On her eponymous CNN show on Thursday night, Christiane Amanpour verbally harassed former U.K. Prime Minister Tony Blair over his involvement in the Iraq War and specifically whether he and former U.S. President George W. Bush “feel pain” and “a sense of responsibility” for the war having supposedly caused recent Islamic terror attacks in Paris and San Bernardino.
Taliban
By Tom Blumer | September 21, 2015 | 11:12 AM EDT
Sunday's New York Times story by Joseph Goldstein appearing on Page A1 above the fold in Monday's print edition contains absolutely appalling news.
Goldstein's report — originally headlined and appearing in print as "U.S. Soldiers Told to Ignore Afghan Allies' Abuse of Boys", and currently carried online as "U.S. Soldiers Told to Ignore Sexual Abuse of Boys by Afghan Allies" — asserts that "American soldiers and Marines have been instructed not to intervene — in some cases, not even when their Afghan allies have abused boys on military bases, according to interviews and court records," in known instances of "sexual abuse of children," particularly young boys. In excerpts following the jump, we will see that Goldstein describes that stance as a "policy" several times (bolds are mine):
By Kyle Drennen | June 1, 2015 | 3:00 PM EDT
Appearing on MSNBC’s The Rundown on Monday, The Atlantic’s Washington editor-at-large Steve Clemons dismissed criticism of the Obama administration trading five Taliban prisoners for Army Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl: “Well, look, I think we need to turn this on its head. There's been a lot of conventional reporting about the Taliban Five....These are important people, but they were largely paper pushers.”
By Kyle Drennen | March 31, 2015 | 4:19 PM EDT
In an exclusive interview with new Defense Secretary Ashton Carter on Tuesday's NBC Today, co-host Savannah Guthrie grilled the Pentagon chief on the Bowe Bergdahl exchange: "Do you think that the White House made a mistake in wrapping its arms around Bowe Bergdahl and saying, for example, that he served with honor and distinction, when the administration knew there were at least questions about the circumstances of him walking off the base?"
By Tom Blumer | March 31, 2015 | 10:40 AM EDT
Bush Derangement Syndrome is alive, well, and living in the head of Nancy A. Youssef at the Daily Beast.
In a March 26 item tagged "Fallen Hero" (?!) about the Army charging Bowe Bergdahl with "desertion and misbehaving before the enemy," the web site's Senior National Security Correspondent wrote that "the administration celebrated negotiating his release after years of failed bids by both the current and former administration." But Bergdahl walked away from his post in June 2009, five months after Barack Obama's inauguration. Youssef's report actually had worse components than that.
By Curtis Houck | March 25, 2015 | 9:39 PM EDT
In their coverage of desertion charges filed against U.S. Army Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl, the major broadcast networks on Wednesday night failed to mention that National Security Advisor Susan Rice had praised Bergdahl for serving “with honor and distinction.” Standing in sharp contrast to this glaring omission by the “big three” of ABC, CBS, and NBC, the clip of Rice’s claim on the June 1, 2014 broadcast of ABC’s This Week was shown on CNN and FNC newscasts.
By Matthew Balan | March 25, 2015 | 5:42 PM EDT
CNN's Brooke Baldwin slanted towards the sympathizers of Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl on Wednesday's CNN Newsroom, just minutes after the U.S. Army announced that the former captive would be charged with desertion. Baldwin asked special forces veteran Scott Mann, "You have those who...on the opposite end, [are] vilifying him. Again, this is someone who was held...for five years by terrorists. Is that not – this is what some say – is that not punishment enough?"
By Curtis Houck | January 30, 2015 | 12:57 AM EST
On Thursday night, the major broadcast networks declined to cover reports that one of the five Taliban detainees swapped for Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl in May 2014 has been seeking to rejoin the terrorism ranks by contacting Taliban members back in Afghanistan.
The news, which was broken by CNN Thursday afternoon, came following reports on Wednesday from Fox News and NBC News that the Army could be pressing desertion charges against Bergdahl for leaving his post prior to his capture in 2009. Since those stories arose, the Pentagon has denied those allegations.
By Curtis Houck | January 28, 2015 | 11:07 PM EST
During the daily White House press briefing on Wednesday, Deputy Spokesman Eric Schultz had an exchange with ABC News chief White House correspondent Jonathan Karl where he declined to label the Taliban as a terrorist organization, instead insisting it's “an armed insurgency.”
In an admission that surely would be covered if it were uttered by a spokesman for a Republican president, the “big three” of ABC, CBS, and NBC all failed to cover this story during their Wednesday evening newscasts.
By Tom Blumer | December 30, 2014 | 4:03 PM EST
At the Associated Press on Christmas Day, reporter Josh Lederman carried out what might as well be his official administration stenographer duties with special aplomb.
Three paragraphs will illustrate how Lederman glossed over realities relating to the 13-year war in Afghanistan and went all gooey over Barack and Michelle Obama's vacation:
By Tom Blumer | December 16, 2014 | 1:51 PM EST
Today, the world has learned that terrorists with the Taliban, the group of Islamic fundamentalist jihadists who have rained terror on Afghanistan and Pakistan for nearly two decades, "attacked a school in Peshawar, killing 141 people, 132 of them children." The death toll will almost certainly rise as some of the 114 children the BBC has reported are injured fail to survive.
But don't ask Muslims to condemn this cowardly attack on innocents. If you do, you'll upset Max Fisher at Vox, who just yesterday (HT Twitchy), in exquisite timing, insisted that it's "bigoted and Islamophobic" to expect anything of the sort:
By Jeffrey Meyer | December 14, 2014 | 1:13 PM EST
On Sunday, NBC’s Meet the Press hosted former Vice President Dick Cheney to speak on the recent Democratic Senate Intelligence Committee report on the CIA’s use of enhanced interrogation tactics on suspected terrorists. While Cheney spoke out in defense of the program, moderator Chuck Todd asked his guest “when you say waterboarding is not torture, then why did we prosecute Japanese soldiers in World War II for waterboarding?”