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Newsweek Continues Apologist Role

By Jeralyn, Section Terror Detainees
Posted on Sun May 22, 2005 at 12:55:57 PM EST
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Newsweek continues to play the Administration's blame game over its mention of a Koran desecration incident and subsequent retraction. Kevin Drum gets it exactly right, calling Newsweek's blunder the equivalent of jaywalking, and concluding:

Newsweek and the rest of the media need to get up off their knees and start fighting back. They've done enough apologizing.

The L.A. Times today reports on the dozens who have alleged mishandling of the Koran. Our compilation on prior Koran abuse claims is here. Our point: Attorney General Alberto Gonzales should appoint a special counsel to investigate the prisoner abuse claims.

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    • Newsweek Continues Apologist Role | 13 comments (13 topical)
    Re: Newsweek Continues Apologist Role (none / 0) (#10)
    by soccerdad on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 12:55:39 PM EST
    insult deleted, this commenter is warned to stop the name-calling or he will be banned from the site.

    Re: Newsweek Continues Apologist Role (none / 0) (#11)
    by ppjakajim on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 12:55:40 PM EST
    SD - What is it that you don't understand about "every?"

    Re: Newsweek Continues Apologist Role (none / 0) (#12)
    by soccerdad on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 12:55:40 PM EST
    insult deleted

    Re: Newsweek Continues Apologist Role (none / 0) (#14)
    by ppjakajim on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 12:55:42 PM EST
    DA - The problem is this: "Robert Walpole, then the national intelligence officer for strategic and nuclear programs, would later tell investigators that "the NSC believed the nuclear case was weak," You see, "believed is a qualifier. A weasle word that, if it was later proved to be wrong, that the NSC could hide behind when asked to explain why they didn't know a nuke was being built for NYC. A President doesn't have that luxury. Be that President a Demo or Repub, Clinton or Bush, the decision must be made by them. You may use the weasle words to attack Bush. But let's not act like that they are anything but that, and that you are engaging in Monday Morning Quarterbacking.

    Re: Newsweek Continues Apologist Role (none / 0) (#1)
    by jarober on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 12:59:17 PM EST
    No, Newsweek, like CBS last year, got caught in an entertaining game of "making crap up" They are now attempting to restore what shreds of credibility they have left. In the meantime, their water carriers at the NY Times are busy dredging up old alleged incidents of abuse elsewhere (aided and abetted by TL, I might add) - in a game that sound like nothing so much as loudly shouting: "Look! A monkey!"

    Re: Newsweek Continues Apologist Role (none / 0) (#2)
    by Sailor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 12:59:17 PM EST
    Nothing has been published that refutes either newsweek or cbs stories, they just couldn't be confirmed, especially after the sources backed down. the wh and the pentagon were repectively given a chance to refute the stories before publication and didn't. There is a lot of proof for both stories. having the wh object to a single source is laughable after they used curveball as a single source to lie to the UN and amerca about wmd's. spin it anyway you want, but bush was a deserter during wartime and american soldiers desecrated the koran.

    Re: Newsweek Continues Apologist Role (none / 0) (#3)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 12:59:17 PM EST
    It is absolutely sickening to me that the RNC and the Bush administration are playing this redirect blame game with NewsWeek. The real story is 1600 US soldiers DEAD! 24,000 Iraqis DEAD! And not because of NewsWeek but because of Bush and the RNC. Our relations with the middlea east are poor not because of NewsWeek but because Bush led us into a failed War based on lies and faulty intelligence. Then, $9 Billion in reconstruction money disappears, we are unable to keep basic serices on for the Iraqis, nor can we protect them from the insurgents. The damage was done long before NewsWeek Mr. President. It is time for you to be a man and admit to your mistakes and stop trying to blame NewsWeek.

    Re: Newsweek Continues Apologist Role (none / 0) (#4)
    by kdog on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 12:59:17 PM EST
    Speaking of misleading info and fact-checking gone AWOL....find any wmd's yet? Talk about making mountains out of molehills, and molehills out of mountains.

    Re: Newsweek Continues Apologist Role (none / 0) (#5)
    by jarober on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 12:59:17 PM EST
    I live the way the left shouts that 1600 dead indicates a "failed war". It's a good thing for you that the founders and Lincoln were made of sterner stuff - you would have given up after the very first engagement of the Civil War, claiming that it was a failed war. In fact, there's an astonishing amount of similarity between the rhetoric of the wartime Democrats from 1860-1865 and the wartime Democrats of the modern era.

    Re: Newsweek Continues Apologist Role (none / 0) (#6)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 12:59:17 PM EST
    Actually James, while I don't quite buy into the "Failed War" rhetoric, I'm inclined to believe it has a lot more to do with the (White House admitted) failure to plan for the post-war environment (gee....who would of thought that you might need a worse-case and middle-case assessment to go with that rose-colored glasses best-case). A failure which has led to the death of 1400 US deaths, a known Iranian spy involved in the Iraqi govt. (Chalabi), and a internecine religious tension that is rapidly devolving into militia warfare. Is this a failed war? Not just yet, IMO, but it's awfuylly close. Instead of adressing these shortcomings, and calling for accountability, all the Right can do is whine that people who point these things out "aren't clapping loud enough" to keep Tinkerbell alive.

    Re: Newsweek Continues Apologist Role (none / 0) (#7)
    by ppjakajim on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 12:59:17 PM EST
    Sailor - I think it was the single source that Newsweeek had that backed down. I wonder what happened to dual sources and verify? It sure used to mean something, but when it is anti-war and anti-US it doesn't seem to matter. As for mishandling a Koran, please, give me a break. Thousands of these are in libraries around the world and thousands are owned by "unbelievers." If these people, the terrorists and those who are facilitating them, were concerned about improper handling, then I would think they would be bringing these other owners into the complaint. But no, they do not. This is really just a tempest in a teapot, fanned by the Left and used by our enemies. In the meantime I would tell the terrorists in prison that if they don't like how we are treating the Koran they should have paid attention the "peaceful" portions of it and not attacked the US.

    Re: Newsweek Continues Apologist Role (none / 0) (#8)
    by soccerdad on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 12:59:17 PM EST
    I wonder what happened to dual sources and verify? It sure used to mean something, but when it is anti-war and anti-US it doesn't seem to matter.
    Which reminds me of the single source that Bush used to promote the mobile biolabs that turned out to be nonsense and the source to be a stooge. And of course PPJ ignores that its not just about the Koran but about the treatment of Muslims, bit prisoners and civilians, by the Americans, The treatment of the Koran becomes a perfect symbol of the contempt that the US shows towards Muslims

    Re: Newsweek Continues Apologist Role (none / 0) (#9)
    by ppjakajim on Sat Dec 17, 2005 at 12:59:18 PM EST
    SD - Please. Every major intelliegence in the world thought he had WMD's. Why do you keep on trying to rewrite history

    Newsweek Continues Apologist Role | 13 comments (13 topical)