Site Presented By
Saturday, Nov 7, 2009
They're looking forward at NPR, not backwards, Glenn. The column was written in the past, like the enhanced interrogation techniques and the OLC memos from Yoo and Bybee that greenlighted them and the orders from the President, Vice President and their Cabinet level officers and Guantanamo and the writ of habeas corpus and the presumption of innocence and the doctrine of separation of powers and the Rule of Law. All in the past.
Let's not bicker and argue over 'oo killed 'oo. And certainly not over what to call it all.
But thanks for trying.
As Clive Crook wrote in yesterday's FT: "Obama is choosing to be weak." (see the lovely Bromley cartoon linked at sig)
So is she.
For much the same reasons:
1. She got righteously hammered for writing blatant nonsense
2. She knew it was nonsense before she wrote it
3. She knows you know
4. She knows there is no defence
There is no point in her repeating the performance on Salon Radio. That would just be an exercise in utter humiliation, that she naturally would rather avoid.
What is left? Deny, obfuscate, dissemble, deny, misdirect, rinse, repeat ...
Orders of the day, right?
I'm not really sure how she views her role as "ombudsman..." it doesn't seem to be functionally different from a role as advocate for her employer.
What I found particularly egregious was the defense she kept raising that the media should describe the techniques and let people make up their minds. Calling torture "enhanced interrogation techniques" though, does the exact opposite. It's not an especially complicated point.
Regardless of your view on the issue, it's hard to make the case that Shepard's particularly well-suited well-suited for this role.
when the only people paying attention to the "Gang of 500", is the "Gang of 500", and the rest of us can finally move on to better things. I can no longer bring myself to visit the WaPo's op-ed section, even though it still features a few good writers, like Dionne, Robinson and Meyerson. But they're working in a fetid swamp that's just too rank for me to spend any time in. I'm trying to wean myself off of the Sunday talk shows and even Countdown, where even though Keith is one of the good guys (most of the time), his obsession with the far-right and concern troll bad guys subjects me to them way more than I can stand.
When oh when will the stupid just end? It's just killing us.
There must be something more important to write about than this petty dispute between pundits (the title "ombudsman" notwithstanding). Glenn, you have right on your side, clearly - you made your point in your previous column - what function does this one serve? Your readers all know the so-called liberal media is not liberal. What about some more information on the kid Bob Herbert writes about today in the NYT - surely more important and pressing?
on a side note: do you think a prisoner cares whether he/she is labelled a detainee or a prisoner or a terrorist or an extremist? Do the Taliban care whether military acts against them are part of the war on terror or an overseas contingency operation? Fights over language really only obscure the true fight about the underlying acts or omissions - labels don't help anyone.
They've been Stockholm Syndromed into submission and even admiration, and just can't bring themselves to admit that we have tortured, extensively, knowingly and repeatedly, even eagerly. They can't bring themselves to admit that we created a torture regime literally no different from that in the worst countries on earth. It's just too much for them to bear, so they resort to comforting euphemisms. Such a useless generation of hack journalists, we've not seen for generations.
Wow. If you had asked me which of those voices on the audio was the ombudsman and which was the defensive administration lackey, I would have gotten it wrong. In the real world there is no controversy about whether the US tortured, she admits, but in her own mind the controversy rages on. She doesn't know what an ombudsman is, she doesn't know what a journalist is, and in the end she can't even remember what a decent human being is. All so that she doesn't have to admit to us that she was wrong. Or worse, doesn't have to admit to herself that she lives in a country that tortures. That's just pathetic.
Thank you, Glenn, for following up on this. I'm also pleased that someone else at NPR showed a bit more character.
There must be something more important to write about than this petty dispute between pundits (the title "ombudsman" notwithstanding). Glenn, you have right on your side, clearly - you made your point in your previous column - what function does this one serve?
Feel free not read topics you don't consider worthwhile -- I usually indicate with the title what it's about. I obviously think the topic is important.
What about some more information on the kid Bob Herbert writes about today in the NYT - surely more important and pressing?
I wrote about that case in very extensive detail months ago:
http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2009/01/21/guantanamo/
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/16/business/media/16radio.html
Is that what we are dealing with here?
I used to listen to NPR for the same reasons I watched PBS. Not so much anymore. NPR's news, financial reporting and a lot of its political commentary seem to have a strong conservative spin these days.
Fights over language really only obscure the true fight about the underlying acts or omissions - labels don't help anyone.
I submit to you that when a society as a whole accepts "ehnanced interrogation techniques" or "pouring water down someone's nose" as acceptable ways to describe torture practices -- and when as a result there can be civilized debates on Sunday chat shows about whether this torture practice or that torture practice is acceptable -- that no, labels do help someone.
And not the good guys.
This should be talked about more, not less.
Much of the initial coverage about Fort Hood turned out to be wrong. Is there anything wrong with that?
The accountability imposed by another country for the CIA's kidnapping and torture reveals much about our own.
The Maine fight was supposed to be the dress rehearsal for repealing California's Prop. 8 -- but gay marriage lost
Fox News' morning show plays to type, talking about whether Muslims in the Army should face "special debriefings"
Once one obtains Seriousness credentials in the Washington media, they are irrevocable no matter one's conduct.
Salon headlines in your mailbox
