You may have encountered the recent story–floated by Newsweek–that interrogators down at Gitmo have been desecrating the Qur’an and, in one case, flushing it in order to get cooperation from interogees.
Doesn’t sound very plausible, does it? Not the kind of tactic a seasoned interrogator would want to use.
I mean, if I saw somebody desecrating the Bible that way, would that make me want to cough up info for them, or would it make me more resolved not to give them info?
I think the latter.
Newsweek, on the heels of a hot story, though, couldn’t think things through this far (perhaps because Newsweek has no sense of what it’s like to be a religious person) and they published the story.
INSTANT RIOTING OVER YONDER IN THE MUSLIM WORLD!
I mean, everyone over in the Muslim world knows that us Americans are just eeevil, right? So why let reason get in the way of passion and stop a good riot?
Trouble is, folks get killed in riots.
EXCERPTS:
Reaction across the Islamic world has been strong, with daily demonstrations since the May 9 story came out. At least 15 people died in Afghanistan after protests broke out Tuesday following the report that interrogators at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, placed Qurans in washrooms to unsettle suspects, and in one case "flushed a holy book down the toilet."
"The American soldiers are known for disrespect to other religions. They do not take care of the sanctity of other religions," Qazi Hussain Ahmed, the Pakistani chief of a coalition of radical Islamic groups, said Sunday
Ahmed’s comments came a day after Pakistan’s President Gen. Pervez Musharraf and Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz, both allies of Washington, demanded an investigation and punishment for those behind the reported desecration of the Quran.
Newsweek apologized in an editor’s note for Monday’s edition and said they were re-examining the allegations.
"We regret that we got any part of our story wrong, and extend our sympathies to victims of the violence and to the U.S. soldiers caught in its midst," Newsweek Editor Mark Whitaker wrote.
Newsweek’s source later said he was unsure about the origin of the Quran allegation, and a top Pentagon spokesman told the magazine that the military "had investigated other desecration charges by detainees and found them ‘not credible.’"
A SECOND STORY CONFIRMING NEWSWEEK’S ERROR HERE.
Now, I dunno from my own experience that the charge is false. I could come up true, after all. So it’s a bit premature to say "Newsweek lied." In fact, I doubt very much that Newsweek did knowingly and deliberately print a falsehood with intent to deceive, so the title of this post is hyperbole in regard to the first part.
But not the second.
People died.
People died on account of what Newsweek irresponsibly printed. To be sure, the Yahoos who would be so foam-at-the-mouth nuts as to start a riot (rather than a peaceful demonstration) so violent that folks would get killed deserve a share of the blame.
But so does Newsweek.
Their irresponsible behavior has not only resulted in the deaths of particular individuals but also in a major international incident at a time of war against terrorists when the U.S. very much needs to improve its image in the Muslim world.
You don’t go to press with anything other than rock-solid verification with a claim like that at a time like this.
Newsweek, you’re despicable.
Once thing is for certain. If anybody flushes Newsweek down the toilet there won’t me much rioting.
Just in practical terms, I doubt that a copy of the Qur’an (or any book) would flush well at all. But the story fit the “template” that the press had already established about America’s treatment of detainees and was just too juicy to leave unprinted. It’s exactly the same disease that afflicted Dan Rather.
Another nail in the coffin of the MSM. Too bad real coffins were also involved.
“If anybody flushes Newsweek down the toilet there won’t me much rioting.”
I have more respect for my septic system than that…
How about a big fat libel suit against Newsweek for lives lost, danger to dipomatic personnel, etc.?
Amen Jimmy. I hope that someone finds a way to make them pay (financially) for their irresponsiblity. It won’t reverse the damage, but at least it might help stop it from being repeated.
Death to the Old Media! Long live the New Media!
Somebody should go to jail. And they should share a cell with Dan Rather.
We flushed the Qur’an down the toilets?! This must have been possible due to the HUMUNGOUS CRAPPERS we have here in the states eh? I mean seriously! My toilet clogs if I flush a handful of toilet paper, yet they supposedly flushed the entire Qur’an without multiple snakings and visits from the local plumber?! Oh Dear. Newsweek is insane.
These are strange times. Having defended on this site taxes (!) and having roasted Jimmy (on economics), now I’m gonna defend Newsweek. Well, not quite. But the fact is Newsweek (which is quite flushable, of course) did not kill anybody. As Jimmy BREIFLY notes, 1000s of nut cases killed peeople (btw, who’d they kill? other nut case rioters?)…i just see too many free will interventions in this chain of events to lay much blame for blood (as opposed to other things) at Newsweek’s door….as i say, these are strange times.
What? Newsweek can’t think past the agenda dangling in front of their collective face?
Man, this makes me angry. Despicable? Yes, Jimmy. And a perversion of journalistic integrity.
Assuming they had any.
Jimmy, you’d be much more credible as an apologist (in the best sense of the word) on theology if you weren’t such a mindless apologist (in the worst sense of the word) for the Right-wing talking point of the day.
The reports of Koran desecration have been out in the worldwide media for many, many months now. The smearing of Gitmo detainees with fake menstrual blood has been out there.
Maybe the problems in Afghanistan have something to do with the fact that we’ve allowed it to go to(remain in) hell by diverting resources to George Bush’s conquest of Iraq.
And if you took the time to read what Newsweek actually clarified, they did not deny or retract the substance of the story. The high-level government official simply clarified that he saw a written report of the incident, just not in the exact place he previously thought he saw it.
Your right-wing hackery on this blog makes me question the legitimacy of the theological answers you provide.
“Right-wing hackery,” eh, Esquire? Not like your “left-wing hackery”?
Dark-hued pot, meet melanin-pigmented kettle.
This makes me sick. This is the sort of thing that drove my media ethics profesor insane. (Yes, there IS such a thing as “media ethics”. And no, it’s not supposed to be an oxymoron.)
If you’re even a LITTLE doubtful of a story’s merits, you’re not supposed to run it.
The problem is that editors, who are supposed to be the story-killers as necessary, are now doing the reverse. They’re pushing controversial stories that have anonymous and/or uncorroborated sources.
As for getting sued, it’s a good bet. As my J-school profesors constantly reminded our classes, “The First Amendment doesn’t cover yelling ‘Fire!’ in a crowded stadium.”
Jimmy,
The issue is different from flushing the Bible down a toilet. For these folks, the Quran is the embodiment of God on Earth. It’s the physical presence of God on Earth. It’s why Muslims freak out when anyone even *talks* about doing something bad to a Quran. During Taliban rule, Mullah Omar banned paper bags because they have the possibility of containing fragments of the Quran.
Of course, this makes Newsweek’s fictious article so absurd, irresponsible, and horrible. The comparison isn’t just flushing a Bible down the toilet, it was flushing the Eucharist down the toilet. However, in the blinkered, upside down world of MSM’s liberal lock step thinking, there probably wouldn’t be any problem with flushing the Eucharist down the toilet. What could happen? An angry letter from the Catholic League? Newsweek editors could handle that.
The problem here goes beyond the multicultural bromides peddled in our schools and through our media. Many members of the MSM are so clueless about faith — any faith — that they don’t care to know the differences, and what those differences may mean: “Flushing Bible, Qurans…what’s the dif?”
This was careless, clueless reporting at its very worse. Worse, much worse, than CBS’s phoney TANG documents. I’m concerned that American soldiers are going to die needlessly and that the Taliban movement — which was quickly losing support among Afghans — will now have new recruits.
Grand Ayatollah Mohammed Hussein Fadlallah urged Muslims and international human rights organizations “to raise their voices loudly against the American behavior, which is hostile to Islam and Muslims.”
In a statement faxed to The Associated Press, Fadlallah called the alleged desecration a “brutal” form of torture.
Where were these people when Sadam Hussein was running people (Muslims) through plastic shredders?
I heard the White House scream and blast the media that Newsweek’s “report has had serious consequences. People have lost their lives. The image of the United States abroad has been damaged.”
Excuse me, but Mr. Bush, Mr. Rove, Mr. Cheney, Mr. Rumsfeld, and Mr. Wolfowitz have caused the image of the USA abroad to be damaged a zillion times more than Newsweek did.
PLEASE… I live in reality and let’s have some intellectual honesty here… unless you have been in a coma since 2000.
Come on, timmy. Neither professional nor amateur US bashers needed any excuse to hate the US even more than they already did. Any port in a storm. That is why even a questionable story is sufficient to spark bloody riots against us.
“Death to America!”… Gee that is a new one! Never heard that before! I guess if we had allowed Saddam to keep blowing smoke up the world’s nether regions, then we would still be loved and admired in the middle east as we were before George Bush took office!
We had a job to do. We did it. People got mad. What else is new?
Interesting that the secularists are so up in arms about this notion of Koran-desecration. When they heard about that “Piss Christ” art exhibit a few years back they all thought it was pretty funny…then defended it to the hilt as a constitutional right. It all depends on which religion you’re desecrating, I suppose. And here’s where the mask falls away. These are the same people who outlawed the Mass during the French Revolution, knocked down churches during the Russian Revolution. They know who their real enemy is…and will side with ANYBODY against Him. Even Saddam or the Taliban.
Interesting that the secularists are so up in arms about this notion of Koran-desecration. When they heard about that “Piss Christ” art exhibit a few years back they all thought it was pretty funny…then defended it to the hilt as a constitutional right. It all depends on which religion you’re desecrating, I suppose. And here’s where the mask falls away. These are the same people who outlawed the Mass during the French Revolution, knocked down churches during the Russian Revolution. They know who their real enemy is…and will side with ANYBODY against Him. Even Saddam or the Taliban.
Worth repeating.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050516/ap_on_re_us/newsweek_quran_13
Now Newsweek has officially retracted the story.
“I tell you, on the day of judgment people will render an account for every careless word they speak.”
Sure Jimmy. And them Abu Ghraib pics were photoshop fakes too, right?
Stop worshipping the flag. It’s idolatry.
Newsweek didn’t lie; they printed what they believed to be true. One might criticize them for not vetting the story as well as they might have, but accusing them of lying is simply wrong. As my friend Serge has pointed out, the story ran for 11 days with no comment from the government. Only after the story prompted riots in the Middle East was Newsweek accused of being “irresponsible.”
You’re missing THE point, AlanDownunder.
There is NO evidence that this incident EVER happened.
None.
The Abu Ghraib sadists are currently on trial or headed to prison.
What is sad is how well a fake story like this works for those, oblivious to facts, who are only looking to feed their loathing.
Lauda Jerusalem Dominum-
I agree that acting on incorrect information cannot be called lying. People have to make decisions, and sometimes they must decide important questions even with incomplete information.
So, shall we let George Bush and Tony Blair and the rest of them off the hook then, please? The pre-war intelligence on Iraq boiled down to this: Saddam probably has weapons of mass destruction, which he would be only too happy to sell to terrorists. Everyone had the same intelligence and believed it, including John Kerry.
dcs: Regarding “lying,” please read the above post again and scan for the word “hyperbole.” Note the sentence in which it occurs. Thanks.
Hyperbole is exaggeration. It is effective because it contains a nugget of truth. For example, if I say “Chimay is the greatest beer on the planet,” I may or may not be indulging in hyperbole but even if I am people can understand, somewhat, what I’m trying to say. Stating that “Newsweek lied” isn’t hyperbole because it simply isn’t true.
dcs: This is an instance of hyperbole. Hyperbole involves taking something that is true and then overstating it for rhetorical effect.
A lie is told when someone (a) tells a falsehood (b) with knowledge that it is false (c) with intent to deceive.
Newsweek told a falsehood, satisfying element (a). It further told it in an irresponsible manner. While telling a falsehood in an irresponsible manner does not satisfy conditions (b) and (c)–in which case a lie would have been told in the literal sense–irresponsibly telling a falsehood is a sufficient basis for exaggeration into the literary form of hyperbole.
“Stop worshipping the flag. It’s idolatry.”
I went back & re-read Jimmy’s post, AlanDownunder, & I’m even more bewildered by your statement above. Specifically, which aspects of Jimmy’s post would constitute idolatry? Because I simply don’t find it there! Please school me.
“So, shall we let George Bush and Tony Blair and the rest of them off the hook then, please?”
Thanks for this, TimJ! Excellent!
So, shall we let George Bush and Tony Blair and the rest of them off the hook then, please? The pre-war intelligence on Iraq boiled down to this: Saddam probably has weapons of mass destruction, which he would be only too happy to sell to terrorists. Everyone had the same intelligence and believed it, including John Kerry.
Do you mean to say that Newsweek wasn’t being irresponsible, or that the Bush Administration was being irresponsible?
I don’t think I’m exactly letting Newsweek off the hook. Nevertheless, I don’t think this case can be compared to the case for war against Iraq, unless Newsweek actively suborned reports of Qur’an desecration at Gitmo (as the evidence seems to indicate the Bush Administration did with respect to Iraq and WMDs).
Newsweek told a falsehood
Attributing a statement to a source isn’t telling a falsehood.
dcs-
Take your pick. Just be consistent.
I have seen no convincing evidence that the Bush administration “cooked” the intelligence, unless one were already disposed to that conclusion.
There are those who would doubtless argue that the decision to go to war was much more serious than a news article and therefore the administration should have waited until the intelligence was certain.
This fails for two reasons:
1) There is very seldom anything like certainty in the intelligence world, particularly when dealing with a closed group of fanatics like the former Iraqi or the present North Korean regimes. It is simply not an exact science. Any administration that was held to that standard of certainty before acting would be permanently paralyzed.
2) The seriousness of the post 9-11 security situation (yes, things ARE different now) made decisiveness at least as important as caution. To wait too long before acting might have been worse (far worse) than acting on sketchy intelligence.
The Newsweek editors had the luxury of waiting, if they wished, without risk of harm to anyone. At least Jimmy made plain in the body of his post that he didn’t think that Newsweek had actually lied (in spite of the inflammatory tagline). Critics of the president, on the other hand, miss no opportunity to ramp up the rhetoric, to the point that they now insist he is simultaneously a babbling lunatic and an evil genius.
Tim.J:
You’re missing THE point, AlanDownunder.
There is NO evidence that this incident EVER happened.
None.
Numerous accusations of Koran desecration over the past year or so from other than Newsweek’s military source who changed his story.
But no hard evidence either way. Naturally the only non-hearsay comes from either guards or prisoners.
So what makes Jimmy so sure it didn’t happen? I’m think it probably did happen, one reason being what happened where this IS evidence – at Abu Ghraib.
Gene Branaman:
“Stop worshipping the flag. It’s idolatry.”
I went back & re-read Jimmy’s post, AlanDownunder, & I’m even more bewildered by your statement above. Specifically, which aspects of Jimmy’s post would constitute idolatry? Because I simply don’t find it there! Please school me.
Only flag idolatory (“my country can do no wrong”) could explain such a simplistic one-sided belief-ridden take on such a complex murky story.
For a sound criticism of Newsweek, go here:
http://tinyurl.com/clltl
For a reasoned take on the Newsweek “retraction”, go here:
http://tinyurl.com/8kk8g
More balance here:
http://tinyurl.com/btunb
And another angle here:
http://tinyurl.com/bly34
I take back what I said about Jimmy. It’s not flag idolatry – it’s worshipping the anti-Christ in the White House, not the White House itself.
“So what makes Jimmy so sure it didn’t happen? I’m think it probably did happen, one reason being what happened where this IS evidence – at Abu Ghraib.”
You’ve completely missed the point. A journalistic outfit may NEVER run a story without confirming. It turns out that there is no known evidence that the U.S. government has confirmed the allegation of Quran abuse at Gitmo. That’s why Newsweek had to completely retract their story. They committed the worst possible offense against journalistic ethics, and one that had literally deadly consequences. What they did is simply indefensible.
I know whereof I speak — I am a journalist by profession.
Newspapers and newsmagazines are NEVER to traffic in mere speculation that U.S. interrogators have abused the Quran. They can report that former detainees have made the allegation, but if there is no proof, they cannot say there is. It is entirely beside the point what MAY have happened or what you personally think PROBABLY happened. In journalism, only one thing counts — the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.
So, now Bush is a babbling lunatic, an evil genius AND the antichrist.
A very “reasoned take” on the whole situation, AlanDownUnder.
Take your pick. Just be consistent.
OK, both the Bush Administration and Newsweek are irresponsible. In my opinion, they both received information that they wanted to find credible and did not spend enough time actually vetting the information.
I have seen no convincing evidence that the Bush administration “cooked” the intelligence, unless one were already disposed to that conclusion.
I don’t necessarily believe that the Bush administration “cooked” anything. Rather, I believe that the administration looked for a certain kind of intelligence and actively suborned it, i.e., told the intelligence community what it wanted to see.
There is very seldom anything like certainty in the intelligence world, particularly when dealing with a closed group of fanatics like the former Iraqi or the present North Korean regimes.
Of course one can’t have total certainty, but one should have a particular degree of certainty. Moral certainty would suffice, I think.
The seriousness of the post 9-11 security situation (yes, things ARE different now) made decisiveness at least as important as caution. To wait too long before acting might have been worse (far worse) than acting on sketchy intelligence.
If the Bush administration felt that Iraq had been involved in 9/11 then I would not describe waiting until 2003 to invade as “decisiveness.”
Nobody believes that Iraq was involved in 9-11. The Iraq war was not meant as punishment. It was part of an attempt to prevent another 9-11 type scenario, with Saddam providing weapons and money to any terrorist organization willing to do the job.
Getting Bin Laden would be nice, but sometimes it sounds as if people think that if we could only nail him, we could all breathe a sigh of relief and go home.
In removing Saddam (WMDs notwithstanding) we cut out the worst of the rotten malignancy and are reasonably hopeful that the remaining cancer will respond to less drastic treatment. Events in Iraq continue to provide as much reason for optimism as pessimism in this regard.
Thanks for the spirited discussion, dcs.
I’m German and it does sound plausible to me. My picture of the USA sufferd greatly during the recent years. The USA is no longer seen as the good guy here in Europe. I even have difficulties to convince people, that George W. Bush didn’t blow up the World Trade Center himself.
And it did seem plausible for Afghans and Indonesians. Iraqis weren’t to upset, probably because this seems petty next to Abu Guhraib.