Hello -- I generally agree with the thrust of David Axe's story, but I take issue with one point.

I don't know of any journalist who actually lives in Baghdad's "Green Zone." The statement, "Western reporters rarely venture out of the heavily fortified Green Zone," is simply incorrect. They are out of the Green Zone far, far more than they are in it.

The area is reserved for international embassy bigwigs and Iraqi govt bigwigs/ offices, but I know of no media organization that is headquartered there. (Unless things have vastly changed since my rotation, in May. But given the number of friends and colleagues I have on the Iraq rotation, I don't think so.)

In fact, residents of the Green Zone, such as diplomats, refer to everything outside of it (the whole of Iraq, in fact) as the "red zone." They are rarely without armed protection if they come to a hotel where journalists must reside.

Most journalists in 3-4 hotels -- two of which, the al-Hamra and the Palestine, came very close to being destroyed by truck bombs in the past couple of months.

That's part of the constant undercurrent of stress for media there: Not only can you be abducted when you're trying to do your job, but your home base could be blown up, or raided, at any given moment, and there's really not that much that can be done about it.

Thank you.

Regards,

M.P. Nunan

Voice of America

This points to a Baghdad journalism conundrum. The news organizations that don't go out to report because of the dangers in Baghdad talk openly about not being able to go out. Meanwhile, the news organizations that do go out cannot talk about it, because of security.

The news organizations that don't go out as much as some others, or at all, therefore shape the perception of Western reporting in Baghdad. But that perception, as given in the article, is incorrect, or at least incomplete. We're not all in the Green Zone; we're not all holed up in hotels.

It's very true that more of Baghdad and Iraq are steadily becoming no-go areas. And I'd never fault any organization for the measures it takes to protect the lives of its foreign and Iraqi staffers. All here are doing what they can in the face of personal danger, and just by being here show a real commitment to the story. But Jill Carroll's kidnapping is sad evidence that Western journalists and their Iraqi co-workers are still going out.

Ellen Knickmeyer

Washington Post bureau chief, Baghdad.

As a working journalist in the states, I used to think that working as a war reporter in Iraq would be an exciting, romatic adventure a la Bogart and Casablanca. Then I saw an internet video of an American contractor getting his head cut off and that was that.

I don't know if I could do that kind of reporting -- unarmed. And I am still not sure if being armed would help much, but a bullet seems better than getting your head hacked off with a kitchen knife.

I think that part of the solution may be to hire more Arab Americans, who if not fluent in the local language, at least have a good chance of blending in, relating to Iraqi natives and understanding the culture a little better.

I for one am grateful for the risk reporters take, the courage they display in taking the assignment and the committment to freedom they have for risking their lives to bring us the news.

And no matter what the government is telling us, the fact that journalist can not move around without being kidnapped or killed means that one thing is clear -- Irag is not a safe place nor is it getting safer.

As Rummy would say, "it is what it is."

As an avid news hound that usues all forms of communication to figure out the ,"real" story on Iraq. This whole article troubles me greatly.

How can a reporter get an unbiased story about conditions in Iraq when their own security is at risk? To me that says it all.

How can as an educated voter get my constituents to listen to me about my concerns in Iraq when their is limited information gotten on the ground?

Dear friends here:

I'm a real newcomer; only five-years computer literate, "carbon dating" now Officially Three-Quarters-of-a-Century Old (as of last month), less than about a week old to this group, and right now fighting severe toothache with all sorts of analgesics I don't much believe in and that don't kick in very fast.

So please forgive what might seem to any or all of you an overly-quick or intemperate or trivial or irrelevant remark but as I, too have, been following the quickness posts on Jill Carroll (Danny Pearl's execution was one of my Introduction to Learnings via Computer, and I've been following many other stories since), it does trouble me that this is the second online post I've seen that refers to Jill's kidnapping as having been on January 7. Though a retired schoolteacher, I don't usually get picky about what seem to me to be typos in online posts but in this case it troubles me -- partly because it IS the second time I've seen this. As it is my understanding that the initial broadcast threat was that she would be killed (if terms weren't met) "within 72 hours", and as other reports have seemed to corroborate that (meaning that today is the posted terminal date) this otherwise simple error (omitting the "1" from "17") seems to me, in context, one of life-threatening significance.

Sorry -- color me concerned, tooth-ached, a bit ancient but ongoingly grateful to Salon and everyone here. Meanwhile, as with so many of us, my prayers for Jill and her family and for some eventual resolution of some of these many so horrifying and complicated conflicts.

"Thanks for listenin'",

salonmarte

Salonmarte: The date of abduction in the article was probably accurate. The demands were not made until the 17th. She was abducted many days before the video of her and the demands were released.