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December 01, 2008

Another wrong-headed headline from the New York Times

Ed Lasky
Does the New York Times care about facts anymore? Or is it too corrupted by Obama love to bother with any bit of research-at all?

Monday's headline is symptomatic of how the paper will be covering the Obama administration-with the same obsequiousess as the paper displayed during the campaign.

Obama's Choice for U.N. Is Advocate of Strong Action Against Mass Killings
The article regards the appointment of Susan Rice, one of Barack Obama's closest foreign policy advisers, as the new US Ambassador to the United Nations.

What is the matter with the headline? It is flat out wrong.

According to Samantha Power, another foreign policy expert who is close to Barack Obama and will serve in his Administration, Rice did NOT distinguish herself in the human rights arena and in fact her actions help stall action against the genocide in Rwanda.
According to human-rights expert Samantha Power's study of the U.S. reaction to genocide, "A Problem From Hell," Rice didn't distinguish herself in the Clinton administration's lax response to the Rwandan genocide of 1994. As an Africa expert on the NSC, she shocked an interagency conference call by interjecting domestic politics into the discussion of the administration's policy options.


"If we use the word ‘genocide,'" Rice allegedly asked her colleagues, "and are seen as doing nothing, what will be the effect on the November [congressional] election?" Rice later told Power - who herself became a trusted foreign-policy adviser to Obama before leaving the campaign during the Democratic primaries - that while she didn't remember saying that, "If I said it, it was completely inappropriate."

Ah, yes. The Washington shuffle."I do not recall saying that. If I said it, it was completely inappropriate". A cliché that has become a trope used by those seeking to disavow responsibility.

Such a statement about one of the most blatant and horrific cases of genocide in the last 50 years does not merit a headline describing her as an "Advocate of Strong Actions Against Mass Killings".

Shameful. Five minutes of internet research found that information.

The Times, with its vast staff, could not devote that much time and effort in fact-finding?

Posted at 09:58 AM | Email | | | Share Share
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