Monday, December 15, 2008

A Question The Times Shouldn't Have Asked

The New York Times devotes considerable effort to asking Iraqis what they think about the President of the United States being attacked by an operative of an anti-Maliki TV network. So low has the President sunk in the media's (and indeed the American people's) estimation that it evidently doesn't occur to the Times that attacking Mr. Bush in a crowded room actually falls below the threshold of legitimate expression.

According to the Times, some Iraqis think the attack was just fine. A way to go, I guess, in establishing a mature polity in their country.

I wonder if the reporters and stringers collecting the quotations followed up with these questions: How would you feel if either President had been hurt or killed? If security agents had opened fire and hurt or killed others in the room? If the President's press secretary had been more severely injured than she was in the scuffle? And if any of them ever saw a "reporter" throw a shoe at Saddam Hussein?

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