Hey! This News is Good!
By Cori Dauber
Listen, you can call me crazy if you want to, but I think Bob Schieffer is doing a terrific job with the CBS Evening News. The format changes (more interaction between the anchor and the reporter so that the reporters are more front and center) I haven't made my mind up about yet, but the program as a whole seems crisper and sharper and Schieffer himself is just terrific.
Given my incessant surfing I missed what was said about Iraq tonight, although it looked as if they just ran footage while Schieffer talked, but they've introduced a middle point between having a reporter present a story and having Schieffer simply read wire copy, where Schieffer reads copy, but then asks questions of a reporter, and Schieffer proceeds to ask questions of CBS reporter Byron Pitts, now back in Iraq. (That my help in and of itself, Elizabeth Palmer being one of the most depressing souls reporting out of the country and Kimberly Dozier a close second.)
Schieffer begins the interaction by saying, "I hate to jinx it . . . but all of a sudden there's some pretty good news . . ."
My notes of the exchange aren't verbatim, so I'll merely list the issues that were raised over the course of a relatively short conversation.
Pitts says no US commander is "thumping his chest" because they understand that wars have "peaks and valleys," however, there's no question that there have been some important developments recently.
Sunday's ambush of a convoy in which a Guard unit fought back and killed over twenty insurgents -- that's a function of both training and equipment. Pitts notes thats a year ago US soldiers were dying in precisely this kind of scenario, but the humvees attacked here were armored, giving them what they needed to fight back.
Iraqis have started to fight from out front. As in the recent attack that killed over 80. Pitts notes that those kinds of moments are important not only because "American sons and daughters" aren't being killed, but because they speak to the "needs of the Iraqis." When it's the Iraqi forces taking the lead, the Iraqi people see what their own forces are capable of, and gain confidence in them.
Interestingly, though, despite all this, when Schieffer asks Pitts, given that this is his third trip, if anything has changed, all he's shown to discuss is his concern for security. (The jump cut makes it clear this is a pre-taped and edited interview.) |
