Defeating CNN.

Yesterday I was at the Lambert-St Louis International Airport. While waiting for my flight I watched the football game between Miami and the New York Giants.

Below the screen there is an image on the frame on the TV that says "CNN" "The most trusted name in news"

Then the game ended and it immediately switched over to "Highlights of Larry King."

I was subjected to 5 minutes of listening to Larry King interview some washed up actor. I would have changed the channel but there was no remote and no buttons.

Americans debated President Bush’s Iraq policies for months, and one of the key questions was the nature of Saddam’s regime — was the dictator pragmatic enough to genuinely cooperate with U.N. inspectors, or was his regime so thoroughly evil that it could not be reformed, disarmed or contained? It turns out news organizations reporting from Baghdad had lots of information about the true nature of Saddam’s regime, but concealed it from viewers.

Thursday night on CNN’s NewsNight, and in an op-ed, “The News We Kept to Ourselves,” in Friday’s New York Times, the executive in charge of CNN’s worldwide news-gathering operations, Eason Jordan, revealed Saddam’s thugs harassed his staff, imprisoned Iraqi citizens who worked for CNN, and hatched a plot to murder his reporters working in Kurdish-controlled northern Iraq.

“The secret police terrorized Iraqis working for international press services,” he disclosed. “Some vanished, never to be heard from again. Others disappeared and then surfaced later with whispered tales of being hauled off and tortured in unimaginable ways.”

“I came to know several Iraqi officials well enough that they confided in me that Saddam Hussein was a maniac who had to be removed,” Jordan wrote. He felt CNN could not reveal any of their information without putting lives at risk: “An aide to Uday [Hussein, Saddam’s son] once told me why he had no front teeth: henchmen had ripped them out with pliars and told him never to wear dentures, so he would always remember the price to be paid for upsetting the boss. Again, we could not broadcast anything these men said to us.”

“I felt awful having these stories bottled up inside me. Now that Saddam Hussein’s regime is gone, I suspect we will hear many, many more gut-wrenching tales from Iraqis about the decades of torment,” Jordan concluded. “At last, these stories can be told freely.”

In the October 28, 2002 New Republic, Franklin Foer documented how foreign journalists in Baghdad were afraid of reporting anything that would upset Saddam and get them kicked out of Iraq. Jordan now admits that CNN kept many of Saddam’s secrets; have other networks also censored their own tales of Saddam’s evil? If accurate reporting from Iraq was impossible, why was access to this dictatorship so important in the first place? And what truths about the thugs who run other totalitarian states — like North Korea, Cuba and Syria — are fearful and/or access-hungry reporters hiding from the American public?

U.S. Government Agency News

Airport delays now on CNN Airport Network Related Resources
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A timely news release from an agency of the US federal government on an important or interesting topic.

Released by the FAA - June 5, 2001

Information on Delays Now Available on CNN Airport Network

WASHINGTON - Immediate information on airport delays will begin airing today as a "ticker" on the bottom of screens on CNN Airport Network. In an effort to provide timely airport delay status information to travelers, House Aviation Subcommittee Chairman John Mica (R-FL), Federal Aviation Administrator Jane F. Garvey, the CNN News Group Chairman and CEO Tom Johnson, and American Association of Airport Executives (AAAE) President Charles Barclay jointly announced this timely new information service for passengers.

The airport delay information comes directly from the Federal Aviation Administration's (FAA) Air Traffic Control System Command Center web site, www.fly.faa.gov, which provides real-time airport status information. Passengers should continue to check with their airline for specific flight information. The new CNN service will provide a ticker that will read: "FAA airport delay advisory" and "Check with your airline for details." It will then scroll the city/airport name, the airport's abbreviation code and the delay time. If there are no delays greater than 60 minutes, the ticker will not appear.

"I am pleased that CNN and the FAA cooperated to create a service to keep airline passengers updated about delays. This is a great example of how the government can work with industry to make the traveler's experience a better one. Information about delays is critical to traveling passengers and this will be a great assistance in helping passengers plan their travel," said Chairman Mica.

"Chairman Mica and Secretary of Transportation Mineta must be applauded for their leadership on this project," said Garvey. "As a result of this joint effort, millions of travelers will have access to information from the FAA's Command Center. We are committed to providing travelers with the most current information so they may make informed decisions."

"CNN is pleased to be playing such an important role in getting valuable airport delay information from the Federal Aviation Administration directly to the traveler," said Johnson.

"A lack of information only compounds the frustration passengers experience when they are stuck at the airport because of a delayed or cancelled flight," said Barclay. "Thanks to the leadership of Chairman Mica and Administrator Garvey, and to the cooperation of CNN Airport Network, this summer millions of passengers will have access to additional, real-time information about the aviation system's status."

The list of major airports and their abbreviation codes on the ticker will include: Atlanta (ATL), Baltimore (BWI), Boston (BOS), Charlotte (CLT), Chicago (ORD), Cincinnati (CVG), Cleveland (CLE), Dallas/Fort Worth (DFW), Denver (DEN), Detroit (DTW), Houston (IAH), LaGuardia (LGA), Las Vegas (LAS), Los Angeles (LAX), Miami (MIA), Minneapolis (MSP), Newark (EWR), New York (JFK), Orlando (MCO), Philadelphia (PHL), Phoenix (PHX), Pittsburgh (PIT), Reagan National (DCA), Salt Lake City (SLC), San Francisco (SFO), Seattle (SEA), St. Louis (STL) and Washington Dulles (IAD).

CNN Airport Network is the only live, satellite-delivered television service that provides up-to-the-minute news and information to the traveling public. Launched in 1992, the service is now offered in 35 of the nation's busiest airports, covering more than 1,600 gates and other viewing areas.

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