NEWS: Iraq Shuts Down Al Jazeera

Yup. Wednesday night and Thursday night more than filled the social calendar.

Again with that pesky problem of seperating someone's opinion from your opinon and declaring one fact, and another fiction. Clinical narcissistic personalities often suffer from that "flaw".

Watched it a bit on a friends dish, and since my knowledge of Arabic is non-existent, all I could do was watch and not really get most of it. But I really don't have any sympathies for a network who has such close ties to wanted thugs. To dispell the brain surgeons who will point to Bush and the like as "known thugs" at least in that case, you know where Bush et al. is. Same can't said for Bin Laden and othe partners in spirit in the mid east.

Control Room does show interesting sides of a non-western news source, but it doesn't reconcile it's questionable morality in being such a close friend to thugs in the mid east. They come off more as a sane and articulated friend of extremists who can speak well on camera rather than a neutral source of news for the region.

Like I said before, even Jimmy Breslin shared the evidence and letters he got form the "Son of Sam" so they could catch that murderer. The fact that Al Jazeera doesn't do anything is quite sick. You'd think that maybe they'd love to report on a mid east where more of these thugs are caught? But I guess the ratings are so good now why fix what ain't broke?

Oh, by the way sunshine (aka: reprobate) how's that drive recovery going? Not so good, right? Saw your plea for help in the Mac Groups and had a healthy laugh! Schadenfraude indeed, but there were some tips I could have given you from real world experience on how to deal with it. Practical and financial to make the whole headache easier to swallow. But you're such a nice guy... Umm, I mean total arrogant "I am never wrong..." prick that hey why should anyone help you? Gotta love that karma!

The Iraqi Communist Party are also supporters of the occupation so your example is irrelevant.

Yup. Wednesday night and Thursday night more than filled the social calendar.

No, Jack really, you've adduced nothing of substance, preferring instead to resort to the above.. But if I ever need psychotherapy from a web designer I'll keep you in mind

And the problem here is that the close ties you're talking about don't exist. I suppose you could argue that they should exercise editorial restraint in their broadcasts but really thats form, not content.

Which of course you know from having watched it for a few minutes.

Except that they turned over the tapes just like Breslin did. It seems you think that these guys just waltz in covered in blood, introduce themselves, drop off the tape and leave. That doesn't happen. They send a courier who knows absolutely nothing. They're vicious, not stupid. Al Jazeera doesn't actually know where the tapes come from, as evidenced by the whole hoax tape fiasco a couple of weeks ago.

Sorry, Jack it went just fine. Its a new and largely empty drive so very little got overwritten, I didn't lose anything I needed. I've actually been recovering data for twenty years, I just needed software recommendations because I've not had to do it under OSX. I needed a tool and I got it.

Nice to know you take delight in the misfortunes of others though. Says loads about your character.

Apparently suppression of free speech is on deplorable when enemies of the US do it, It is instructive to see the hoops you are willing to jump through to rationalize the suppresstion of fundamental principles of liberal democracy.

What exactly did Al Jazeera do to incite violence again?

Ideological? Because it expresses the views of the locals? Because it isn't keen on the invasion and continuing occupation?

As far as airing the terrorist videos - what would you expect them to do when they receive a scoop? I doubt that the videos come with a return address.

Reporting the news does not make them an accomplice of the people you call terrorists. If they were flat out making shit up then there would be a valid basis for criticism. I understand why their version of events makes so many people uncomfortable - it certainly doesn't jive with the fairy tale version of events that turns up on most news channels. It is not pleasant to see news coverage that shows innocent people being slaughtered - unless it is the other side doing the slaughtering.

It is certainly much easier to listen to news that frames events in a more palatable way. You know - like " smart bombs " that only blow up the bad guys. Or body counts that classify every man, woman, and child as enemy combatants.

and only the coolest and smartest guys have them on their trucks.

To this very day we don't know who Deep Throat was. I'm curious, but I respect the fact that Woodward and Bernstein have continued keeping their source a secret. That individual would have been effectively destroyed by the Nixon White House for revealing what he did about Watergate.

And no, kids, I'm not talking about Linda Lovelace either.

That's a very good point Timer. Even if Al-Jezzera knows who these people are, and that has not been ascertained as far as I know, they would need to make an ethical choice as to reveal the information. If they became known as a media source that regularly sold out informants then they probably wouldn't be very effective as a journalists. Putting the issue of Iraq aside for a moment, I doubt an official from another Arabic country would feel safe coming forward to reveal corruption in their goverment. It's this kind of ethical grey zone that most effective independent journalism operates in.
I realise that Al-Jezzera isn't independent from a Western standard but compared to the State sponsered media in the area it's about as good as it gets.