Sadr Lives By MSM Standards, Succeeding By Failing Upwards

They recognize him as one of their own and so offer him their own deal.

Sadr got his ass kicked, sued for peace, capitulated... and therefore he won.

Too many more such victories and we will be undone, he must be thinking.

From Instapundit's rich and savory link dump, which includes a bit about a former Saddam officer now on the New York Times' payroll -- but also a defense of him by Damien Cave.

Cave writes, in a lengthy defense:

Just to give you an idea of how ludicrous the criticism sounds to those of us know who Qais, let me offer an anecdote. At one point last year, Prime Minister Maliki appeared before Congress. Qais and I were watching it on TV and while I saw little of interest in the exchange, he stood up and seemed to swell with hope, not a common emotion at the time. Seeing American lawmakers standing and clapping for Maliki, Qais said he felt like maybe his country had reached a turning point; maybe it was getting the respect and support it needed; maybe peace and prosperity would begin to grow, and maybe his children could once again feel safe.

I didn’t have the heart to tell him that it was a common courtesy to stand and applaud, but my point is that no lover of Saddam, watching Maliki in Congress, would ever have had such a reaction. The accusations of bias in this case are entirely baseless and insulting.

Eh. I am not entirely convinced by the defense but then neither am I really that outraged by the charge.

To be honest, I'm not sure how, were it truly the case, having a Saddam loyalist reporting for the NYT would substantially change their coverage anyway.

If anything, it might actually tilt it back towards objective.

Thanks to CJ.

posted by Ace at 02:08 PM

| Access Comments