CNN’s Skeleton and Eason Jordan’s Davos Gossip
Austin Bay
Filed under: * General
— site admin @ 6:13 pm
I’m waiting for CNN to release the actual audio or a full-written transcript of Eason Jordan’s remarks in Davos, Switzerland. That will clarify and –to pinch CNN’s word—properly “contextualize” Jordan’s alleged anti-US slur.
We do know this: Jordan’s statement –whether chitchat or slander– was made before an international audience that included a score of Third World elites. These are the ruling class fat cats who have a big say back home about who gets to do what. They are the movers and shakers who have power to influence industrial concessions and –here’s the kicker in this analysis– with a wink and a nod can grant a news organization access to people and places. These elites are themselves potential news sources, bigshots who can add hardhitting soundbites.
Hugh Hewitt has a long post rich with links to discussion about Jordan’s gossip in Davos. The newsdissector.org site has an interesting slant. The CaptainsQuarters blog run by Ed Morrissey adds some historical depth. This post from powerline has an email passed on from Jordan which –as I read it– confuses rather than clarifies. (But go read it– that’s the fair thing to do.)
There are many reasons for CNN to make a full, complete disclosure, and they go beyond mere clarity of expression. I think this is the biggest: If Jordan did say he believes the US military “targeted” journalists (implying physical targeting) then we need to hear his evidence — premeditated murder is more than political scandal, it’s crime. This would be a bigger crime than Abu Ghraib.
There’s a second reason: CNN has a corporate skeleton rattling in its closet, and the skeleton involves Jordan. It also involves a deal with a local ruling class — in this case, Saddam Hussein and his pals.
This is no allegation. Jordan wrote an essay for the NY Times admitting his network regularly withheld information about Saddam’s evil regime – because that’s what it took to keep the bureau open. (Here’s a link to the abstract of Jordans’ The News We Kept to Ourselves which ran in the NY Times on April 11, 2003. The abstract doesn’t do justice to the depravity of Jordan’s op-ed.)
I suspect we do not have all the facts on the CNN-Saddam deal, and in my view another major news organization should have investigated CNN’s admission. (If one did and I missed it, email me with a link.)
Perhaps one of Baghdad’s new newspapers will take on that challenge, which would be deliciously ironic.
But first let me make a few points some readers may find surprisingly sympathetic to CNN: News gathering in dangerous places often means negotiating with devils to get interviews, to travel, to simply get inside a prison society like Saddam’s. I do not mean making deals to deceive, but reaching careful, a priori understandings about the restrictions tyrants place on free journalists, such as where the reporter is allowed to go, whom he goes with, when he can file, etcetera. (Editors and reporters can –and do—decide to reject such restrictions, God bless’em.) Why accept a travel restriction? Often a narrow window – a narrowly framed report — can shed useful light in these hellholes.
In an ideal world editors would append a note informing the reader of the specific restrictions the correspondent faced. But we don’t live in an ideal world, and an “editor’s note” like that could get a correspondent jailed or killed if it irks the local tyrant. Editors have to weigh consequences, and a reporter killed in the line of duty is a severe consequence. Savvy readers, and tv viewers, learn to pick up on clues dropped by experienced correspondents.
As far I can tell, the CNN Baghdad situation wasn’t based on these real-world caveats. The network’s deal with the devil lasted a dozen years. The deal brought the network a commercial advantage over more tough-minded competitors. Moreover, CNN’s depiction of Saddam’s regime was often differed, oh, a hundred degrees from the critical reporting of the NY Times’ John Burns. (Saddam jailed Burns at least twice—underlining my point about the risk correspondents face.) Sure, CNN portrayed Saddam as a strong man – but by the way, Iraqi children were dying. Though Saddam had invaded Kuwait and had a meanish streak, in CNN’s Iraq children died because of UN sanctions enforced by the US military.
CNN played a “he’s bad, but—“ game. I’ll wager the journalistic excuse was “balance” — a balance Saddam and Baghdad Bob certainly appreciated. CNN’s “balance” was of course anything but balance – over the long haul I believe the network put a finger on the scale that gave Saddam undeserved moral and political weight.
We now know the reason Iraqi children were dying: Saddam had corrupted the UN’s Oil For Food program and was skimming money that was supposed to buy medicine and food.
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