Friday, May 07, 2004
Liberal Media?
The re-cap below, taken from an article by Eric Alterman, captures the insincerity of Sinclair Broadcasting in its decision not to air the Nightline episode in which Ted Koppel read the names and showed the faces of the 721 US soldiers who had died in Iraq as of the date of broadcast.
"Barry Faber, Sinclair vice president and general counsel, told the Washington Post that they had chosen to censor Nightline because they believed the program's "motivation is to focus attention solely on people who have died in the war in order to push public opinion toward the United States getting out of Iraq." Faber suggested that the reading of the names of the dead would "unduly influence people."
A Sinclair press release demanded to know why Koppel did not read "the names of the thousands of private citizens killed in terrorist attacks since and including the events of September 11, 2001. In his answer, we believe you will find the real motivation behind his action scheduled for this Friday." Well, the answer is, he did--on the first anniversary of 9/11--but don't bother Sinclair with facts. "The average viewer who watches the show is not going to remember that," Faber replied to Post reporter Lisa de Moraes, who pointed it out to him."
The rest of the piece can be found here.
"Barry Faber, Sinclair vice president and general counsel, told the Washington Post that they had chosen to censor Nightline because they believed the program's "motivation is to focus attention solely on people who have died in the war in order to push public opinion toward the United States getting out of Iraq." Faber suggested that the reading of the names of the dead would "unduly influence people."
A Sinclair press release demanded to know why Koppel did not read "the names of the thousands of private citizens killed in terrorist attacks since and including the events of September 11, 2001. In his answer, we believe you will find the real motivation behind his action scheduled for this Friday." Well, the answer is, he did--on the first anniversary of 9/11--but don't bother Sinclair with facts. "The average viewer who watches the show is not going to remember that," Faber replied to Post reporter Lisa de Moraes, who pointed it out to him."
The rest of the piece can be found here.
