I’m still bothered by the news I commented on yesterday about CNN’s silence in their coverage of happenings in Iraq. I’m bothered even more by a link provided by Dan Lyke. For a contrast let’s look back about six months ago to an October 25, 2002 interview of Eason Jordan conducted by WNYC’s Bob Garfield.

BOB GARFIELD: I’m sure you have seen Franklin Foer’s article in The New Republic which charges that the Western press is appeasing the Iraqi regime in order to maintain its visas — to be there reporting should a war ultimately break out. What’s your take on that?

EASON JORDAN: The writer clearly doesn’t have a clear understanding of the realities on the ground because CNN has demonstrated again and again that it has a spine; that it’s prepared to be forthright; is forthright in its reporting. We wouldn’t have a team in northern Iraq right now if we didn’t want to upset the Saddam Hussein regime. We wouldn’t report on the demonstration if we didn’t want to upset the Saddam Hussein regime. We wouldn’t have been thrown out of Iraq already 5 times over the last several years if we were there to please the Saddam Hussein regime. So the story was lopsided, unfair and chose to ignore facts that would refute the premise of the article.

BOB GARFIELD: Well what is the calculus? In the New Republic article he cites the coverage of Saddam Hussein’s birthday by CNN which he deemed to be not a huge news event. Are you tossing bones to Saddam Hussein in order to be there when, when it really matters?

EASON JORDAN: No. I don’t think that’s the case at all. Now, there is Iraqi propaganda that is news! I mean there is propaganda from a lot of governments around the world that is newsworthy and we should report on those things. Saddam Hussein’s birthday is a big deal in that country. We’re not reading Iraqi propaganda; we’re reporting as an independent news organization.

BOB GARFIELD: Back in ‘91 CNN and Peter Arnett in particular were heavily criticized, mostly by civilians, for reporting from within Baghdad during the U.S. attack in ways that they’d consider to be utter propaganda and to– out of context and not reflecting the overall reality of Saddam Hussein’ regime. Have you analyzed what you can get access to without appearing to be just a propaganda tool for Saddam?

EASON JORDAN: Well absolutely. I mean we work very hard to report forthrightly, to report fairly and to report accurately and if we ever determine we cannot do that, then we would not want to be there; but we do think that some light is better than no light whatsoever. I think that the world, the American people will be shortchanged if foreign journalists are kicked out, because even in Peter Arnett’s case there were things that he reported on — and this is a long time ago now — but things he reported on that I don’t think would have been reported at all had he not been there. We feel committed to our Baghdad presence. We’ve had a bureau there for 12 years with occasional interruptions when we’ve been thrown out, but we’re not there to please the Iraqi government — we’re not there to displease the Iraqi government — we’re just there to do our job.

I think I’m going to unprogram CNN from my office TV. This goes beyond just being upset with CNN’s lack of journalistic integrity. As Dan points out in a comment this goes beyond just silence and journeys into complicity. CNN was assuring us that they were giving us accurate reporting of what they were seeing in Iraq all the while not telling us how bad things had truely become.

This is going around a few other places but I felt compelled to comment on it also. Eason Jordan gives us a very good reason of why the lives of a few often must be sacrificed for the lives of many. It isn’t something that any one wants on their hands but sometimes our actions of protecting a few acquantances has the consequence of putting an entire country in jeapordy.

The whaling industry is often villified just for doing what they are in business to do, afterall there just can’t be a whaling industry without whaling. I’ve got to wonder just how justified this condemnation of an entire industry is. Jonathon Delacour got me thinking about this with a recent article of his. It seems that there are two reasons that most people think that whaling is wrong, because we are about to hunt whales to extinction and whales are just too intelligent for us to be killing. However, to say that all whales are intelligent or that all whales are on the verge of extinction ignores the diversity of the group Cetacea.

I also have to question the idea of an animal being too intelligent to treat as a crop to harvest. There are a number of intelligent animals that we use as food. Right off the top of my head I think of pigs. Pigs are very intelligent yet they have been domesticated for the sole purpose of slaughtering for their meat and hides.

Don’t get me wrong, I fully agree that if any species, regardless of intelligence, that can’t stand the pressure of hunting or harvesting that species needs to be protected. However, if whaling can be done in a sustainable fashion I think we need to rethink how the whaling industry is treated.

I’m trying to figure out this BlogShares thing. This blog is currently selling for 1¢ per share, as low as it goes. This appears to be a fun stock market simulation game if I can figure out what variables affect the price of the stock. I don’t think outgoing links affect the stock price but incoming links do but by how much? Can I get in trouble for insider trading? Let’s see how it goes.

I haven’t double checked the facts presented by this site but it’s worth reading through. Some of the stuff I knew but there are a lot of little items about the Viet Nam War that I just took as fact because I kept hearing them. This is causing me to take a new look at what I thought I knew.

My friend Dan is on a tear about the Bush administration. No, this has nothing to do directly with our current actions in Iraq, he actually sort of supports that, this is more personal. It’s a domestic issue. You see, Dan lives in California and is concerned about environmental issues. California has lead the way in tough vehicle emissions laws and in regulating the auto industry. The Bush administration is urging a federal appeals court to nullify California rules demanding that car manufacturers reduce emissions or increase miles per gallon for new vehicles sold in the state.

After reading the article I’ve got to say that I believe Dan is overreacting a little. According to the article no one is really happy with this law; the environmentalist think it’s too weak and the automakers think it is unworkable. This tells me that it may just be an ill-written law attempting to solve a very real problem that California has.

This whole thing started out with California demanding that 10 percent of automakers’ fleets sold there produce zero emissions beginning next year. A Fresno federal judge told them they couldn’t do this and even California regulators recognized that this was an unworkable law so they decided to make allowances as long as certain gas mileage goals were met. That’s where the feds stepped in. Regulating gas mileage is the domain of federal regulators, not the state’s.

Dan seems to believe that the Bush administration is getting involved because of their buddies in the auto industry. I tend to believe this not to be the case. Any government is going to do everything they can in order to protect their authority in their jurisdiction. If regulating gas mileage is in the exclusive domain of the feds then they have to do what they can to prevent the state from usurping their authority.

Now, Dan’s other complaint is valid. I know that Bush has had a hard-on for Saddam Hussein since before he was elected but wanting to take on Iraq before dealing with al-Qaeda and the Taliban would have been a horrible mistake.

If you’ve ever played with Microsoft’s Flight Simulator you are familiar with Meigs Field. This was the GA airport on Chicago’s lakefront that is featured in that software package as the default location. It’s also the only way you’ll ever take-off or land at that airport again. Meigs field is now closed.

Just before midnight Sunday, backhoes and large trucks trundled into the airport and began carving large X’s into the runway. Chicago police barred access to the site while the work took place. Daley said the covert action was done to avoid delays and lawsuits by critics who have long fought to keep the airport open.

Chicago’s Mayor Daley has been trying to close this airport for years in order to open up a park and recreation facility for the good people of Chicago. It seems that a legacy is something that the good mayor is after. Regardless of the reasons, this was a terrible end to a great GA airport.