The MSM Protects Its Own

Okay, enough.

I'm sick of the mainstream media.

I saw the following story in Opinion Journal's Political Diary myself last week, but figured it would take a few days to hit the mainstream press. Heck, it took the blogosphere until early this week to start looking into it. But here's the first post at TKS about the Chief News Executive at CNN accusing American troops of targeting journalists for death...

An extremely disturbing report from Rony Abovitz at the Davos conference:

During one of the discussions about the number of journalists killed in the Iraq War, Eason Jordan [chief news executive of CNN] asserted that he knew of 12 journalists who had not only been killed by U.S. troops in Iraq, but they had in fact been targeted. He repeated the assertion a few times, which seemed to win favor in parts of the audience (the anti-US crowd) and cause great strain on others.

Due to the nature of the forum, I was able to directly challenge Eason, asking if he had any objective and clear evidence to backup these claims, because if what he said was true, it would make Abu Ghraib look like a walk in the park. David Gergen was also clearly disturbed and shocked by the allegation that the U.S. would target journalists, foreign or U.S. He had always seen the U.S. military as the providers of safety and rescue for all reporters.

Eason seemed to backpedal quickly, but his initial statements were backed by other members of the audience (one in particular who represented a worldwide journalist group). The ensuing debate was (for lack of better words) a real "sh — storm". What intensified the problem was the fact that the session was a public forum being taped on camera, in front of an international crowd. The other looming shadow on what was going on was the presence of a U.S. Congressman and a U.S. Senator in the middle of some very serious accusations about the U.S. military.

To be fair (and balanced), Eason did backpedal and make a number of statements claiming that he really did not know if what he said was true, and that he did not himself believe it. But when pressed by others, he seemed to waver back and forth between what might have been his beliefs and the realization that he had created a kind of public mess. His statements, his reaction, and the reaction of all in attendance left me perplexed and confused.

Rony Abovitz is calling on the U.S. lawmakers present to get to the bottom of Jordan's story - if there's something to it, let's investigate. If it isn't, CNN ought to clear up why their head man is spreading horrifying rumors around about U.S. troops.

Yes, this is the same Eason Jordan who wrote in the New York Times that CNN reporters in Baghdad witnessed abuses, including torture of Iraqis by Saddam's secret police, and did not report this to viewers in order to to keep CNN's Baghdad bureau open.

Since then, half the world has been blogging the story, as TKS noted later. And that was yesterday morning. Hell, they're spending most of their time praising Barney Frank, a liberal icon, who had the decency and intelligence to ask Jordan to explain his insane charges that slandered the American military.

Is CNN reporting this? The Washington Post? The left-wing dishrag? Has even Fox News caught wind of this?

Not that they're telling us yet. But hey, I'm sure they'll get to it after the Super Bowl.