FURY OVER CNN BIG'S COVER-UP

New York Post ^ | 4/12/03 | MICHAEL STARR and DEBORAH ORIN

[kattracks]

April 12, 2003 -- CNN exec Eason Jordan's stunning admission that he withheld information about Saddam Hussein's atrocities drew a scathing response yesterday from media watchdogs and Iraqi opposition groups.

Jordan, CNN's news chief, wrote an op-ed piece in yesterday's New York Times about horrors he learned of - but didn't report - when he visited Baghdad "to lobby the government to keep CNN's Baghdad bureau open and to arrange interviews with Iraqi leaders."

[mewzilla]

NO BLOOD FOR RATINGS!!

CNN's still doing this in other places. Anyone heard anything critical about Cuba?

[Cosmo]

Now that's a good one. Make it your tag-line!

[The G Man]

Now that's a good one. Make it your tag-line!

Done. Good idea.

I think an Atlanta based FReep of CNN Center in Atlanta may be in order. With signs saying "No blood for ratings" and "What did CNN know and when did they know it!"

[Nick Danger]

[Liberty]

Did everyone see the Iraqi Ambassador to the U.N. kiss the male CNN reporter goodbye as he left for the airport? Figures.

[visualops]

You should read this piece on cnn's 'sins of omission':
http://www.techcentralstation.com/1051/defensewrapper.jsp?PID=1051-350&CID=1051-041103H

[uncbob]

CNN and all the other networks are still covering up on Clinton's treason corruption and rape escapade as well as his wife's crimes

[Libloather]

"CNN was clearly trading truth for access..."

What an advertisement. Makes ya just want to tune into CNN to see what they're spewing now - eh?

[philetus]

Eason Jordan needs to be arrested and charged with being an accessory to murder, torture, and terrorism.

[TechJunkYard]

CNN is a news-gathering organization (albeit with a leftist bent). Its job is to gather and disseminate news. In order to do that, it needs to be where the news is happening. Sometimes it needs to hold its nose and overlook stuff in order to stay there. It needs to employ local people who know the area and the language.

Pulling out would have endangered those local folks who would have had to stay behind. They would also lose a prime source for news. Factually reporting all they knew would get people tortured and killed and others kicked out of the country.

Eason Jordan knew all of this. To his credit, he did advise King Hussein when he learned of a specific threat. Now he has revealed this nastyness to all of us. Frankly, I think the guy deserves a couple of attaboys for being the first to do it. There will be others. Surely, CNN is not the only organization which had to overlook and not report stuff that it knew in order to protect its people.

[RWG]

Didn't report atrocities but told king of jordan? Like that was not going to get back to the madman.

[wimpycat]

Let's not kid ourselves here. If CNN new about the torture and the killings, then every other western news organization who had a bureau in Baghdad knew about it, too. That would include at least the BBC & ITN, Reuters, AP, CBS, NBC & ABC (I'm assuming they all had offices in Baghdad) and quite probably Fox and Skynews as well.

They were all presented with a moral test; be complicit in order to be allowed to report in Iraq or get the hell out and scream the truth from the rooftops---and they failed the test.

I would love to be able to single out CNN, but I just can't. I'm not sure which news organizations had offices in Baghdad, but I'd be quite surprised if the other huge organizations such as BBC, AP & Reuters weren't equally complicit in the coverup.

[wimpycat]

They may have warned King Hussein, but they didn't advise Saddam's sons-in-law about the plan to kill them.

[skinkinthegrass]

cnn, the u.n. and jimmy carter are like those frenchmen that coddled the nazis. cnn is the network of genocide and the u.n. is the political ally of saddam...If saddam is ever tried for genocide, cnn and the u.n. should be as well.

Since after WWI...Genocide is a Hallmark for Socialism/Liberalism from Stalin, Hilter, Mao, ..etc. to Saddam.

Now, We have Shillary... :(

[Timesink]

Let's not kid ourselves here. If CNN new about the torture and the killings, then every other western news organization who had a bureau in Baghdad knew about it, too. That would include at least the BBC & ITN, Reuters, AP, CBS, NBC & ABC (I'm assuming they all had offices in Baghdad) and quite probably Fox and Skynews as well.

No, you're not correct. I can't speak for all the news organizations you name, but I know that most of them did NOT have a Baghdad bureau. There's a reason CNN was so desperate to hold onto their bureau: Because they were one of - if not the only - western news media that had one. (This is why all those Reuters people died in the Palestine Hotel, for example: Because they didn't have one before they showed up to cover the war and they got shoved into a hotel room.)

CNN occupies a special place in the Pantheon of Evil with this revelation.

[TechJunkYard]

I don't think they had access to those guys in order to warn them privately.

[BIGZ]

Lets not forget AOL.

Boycot the French, we should have s--t-canned aol a long time ago.

[wimpycat]

I'm sure at least the BBC did. The BBC is bigger than CNN.

[LegionofDorkness]

Let me get this straight. If CNN factually reported all they knew about people being torured and killed by Hussein's regime, it would get people tortured and killed?

How about if they came out sooner, it may have prevented more people from being tortured and killed. Maybe the USA wouldn't have had to dance with the UN for a year and a half before getting Saddam.

On the other hand, this story is just going to fade away. Any major news organization is not going to make a big deal over it because chances are that they had people in Iraq who knew about this stuff also. Chances are that includes all the major networks AND are beloved FOX unfortuneately.