The Chron should post audio/video of Abizaid interview
We previously noted that only two of the state's newspapers chose to run house editorials on Monday on the weekend elections in Iraq.
The Chronicle, we reported, covered other topics that day.
Today, Wednesday, the editors finally got around to penning an editorial on Iraq that begins and ends with positive paragraphs that sandwich mostly dour prose that compares Iraq to Vietnam and reflects seriously on the "exit strategy" bellowing of two Democrats largely irrelevant to American foreign policy at the moment, Senators Ted Kennedy and Harry Reid.
The editorial also refers to the board's "interview" with General John Abizaid, which is condensed to the following:
In a meeting with members of the Chronicle Editorial Board on the Friday before the elections, Gen. John Abizaid, commander of the U.S. military forces in Iraq and Afghanistan, warned that elements of Saddam Hussein's old regime remain an immediate threat. Major, sustained violence in Iraq is not beyond the pale, he said.
"Last year, I would have said I thought the chances of a civil war were almost zero. This year I think that if the exact set of bad circumstances take place, it's possible. But I still don't think it's probable."
Abizaid added that training and equipping adequate numbers of Iraqi security forces is paramount to a successful exit of American forces, noting that 130,000 such troops have been trained so far and that Iraq has plentiful "recruits and AK-47s."
The editorial board interviews the commander of U.S. military forces in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the only part of the interview reproduced is the phrase "recruits and AK-47s" and a cherrypicked quote absent context that suggests the situation in Iraq has deteriorated in a year's time?
This is what they've come up with after days of reflection on the elections in Iraq?
We'll expand a suggestion we made in our list of suggestions for improving the Chronicle in 2005 -- not only does the Chronicle editorial board need to place audio/video of its interviews with political candidates online, but it also needs to post audio/video of its interviews with important political figures like General Abizaid.
Let readers see and hear what important political figures have to say to the newspaper's editorial board. Even more importantly, let readers know the sorts of questions on the minds of editorial board members (like Leftover Specialist First Class Andrea Georgsson). The transparency would be highly informative for readers, who can surely figure out what they think without the Chronicle filtering the information, and the feedback from readers couldn't help but improve the final editorial product.
UPDATE: Anne Linehan reminds me that the Chronicle did post this story on Abizaid over the weekend, but is this the full interview, or just cherrypicked quotes? Did he have anything else to add? We aren't idiots -- give us online access to editorial board audio/video and let us make up our minds! This notion of distilling an interview with an important person into a few quotes is SO old media.
Posted by Kevin Whited @ 02/02/05 11:39 PM | Print |
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