I don’t know if she’s a liberal or not, but you’re prolly spot on about the naivete. You have to be really naive or STUPID to travel through the ME, including Turkey, alone. Doubly stupid for a woman and she was staying in and touring through a particularly bad spot of town.
Daniel Pearl was as naive. He was less of a journalist and more of a cautionary tale, if anybody was interested in listening.
Pearl was a selfish thrill-seeker with no regard for his wife and children. Cautionary indeed.