I did; to this very poster, who hurriedly decided to put up a thread about it, alluding to him being involved in something nefarious.
It's TACKY.
Believe it or not, there IS a difference between this reporter who finally found the time to find Iraq...
That's just the kind of remark I'm talking about; I don't know this man and I'm not defending him, but from what little I have read about him yesterday and today, that's just not true. He's been there NUMEROUS times; and to Afghanistan and to North Korea and loads of other places.
— - Bob Woodruff is co-anchor of ABC News' "World News Tonight," a role he has held since January 2006.
Previously the anchor of the weekend edition of "World News Tonight" and one of ABC News' top correspondents, Woodruff has covered major stories throughout the country and around the world. His reports from New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina helped focus the nation's attention on the building tragedy there. He was ABC's lead correspondent on the Asian Tsunami, reporting from Banda Aceh, Indonesia and Sri Lanka. Woodruff has covered the entire so-called "axis of evil," the nuclear showdown in Iran, and in June 2005 he got unprecedented access to the secretive country of North Korea. In the last presidential election Woodruff reported on the campaign of Democratic Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina. He also has reported extensively on the continuing unrest in Iraq from Baghdad, Najaf, Nassariya and Basra. During the initial invasion in March 2003, Woodruff reported from the front lines as an embedded journalist with the First Marine Division, 1st Light Armored Reconnaissance Battalion.
Before moving to New York in 2002, Woodruff worked out of ABC News' London Bureau. After the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, he was among the first Western reporters to filed from Pakistan and was one of ABC News' lead foreign correspondents during the war in Afghanistan, reporting from Kabul and Kandahar on the fall of the Taliban. His overseas reporting of the fallout from Sept. 11 was part of ABC News' coverage recognized with the Alfred I. Dupont Award and the George Foster Peabody Award, the two highest honors in broadcast journalism. He was also a part of the ABC News team recognized with an Alfred I. duPont award for live coverage of the death of Pope John Paul II and the election of Pope Benedict XVI.
Before becoming a journalist Woodruff was an attorney. But in 1989 while teaching law in Beijing he was hired by CBS News to work as a translator during the Tiananmen Square uprising, and a short time later he changed careers. As ABC News' Justice Department correspondent in Washington in the late 1990s, Woodruff covered the office of Attorney General Janet Reno, the FBI and ATF. In 1999 he reported from Belgrade and Kosovo during the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia. Since then he has reported extensively on Europe and the Middle East.
Prior to joining ABC News, Woodruff was a reporter for KCPM-TV, the NBC affiliate in Redding, Calif., from 1991 to 1992; for the CBS affiliate WTVR-TV in Richmond, Va., from 1992 to 1994; and for KNXV-TV, the ABC affiliate in Phoenix, Ariz. from 1994 to 1996. He joined ABC News in 1996, based in the network's Chicago bureau.
Woodruff has a law degree from the University of Michigan Law School and a B.A. from Colgate University. He is married and has four children.
So, he's better than every other American who's been wounded in Iraq? What has he done to make Iraq better? What is your point?
I never attacked Woodruff. I attacked the media for making him a hero when he's merely an observer, and an inaccurate one at that. Show me not that he's been there. Show me where he's given fair and balanced coverage while he's been there.
He's being made a hero because his victimhood of one of the attacks that happens there every day 'proves' the false media paradigm that we're losing in Iraq.
If he had completed the convoy, found out the police were doing a great job (which they are), and seen for himself that a large part of the success in Iraq is due to U.S. forces training competent soldiers and policemen (which happens every day, day-in, day-out) you wouldn't have heard a damn word about Woodruff's trip through Taji. His own story wouldn't have made his own network's web page, let alone it's national broadcast.
Where am I wrong? I don't wish Woodruff ill, and I, too, pray for his and his cameraman's recovery.
I still don't think he's a hero or should be portrayed as one.