.. to a group of journalists who, using unnamed sources made an extreme claim against the United States and her military in their continued attempts to undermine the war effort. These people are responsible for using inflamatory language and inciting riots, further weakening the U.S.’s standing around the Muslim world and playing into the insane imams and mullahs hands by giving them more propaganda to indoctrinate more jihadists to join the ranks of Al Qaeda and other terrorists….
GOES TO THE TERRORIST INCITERS AT
Newsweek magazine today said it may have erred in a May 9 report that said U.S. interrogators desecrated the Koran at Guantanamo Bay, and apologized to victims of deadly violence sparked by the article.
Oops! Maybe there should be an invesitgation into why they ran a report that has directly led to “deadly” violence. Maybe they could follow the same investigational techniques over at CBS and just brush it under the rug and say “but there is truth to the story…”
The weekly news magazine said in its May 23 edition that the original source of the allegation was not sure where he saw the assertion that at least one copy of the Koran was flushed down a toilet in an attempt to get detainees to talk.
OH, WAIT! I didn’t really remember WHERE and IF I actually saw anyone flushing the Koran down the toilet. What do you mean, you already ran with the story? Oh well, it is not like any one is going to get killed over this little oversight right?
The report has sparked angry and violent protests across the Muslim world from Afghanistan, where 16 were killed and more than 100 injured, to Pakistan to Indonesia to Gaza.
Well, some people have died because of our shoddy reporting… but here is all we can really say :
“We regret that we got any part of our story wrong, and extend our sympathies to victims of the violence and to the U.S. soldiers caught in its midst,” Editor Mark Whitaker wrote in the magazine’s latest issue, due to appear on U.S. newsstands Monday.
This is not just a little story that they might have got wrong. Newsweek thought they had the next military scandal and could run with it for a few months just like Abu Ghraib. I mean, the MSM could run with the headlines “INTOLERANT AMERICAN SOLDIERS FLUSHED MUSLIM HOLY BOOK DOWN THE TOILET” for DAYS! And I doubt that their “apology” is much consolation to the families of those protestors killed or to the American soldiers who must face the consequences of Newsweeks piss poor “vetting” process. Yet imagine Newsweeks little commie souls lighting up with excitement when they heard this response from the Muslim world :
Today, Afghan Muslim clerics threatened to call for a holy war against the United States in three days unless it handed over the interrogators in question.
Anybody else think that the clerics are going to see, or even acknowledge, the admitted errors by Newsweek. Maybe they’ll retract their call for Holy War in light of this new revelation the Newsweek ran a faulty story? Think so? Nah. Me neither..
But hey, atleast they apologized… but I just find them absurd….
{Cross-posted @ Parrot Check}
UPDATE:
Dr. Shackleford over at My Pet Jawa mentions this little tidbit:
I mean, how could we forget when Palestinian terrorists occupied the Church of the Nativity for 39 days in 2002? They fired a bullet into a statue of the Virgin Mary, looted the gold appointments, and urinated everywhere within an ancient church commemorating the spot where Jesus was born.
And of course we remember the resulting riots that shook every corner of Christendom as Christians reacted to their insult. The torchlit mobs, the desecration and firebombing of mosques, the horrendous toll of innocent death, the public flaying and crucifiction of the terrorists (and their subsequent head-piking) who occupied the Church? How could we forget? And the nuclear-armed B1’s streaking toward the Levant ready to avenge the wounded honor of our religion, only to turn aside at the last moment so our leaders might devise an even more sinister and lingering punishment?
Remember all that?
No?
Said Duncan Avatar @ 2:15 pm | Permalink
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The irresponsibility of the lamestream news media is truly unconscionable. Reporting something like this would be like spraying gasoline on a fire even if it were true. To make something like this up — or to pass along unverified rumors as if they were facts, which amounts to the same thing — is absolutely criminal. The MSM has proven once again that they will do whatever they can to fan the flames of anti-American hatred, consequences be damned.
Comment by Van Helsing — 5/15/2005 @ 2:45 pm
How can we hold the editor accountable for his
storylie?The Government can’t but the free market can. The fact that people are hurt by the lies doesn’t faze the old bats in old media. Until their timely demise we have to put up with such trash. Such is the cost of freedom.
Comment by flightpundit — 5/15/2005 @ 3:34 pm
Lol you have to wonder whose side newsweek is on.
Comment by talkingtina — 5/15/2005 @ 9:43 pm
Comment by Cao — 5/16/2005 @ 3:06 am
Now to the content of the post: Newsweek sucks, of course. And if anyone thinks of them as more “fair and balanced” than, say, C-BS–this is a prime example of how dangerous the rhetoric is that comes out of the MSM. The fact that people died because of the Islamic reaction to that Newsweek piece just goes to show you how bad the MSM really is. And I don’t necessarily agree that such is the price of “freedom”. This is not an example of “free press”–this is an example of the socialist terrorist-loving rhetoric that is pervading the MSM.
The terrorists have a stranglehold on the media in the Middle East; looks as though something similar is happening to the Western media. To me, that doesn’t represent anything even remotely resembling “free”. Unless you mean “free” trash that’s dangerous for America and what we’re trying to accomplish in Iraq.
Comment by Cao — 5/16/2005 @ 4:55 am
I don’t consider Newsweek to be anything more than a step up from US or People. It is packaged news for folks of a certain mindset. It certainly isn’t serious news but that doesn’t or should not relieve them of the responsibility to report accurately. No this is more than getting a fact wrong. I am too distressed by this.
Comment by Carol — 5/16/2005 @ 5:29 am
Newsweek’s “oops” costs 16 lives
Amazingly, the original story of the Qu’ran flushers gave the jihadis another pretext to kill, but Newsweek now says “oops!” Wouldn’t you say it’s a little too late when 16 people are dead as a result? Unfortunately, Newsweek’s johnny-come-l…
Trackback by Cao's Blog — 5/16/2005 @ 6:30 am
“Newsweek’s oops cost 16 lives.”
President Bush’s oops about the WMDs cost 1,600 AMERICAN lives. At least Newsweek’s editor is man enough to stand up and apologize — still waiting for that from W.
And Newsweek is at least jumping quickly to investigate what went wrong — unlike the feetdragging that preceded the President finally allowing a commission to look into his error.
Comment by Denny Hix — 5/16/2005 @ 9:02 am
Denny,
I am sure that if President Bush had not taken us to war against the terrorist regime in Iraq, then you would be lamenting about the 180 American lost in that terrible imperialist crusade against the poor Taliban in Afghanistan.
And since you can only cry about the WMDs you forget the many other reasons to go to war with Iraq, like the many violations of the ceasefire agreement as well as the 17 U.N. resolutions that Saddam summarily wiped his arse with. So President Bush doesn’t have to apologize for defending this country and your sorry hide.
The Newsweek article is just another example of crappy reporting in an attempt to tear down the war effort, which, from your anti-Bush rhetoric, means you don’t support the war, or the troops. Their apology is more of an “we’re sorry we can’t prove the story” as opposed to “we’re sorry that we caused unwarranted riots and put our soldiers into more violent situations.”
So Denny, go back to the basement of your parents house, get yourself a cup of coffee, sit down with your other America-hater friends, and plan the next communist revolution to overthrow the evil American capitalist imperial empire…..
Comment by Duncan Avatar — 5/16/2005 @ 11:14 am
Sorry, Cao, I keep forgetting the kick you get out of Desi and his wonderful bongo playing ability… it is so like a car wreck, you don’t want to look at him, but you just can’t take your eyes of his goofy grin…
Comment by Duncan Avatar — 5/16/2005 @ 11:16 am
None of you still understand the MSM. They don’t care about truth. They don’t care about America or American’s one way or the other. They don’t have a position on the war.
They have a position on money. That position is that they want as much of it as they can get.
To do this, they must generate the most entertaining story. Make stuff up. Create “crisis”. Make things sound extremely dire, when they’re not.
Right now, that is all about bashing the current agenda and war. 2.5 years ago, they were all about promoting that same war. Remember (pre-war) when you couldn’t turn on the TV and not see the slogan “Crisis in Iraq”? What happened to that? Well, the war dragged on, they could no longer hold that line and still make “news” entertaining, so they changed their stance.
Its not about truth or taking a position. Its about money and entertainment.
Comment by KraftyOne — 5/16/2005 @ 3:43 pm
So these protests and riots were all caused by a magazine article?!? These right wing dildos have such a clear grasp of cause and effect, they probably think rain is caused by wet sidewalks.
Comment by Sven — 5/16/2005 @ 5:45 pm
Duncan, I’m all for the war in Afghanistan. But I think it was a cheap shot about how W led us into the Iraq War.
It’s easier to get people scared — “Saddam is about to attack us” than to motivate people to do the right thing.
I’d agree that we went into Iraq for a noble cause if W would show some backbone and go into Darfur. If the administration was really serious about stopping human suffering they’d be trying to stop a genocide.
In the meantime, remember it was a Newsweek article. But the statement that triggered the riots came from a Bush administration operative speaking to Michael Isikoff — a right wing journalist who’s claim to fame was trying to bring down the Clinton administration. He was the guy, afterall, who broke the Monica Lewinsky story.
So blame this on the MSM if you wanna. But remember, it’s a neocon’s quote to a right wing journalist.
Comment by Denny Hix — 5/16/2005 @ 9:28 pm