NationStates Jolt Archive

From Bob Garfield's interview with Wall Street Journal reporter Farnaz Fassihi, who recently left Baghdad:

"BOB GARFIELD: When you read criticism of the press in general, that it is somehow so fixated on bad news that it doesn't report the good, that it's essentially suppressing the good news out of Iraq, what do you all say to one another? How do you react?

FARNAZ FASSIHI: I can just say that if there were five car bombs going off in New York and 50 people kidnapped a day, I'm sure that metro reporters would be writing those stories and not talking about the school that was painted. When you're sitting in Iraq and putting your neck on the line to try to bring as balanced a story as possible, it's very frustrating to hear criticism like that, because you know, as a professional reporter, that the only reason you're there is because you want to convey the truth. And I can say that everyone is trying to go out their extra mile to find out exactly what's happening there, good or bad, to try to find progress, obstacles, frustration. And I think, considering, we've done a pretty good job. I'm proud of what my colleagues have achieved."


I can't help but agree...

Very true. People seem to think hourly sectarian terrorism and extrajudicial executions is in some way normal.

Exactly. Rush Limbaugh wants the press in Iraq to focus more on the fact that the mail was delivered on time a few times last month rather than on the fact that 72 bodies were found executed military style outside southern Baghdad. The fact is that violence is more important than progress on building the local bathroom at the park. 9/11 proves it. When 9/11 happened in New York it became the central organizing factor in every citizen's life for weeks if not months. The future of Iraq is going to be shaped not by new bike lanes on the Blvd. in Tikrit, but by the level of violence in the country. That's why it gets reported.

What ever happened with that idiotic, right-wing pundit sponsored "truth tour" anyway?

What? No one knows what happened with the, so called, "truth(y) tour?"