Thursday, March 30, 2006

putting the "free" back in "freelance"

Go Jill Carrol:
American Reporter Kidnapped in Baghdad Is Released [nytimes]

archived copy here:
Freelance Journalist Kidnapped in Iraq Is Freed [truthout]

Don't remember where I found these quotes from:
Instead of celebrating her freedom, some in the media took the opportunity to make light of her situation. Hours after Carroll’s release Bernard McGurik, the executive producer of “Imus in the Morning” (who also appears on air), said that Carroll “strikes me as the kind of woman who would wear one of those suicide vests. You know, walk into the — try and sneak into the Green Zone.” Imus’ sidekick Charles McCord was concerned that Carroll was “a person who strived for their, represented their [the Iraqi people’s] plight for a long, long time.” (Don Imus, to his credit, repeatedly told McGurik and McCord to shut up. Unfortunately, he wasn’t successful.)

The National Review jumps into the fray, questioning Carroll’s mental state. The National Review’s John Podhoretz said “after watching someone who was a hostage for three months say on television she was well-treated because she wasn’t beaten or killed — while being dressed in the garb of a modest Muslim woman rather than the non-Muslim woman she actually is — I expect there will be some Stockholm Syndrome talk in the coming days.” Apparently because Carroll was wearing the Muslim garb that she used as a safety precaution, Podhoretz couldn’t believe that she was telling truth. His colleague Jonah Goldberg added that it “is increasingly starting to bug me,” and concluded, “I’m very glad she’s alive, but I’m getting a very bad vibe.”

Tuesday, March 21, 2006

liberal vs. conservative assassinations

from the Big Question Dept.

Throughout history, have more "liberals" been assassinated than "conservatives"? If so, that's pretty fucked up. And also if so, seems to me it would make it maybe slightly harder to align oneself with a type of political thought that repeatedly attempted to consolidate its power with violent actions by a small group. I'm defining liberal and conservative quite (ahem) liberally here -- basically to mean any figure progressive type figure, and any traditional/preserving type figure, respectively. Also, I want to be careful to exclude here things like popular uprisings resulting in beheadings of monarchs and such -- these are more violent revolutions than assassinations I think?

Anyone have any answers here?