Throughout the trial of the Butcher of Baghdad it has been obvious from the reporting that the Media has felt uncomfortable. Many reporters have insisted on calling him Mr. Hussein and written about his trial in much the same way as they would on a fraud case where one needs to hear all the evidence before reaching a conclusion. This treatment of his trial has been paralleled by the Leftists’ demands that terrorists should be dealt with as ordinary criminals and protected by the Justice system. This is meant to enhance the Leftists’ credentials as dispassionate, morally superior people who can rise above emotions and aspire to loftier goals.
Since 9/11, the Media and its Leftist allies have gradually evolved a stance towards terrorists and Saddam that they believe will both trivialize the threat to the American people and rescue themselves from having to be on the same side as the hated George Bush. They have scoffed at the war on terror, opposed military tribunals and efforts at counter-terrorist intelligence and trivialized and mocked the trial of an evil monster. Without ever offering a set of concrete alternatives in response to 9/11, they have nitpicked and sniped and focused attention on every setback in Iraq and Afghanistan. Whilst furiously denying that their tactics have encouraged America’s enemies and that they are unpatriotic, they have done all they can to provide aid and comfort.
When the news broke last weekend that the evil Saddam Hussein had been found guilty of mass murder and sentenced to be hanged along with two henchmen, the Media was palpably distressed. Here was a difficult situation for them just before a crucial US election in which the Media Class has much invested. The Media’s first worry was that in some way the verdict might bolster the Republican vote. For most of us, there was no connection between the verdict and the election. We have waited (too long in my view) for this outcome and for his death because he deserves to be hanged many times over. His crimes put him into the same class as Stalin, Hitler, Mao, Idi Amin and Pol Pot, and his tortured victims cry out from their mass graves for retribution. I would have preferred that when he was dragged from his foxhole he was immediately shot and his body dragged through Baghdad by the Iraqis. Mussolini received this treatment and he was never the monster to his own people that this disgusting creature has been.
It is clear that the Media has not shared my outrage about this man, and that it has been preoccupied with the effect of the trial’s outcome on the US elections. The Media reports speak for themselves. For overseas events like this trial, the Associated Press and Reuters are the Media Class leaders, for their reports are fed into almost all US media outlets. AP’s William J. Kole was first out with a report that was carried on the Internet. His long piece was entitled “World Opinion Differs on Saddam Verdict” and I would ask you to ponder that headline.
For this trial has been, above all else, an Iraqi event, conducted by Iraqis in their reconstituted State, and concerning Iraqi victims. The sentence has been greeted with joy by hundreds of thousands of Iraqis in the streets and probably by tens of millions in their hearts, and one would have thought that the first Media reports would have been all about their responses. Of course, I am aware that some Sunnis will not be joyful, but we would not have concerned ourselves with the feelings of Nazi SS men when getting media reports of Hitler’s death in 1945. But AP and its friends do not want to turn this event into a celebration. And we soon learned why in Kole’s article for he quickly told us that ‘some’ were alleging that the Iraq Court’s timing of the decision had been manipulated by the Bush Administration in order to influence the US election. This is a claim that has been repeated in nearly every Media report since, yet I have searched in vain for the identity of the ‘some’. It is not Democrat politicians, though I have no doubt that they are only too pleased to see this allegation given prominence. One has to assume that the ‘some’ amongst whom this claim surfaced were Mr. Kole’s colleagues in the newsroom. No-one subsequently seems willing to take responsibility for making the allegation, yet it has circulated and circulated in Media reports.
I looked in vain too, for the “differences” in World opinion that featured in the headline. It seemed that ‘World’ opinion was pretty united around concern that the Baghdad Butcher might be hanged. It is surely quite dishonest to talk about “world opinion”, since we can never know what it is. Mr Kole was clearly talking about the kind of people that AP reporters consider to be important, politically correct and useful, such as EU leaders, ‘Human Rights’ people, Amnesty International, and Muslim apologists. The Pope was for once also included since he opposes the death penalty. We were also told that some important people did not consider that Hussein had a fair trial. One was the former US Attorney General, Leftist Ramsey Clarke, who had been leading the legal defense team in Baghdad. Only Jimmy Carter and Cindy Sheehan were missing from the great and the good who were quoted as upset by the Baghdad Court’s decision. Jimmy, as it happens, was busy helping the Sandanistas in Nicaragua and so missed an opportunity to pontificate and place all blame on the US.
It is amazing how the Media Class sees itself as above the fray between the West and militant Islamic Imperialism, thus enabling it to view all aspects of the war in terms of short-term political gain in the US. Of course it has to keep its useful Leftist allies in academia and on the streets of San Francisco aboard and that means going easy on Leftist thugs and dictators, but does it not see what is at stake? Apparently not!
I doubt that the trial decision will have had any noticeable impact on the US elections, but once again we see the Media Class in lockstep during this election campaign and leaving nothing to chance.