[thechat] reporter fired for reporting

[Bob Haroche]

Erik Mattheis wrote:
> "March 31 — NBC and MSNBC on Monday said they had terminated their
> relationship with Peter Arnett after the journalist told state-run
> Iraqi TV that the U.S.-led coalition’s initial war plan had failed


I read excerpts of Arnett's interview with Iraqi TV. Regardless of
what he says about current civilian casualties, he did sound slightly
out of his mind on some other points. Notably, he said the Iraq
government had always been very cooperative with his ability to do his
reporting. That struck me as so strange since every other Western
journalist to describe what it's like to report from (pre-war) Iraq
says that the government assigned 24/7 "minders" to the journalists to
prevent them from having candid interviews with the population. These
journalists said it was virtually imposssible to know what ordinary
people thought for fear of being turned in by these "cooperative"
minders.

Arnett may be dead right with regard to the US war plan and
casualties, but it was points like this that made me suspect his
candor and perspective.

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Regards,
Bob Haroche
O n P o i n t  S o l u t i o n s
www.OnPointSolutions.com