of undermining the regime. And in that sequence, today was the day that Iraqi television was scheduled to be taken out, Aaron.
BROWN: Jamie, thank you very much.
The above is from CNN's rush transcript for the March 25, 2003 broadcast of CNN NEWSNIGHT AARON BROWN. We're going back to it (the above was to set up that day's event) and, yes, there is a point. Here's the New York Times' Michael Gordon on the same program.
So I think the headline really is, shift of focus in the ground attack to the south. The air is continuing to focus on the Republican Guard in the north. And, you know, it's an adaptation, and I think really a necessary one.
And personally, I think the television, based on what I've seen of Iraqi television, with Saddam Hussein presenting propaganda to his people and showing off the Apache helicopter and claiming a farmer shot it down and trying to persuade his own public that he was really in charge, when we're trying to send the exact opposite message, I think, was an appropriate target.
Gordon wasn't asked, by Brown or anyone else, according to the transcript -- read it yourself, about the bombing of Iraqi television, he brings it up himself and, above, is his full statement.
At the top of the program, the day's events are explained and they include that "a number of precision-guided munitions were used to take out a group of buildings that comprise something that makes up Iraqi television." The embed Gordon (he identifies himself that way on air), brings up the topic without prompting and states:
And personally, I think the television, based on what I've seen of Iraqi television, with Saddam Hussein presenting propaganda to his people and showing off the Apache helicopter and claiming a farmer shot it down and trying to persuade his own public that he was really in charge, when we're trying to send the exact opposite message, I think, was an appropriate target.
Now we're going to yesterday's Democracy Now! ("New York Times Chief Military Correspondent Michael Gordon Defends Pre-War Reporting on WMDs"). Here is what Juan Gonzalez asked him:
JUAN GONZALEZ: There was, of course, the bombing of Iraqi television that occurred in the early days of the war. And you were actually on CNN where you were quoted as saying, "Personally, I think that the television, based on what I've seen of Iraqi television, with Saddam Hussein presenting propaganda, that I think it was an appropriate target." And your, in retrospect, on that, that was condemned by many journalism organizations around the world, the attacking of Iraqi television. Your thoughts on it?
Now let's go through Judith Miller's former writing partner, who has now turned war pornographer, response, in full, to a direct question from Gonzalez:
MICHAEL GORDON: Well, I think when--you know, I don't know what was in General Franks' mind when he meant "media targets." I think General Franks has an odd way of talking, if you're familiar, if you've listened to him a lot or are familiar with him, and he's not always -- I don't want to cast any aspersions on him, but he's not always precise in his language. I think by "media targets" in that context, really what he meant was command-control communications.
But here was the issue: in the first war, they knocked Iraqi TV off the air. I'm not calling, and I shouldn't be interpreted as calling on the United States to bomb, you know, TV technicians--some of my best friends are TV technicians; I don't care if they're American or Iraqi. I don't want people to bomb TV stations per se, but I think that one of the problems they were had was keeping Iraqi television off the air, either through electronic jamming or by, you know, if you could hit an antenna, or, you know, hit a some sort of, you know, cable, or, you know, if there was some way of doing it.
He was asked to explain his statement saying that a civilian target, a TV station, was an appropriate target. Did Gonzalez mention Tommy Franks? No, he did not. Why Gordon brings up Franks is anyone's guess. No, Gordon didn't 'call' for a bombing of Iraqi TV, he merely justified it, after the fact, on his own, with no prompting from Aaron Brown. He brought the bombing up, on CNN in real time, on his own and justified it. Now, pressed on it yesterday, he can't admit what he did it. He can't own what he did. Why? Because it's that damn disgusting.
It goes against journalism, it goes against the rules of engagement for warfare. But he was there, in real time, to cheerlead a military attack on a civilian target. Now? He wants to act as though he was asked about Tommy Franks. By by Aaron Brown, Juan Gonzalez or his own craven ego desperate to save himself, I don't know. But he appears to think someone mentioned Tommy Franks.
(Or maybe the good embed just always pictures Franks in his head -- fully dressed or not, I wouldn't know.)
- - - - - -
That's the opening. To read more about Gordon's embarrassing attempts at denial when questioned by Amy Goodman and Juan Gonzalez, read "NYT: Can't own up to mistakes, be it the paper or Michael Gordon."
Listen to Laura Flanders.
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