Lance Armstrong lost many fans a couple years ago when he dumped his wife Kristin, with whom he has three children, for rock star Sheryl Crow. Apparently, these cycling fans sympathized with Kristin who nursed him through radiation treatment for testicular cancer and stood by his side when many thought his cycling career was over.
But then Armstrong lost even more fans earlier this year when he split from Crow just weeks before it was revealed that – in a remarkably ironic fate – she was stricken with breast cancer. Because, this time, not only his cycling but also her rock fans blamed him for the sudden end to their engagement, which was announced in September 2005. (And, alas, he was not there to nurse her through her recovery and stand by her side when many thought her singing career was over.)
So what’s the good news?
Well, I never understood why all the drama in his personal life affected so many people’s support for him as a cycling champion. Because I too threatened to become a disaffected fan but my reason had nothing to do with his personal relationships. Instead, as I wrote in this previous article, I was extremely troubled by what appeared to be persuasive and damning reports that Lance was a dope fiend who fueled his way to mythological heights in the cycling world on a cocktail of performance-enhancing drugs that would make those Barry Bonds allegedly took seem like sugar tablets by comparison. And I ended that article with this warning, if those reports proved to be true:
….if Armstrong turns out to be another Rafael Palmiero, then I’m sure his cycle of bad karma will soon render the one testicle he has left utterly useless.
Nonetheless, the findings by the Dutch investigators provide as much vindication and sweet revenge as humanly possible. And having one’s name cleared and honor restored in this extraordinary way could not have happened to a more worthy sportsman….
Lance, LIVESTRONG!
NOTE: This week, international tabloids ran banner headlines about the revelations that Prince Albert II of Monaco had sired yet another lovechild (now 13) from one of the many liaisons dangereuses for which he has established a notorious reputation. And, after commentinng on last year’s truly shocking revelation that he had sired a black child (now 3), I felt obliged to follow-up with an article published today at CNN. I invite you to read it by clicking here….
Incidentally, if I were a gambling man, I would bet good money that there are more concubines in waiting to debut the natural treasures they produced courtesy of Albert’s itinerant seed….
Lance Armstrong, cycling doping allegations, Prince Albert of Monaco
Francine says
More moronic, misinformed comment. Albert has not ‘disinherited’ any of the children which he has recognised so far. Indeed by recognising them under French and Monegasque law they become his legitimate heirs. They do not, however, acquire the right to succeed him as the ruler of Monaco. Only legitimate children have that right.
Your slanderous, misinformed comment comes across as envy.
I suppose that envy is something to be expected from someone who boasts that he “made quite an exotic impression on my loyal Upper East Side trophy-wife clientele”.
White Upper-East Side trophy-wives perchance ? Why don’t you provide us with some more details about your history in this area ? Otherwise your moral stance with regard to Albert’s sex life might be perceived as mere hypocrisy.
michelle says
Hi Anthony
I’m one of those fans who was really mad at Lance for dumping his wife. But I’m glad he was exonerated.
Anonymous says
An illegitimate child cannot accede to power in Monaco, unless the Prince marries the child’s mother. Under a 2002 succession law, Monaco’s throne will pass to Princess Caroline if Prince Albert dies without legitimate offspring.
However after Alexandre was recognised last year, the Prince’s lawyer made clear that he has the right to inherit his father’s wealth. Prince Albert’s fortune was estimated recently at $1 billion by Forbes magazine, which placed him sixth in its list of the world’s richest people, ahead of the Queen.
Michelle says
Hi again Anthony
I get the impression you don’t mind people making ignorant comments about your articles but it pisses me off. So here’s a little info for Madame Francine:
“there seems little or nothing Ms. Coste can do to compel him to recognize Alexandre — beyond providing common law child support which he has apparently consented belatedly to do on rather generous terms.”
Maybe you didn’t get it but the only time “disinherit” is mentioned in that article was when Anthony raised questions Albert’s black son might ask when he grows up and it obviously refers to the fact that Albert has declared that his white nephew, not his own black son, will inherit his throne.
Also, since Albert is an absolute ruler, he clearly has the power to change the succession laws of his principality. I think that’s why Anthony mentioned Henry VIII in his NOTE. Or was that too much for you to grasp Francine….
Francine says
The child has been recognised you moron. Why should Albert be compelled to place him in line for the throne ? Just because he’s black. Give me a break.
Phil says
I agree Michelle.
Besides unless ALH has little bastards all over the world calling him daddy like this pathetic prince does, I don’t know what “moronic, misinformed” Madame Francine finds hypocritical about his article.
Anonymous says
However, Nicole Coste’s lawyer, Daniel Vasconsin, said last week Prince
Albert was going to give instructions “to complete” Alexandre’s birth
records.
According to L’Express, genetic testing conducted in Switzerland has
confirmed the prince’s paternity.
Coste, who has two children from a marriage ended in 1998, said she met
Prince Albert on an Air France flight she was working on in July 1997.
Coste fell pregnant in December 2002 after “forgetting” her
contraceptive pill on a trip to New York, and Alexandre was born the
following year.
She denied accusations she was a gold digger.
Anonymous says
I like the comparison you make between Armstrong and Bonds because I can be more confident now telling me kid to look up to Armstrong as a real American sports hero. But until Bonds submits to the kind of investigation Armstrong did, there will always be a black cloud over his head.
ALH ipinions says
Francine
Thank you for your comments. However, as Michelle suggests, a second reading of my article about Prince Albert might help you grasp some of the basic points that seem to have eluded you the first time. For example, you express indignation at the thought that Albert should place his son in the line of succession “Just because he’s black.” Whereas, I assert, most emphatically, that he should do so “to honor his own flesh and blood.”
Nevertheless, apropos “slanderous, misinformed [reporting which] comes across as envy”, perhaps you’ll favor us with more informed thoughts (assuming that my inference from your name that you’re French is correct) on the findings that French reporters and French anti-doping officials acted with reckless disregard for the truth in their attempts to disqualify the cycling prowess (and impugn the character) of Lance Armstrong – arguably out of jingoistic resentment because of his 7 consecutive bike rides down the Champs-Elysées as champion of their Tour de France?
Jim says
Ouch!!!
Boy ALH – forget what I was gonna write. Seeing how way you bitch-slapped that Frenchwoman no wonder few people dare to criticize anything you write.
Talk about an artful put down. You must be a riot at parties after you’ve had a few martinis.
Francine says
I’m not really interested in Armstrong to be honest. Armstrong has well established links to an Italian doctor, Michele Ferrari, who has been under investigation for supplying performance enhancing drugs to athletes. I don’t think he will ever really live that down.
But let’s not change the subject.
Your idea that Albert should give succession to the Monegasque throne to any illegitimate child he might sire, black or otherwise, is frankly laughable.
If that is your position why aren’t you out there championing the rights of his elder sister ?
Oh, of course, she’s not black. Silly me.
And do tell us more about the “exotic impression” which you apparently made on your “loyal Upper East Side trophy-wife clientele”.
And Jim, my boy, “bitch-slapped that Frenchwoman” ?? What a quaint idea. Thank goodness people like you don’t possess passports. I guess it’s already something that you can actually read and write.
Anonymous says
My daughter is a competitive swimmer and cancer survivor and Lance is her hero. We were both happy to hear the news a couple days ago and really appreciate you writing about Lance here and in your other articles in such a brilliant, positive and entertaining way.
T. Weiss
Florida
Anonymous says
The World Anti-Doping Agency has rejected a Dutch investigator’s report that cleared American Lance Armstrong of allegations he used performance-enhancing drugs at the 1999 Tour de France.
WADA chairman Dick Pound said in a statement released Friday that the report written by lawyer Emile Vrijman for the International Cycling Union (UCI) was, “so lacking in professionalism and objectivity that it borders on the farcical.”
http://www.canada.com/topics/sports/story.html?id=21378ce8-e0b6-405b-bf76-a802be937958&k=44096
Anonymous says
“the Daily Kos blog…. book has sold only 2,062 copies at retail since its release over six weeks ago.
Of course, this presents an irresistible opportunity for me – as David to Kos’ Goliath – to slay the self-proclaimed giant of the blogosphere.”
So how are your sales going ?
jennifer says
Hi Anthony
Sorry I’m coming so late to the party. Glad to see Michelle and others set that Francine women straight though. What a treat to to see you chiming in. It’s amazing that you can be so tactful and charming when correcting ignorant and arrogant people like her. I think she just hates that you don’t fawn over royal fools in Europe like so many people do. I think Albert’s a disgrace and that Lance is a real international hero.
Anonymous says
The head of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) blasted a report clearing seven-times Tour de France champion Lance Armstrong of doping allegations as “bordering on farcical” on Friday.
Chairman Dick Pound said in a statement that WADA was considering legal action after the investigation headed by lawyer Emile Vrijman and the Dutch law firm Scholten accused the agency of behaving in ways “completely inconsistent” with testing rules.
The independent investigation exonerated Armstrong of doping during the 1999 Tour, which he won, and determined the testing procedures at the French national doping laboratory LNDD had been insufficient to label the American’s sample positive.
Vrijman also stated in the report that WADA and the LNDD had effectively pronounced Armstrong guilty of a doping violation without sufficient basis.
Armstrong, who retired last July, has vehemently denied ever using performance-enhancing drugs.
In a harshly worded statement, WADA said it completely rejected the so-called “Vrijman report” and that its preliminary conclusion was that “the report was defamatory to the Agency, its officers and employees, as well as the accredited laboratory involved.”
The agency said it had taken legal advice regarding its recourses against the investigator and any organization, including the International Cycling Union (UCI), that may publicly adopt its conclusions.
“WADA is an independent agency, comprised of equal representatives from the sports movement and the governments, which is concerned with the integrity of sport and the health of the athletes who practice it,” said Pound in a statement.
http://today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=sportsNews&storyID=2006-06-02T185310Z_01_L02653847_RTRUKOC_0_US-DOPING-WADA-ARMSTRONG.xml
Anonymous says
World Anti-Doping Agency Chairman Dick Pound said Friday that a Dutch investigator’s report clearing Lance Armstrong from doping allegations made by a French newspaper is full of holes.
He said the report had so many factual errors that “pointing them out would probably take as much space as the [132-page] report.” WADA will consider legal action against Vrijman and “any organization, including UCI, that may publicly adopt its conclusions.”
http://www.latimes.com/sports/la-sp-newswire3jun03,1,7822965.story?coll=la-headlines-sports
Chad says
Give it a rest Frenchie (oh, I’m sorry, I meant Francine or do you prefer to be “Anonymous” now?)
It’s clear that you people can’t stand that an American has dominated your national sport like Lance has done for the past seven years.
By the way, it wasn’t an American who found that the Frenchmen and their Canadian stooges who run the World Anti-Doping Agency were doing all they could to frame Lance because they are so jealous of Americans, it was a Dutchman.
You’re all sore losers!!!
Anonymous says
Why should I be French ? The head of the WADA isn’t French either. Believe me right now just about everyone else on the planet is NOT CHEERING the USA.
What with the moron you voted into the White House (well alright maybe he stole the election like in a Banana Republic) and the American thugs committing atrocities in Iraq, being American isn’t exactly flavour of the month.
No matter you cheer on your doped-up athletes and, more importantly, stay home. Shoot each other on your own streets.
Anonymous says
Robert Fisk in The Independent
Could Haditha be just the tip of the mass grave? The corpses we have glimpsed, the grainy footage of the cadavers and the dead children; could these be just a few of many? Does the handiwork of America’s army of the slums go further?
I remember clearly the first suspicions I had that murder most foul might be taking place in our name in Iraq. I was in the Baghdad mortuary, counting corpses, when one of the city’s senior medical officials – an old friend – told me of his fears. “Everyone brings bodies here,” he said. “But when the Americans bring bodies in, we are instructed that under no circumstances are we ever to do post-mortems. We were given to understand that this had already been done. Sometimes we’d get a piece of paper like this one with a body.” And here the man handed me an American military document showing the hand-drawn outline of a man’s body and the words “trauma wounds”.
What kind of trauma? Indeed, what kind of trauma is now being experienced in Iraq? Who is doing the mass killing? Who is dumping so many bodies on garbage heaps? After Haditha, we are going to reshape our suspicions.
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/fisk/article624173.ece
Joy says
While many people in the United States feel Armstrong is victim of a French conspiracy, there has been a steady stream of detractors who claim the 33-year-old American, who has never tested positive, did use illicit means throughout his career.
On Sunday Dutchman Ron Jongen, who worked with Armstrong’s former team US Postal in 1999, claimed he witnessed “strange occurrences” during the 1999 Tour, claiming that three Spanish “doctors” discreetly visited the cycling team on a regular basis at their hotels.
The Dutchman even claims he overheard Armstrong’s team manager Johan Bruyneel, who is still manager of the Discovery Channel team talking about his riders’ red blood cell (haematocrit) level before the 1999 Tour de France.
Using EPO, a naturally-occurring hormone which is also synthetically produced and has the advantage of increasing the volume of oxygen-rich red blood cells in the blood, also automatically raises the haematocrit level.
Last week a former anti-doping expert in Italy went so far as to say Armstrong would have had recourse to other illegal drugs and not just EPO.
Alessandro Donati, a specialist in the fight against doping in sport, suggested Armstrong’s performances suggest he used a range of banned substances, including anabolic steroids.
“There have been clear indications for years as to how Armstrong has been so successful,” Donati, who was formerly in charge of the Italian Olympic Committee (CONI) research centre, said.
“No one could achieve what Armstrong has achieved taking EPO on its own. EPO improves your breathing capacity. But you also need other substances, such as anabolics, testosterone and a lot of others,” he stressed.
http://english.people.com.cn/200509/07/eng20050907_207036.html
Jim says
Hey Francine, Anonymous, Joy … I see you’re still taking cheap shots at America.
But I just reread your comments from yesterday and those from today and I’ve decided that you’re just an army of one petty-minded, spiteful, jealous french old maid with too much time on her hands. So get a life bitch!!!
joy says
What charming people you Americans are. And so quick to engage in informed debate. I think really you should stick with what you are good at: drive by killings, selling crack to kids and stuff like that. And Jim and Chad are who exactly ? ALH incognito ? Charming, just charming.
Anonymous says
I agree Joy. I always thought something was fishy about this site. I think there’s maybe a group of white conservatives writing these articles and using this guy as a front. Since no way this ALH ipinions writes all this stuff by himself. Also I’m no bigot but there’s just no way a black guy writes like that.
Francine says
Boy. What a comment. What does that mean ? That you are surprised he gets his spelling and grammar correct and actually has access to a vocabulary that’s more than a dozen words ? That’s not so surprising since he didn’t actually go to school in the USA, where they don’t teach that stuff any more. The range of topics ? That’s not so surprising either. Pretty ordinary-Joe stuff there. Anyone who reads a newspaper regularly would have the same range. Or is it the conservative tone ? Well the conservative tone is a bit stomach churning, but hey I didn’t think the political discourse in America was particularly brilliant in the first place. America is still tossing around political concepts which have been “fait accompli” for decades in Europe, and you guys still don’t have free Medical Care, free tertiary education and a decent welfare system.
Anonymous says
Is it really 2006? DId some so called enlightened soul actually suggest that a black man can not write like ALH does? And of course this was prefaced with “I am no bigot”. I will not claim to be so enlightened, so I will just wonder (aloud) what kind of person(s) this actually might be…?
Rage…….
Anonymous says
Anonymous, joy, Jim or whatever alias you are going by, I am not surprised by your comments at all as the French are extremely arrogant, rude and ignorant. I am also not surprised that you are indeed and in fact a racist, this might come as a surprise to you but there are EDUCATED, WELL INFORMED, BLACK people in this world, and I assure you my dear that Anthony can put you in his pocket. Whilst you’re bashing the US by saying all they are good for are drive-bys etc. maybe you would like to enlighten us all about the racial tensions that are going on in France. May I refresh your memory; on October 27,2005 three dark-skinned teenagers, all French citizens, but from immigrant families we’re returning from playing soccer when they were confronted at a police identification checkpoint which only happens to be situated on the outskirts of Paris which is occupied by immigrants from North and West African countries, and is apparently done to ensure that these children who were born and grew up in France are indeed French, for the Americans this is what we call WWB “Walking While Black”. The police during their “routine check” started chasing the teenagers which ultimately ended in the deaths of two of the teenagers, Zyed Benna 17, and Bouna Traore 15 who were electrocuted and the third boy, Muttin Altun, 17 was gravely burned as they were chased into an electrical substation. This event sparked what was known as the Parisian Riots, so whilst you are accusing the Americans of such grave injustice against humanity please enlighten us about the racial profiling and abuse that is so rampant in your country. Is there any wonder Prince Albert won’t recognize his black son? And should we be surprised that you have bashed Anthony for his views on this matter and have yourself reverted to racist comments whilst using the alias Jim? I think not!!!!
Francine says
Look I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: I’m not French. Why would you think I am? I didn’t post the comment about black writers. So give me a break. As for the riots in France: like I care!! No interest and why introduce the topic at all? What is the relevancy here?
Obviously you are all-knowing, all-seeing and incredibly smug. Must be great being you. Talk about an alternative reality….
Francine says
And given the tone of the comment posted 6/03/2006 05:50:17 PM, I think it’s fair to assume that it was posted by one of your erudite, enlightened fellow Americans.
You know, the ones the rest of us would like to see kept at home.
Anonymous says
Normalizing the Unthinkable
John Pilger, Robert Fisk, Charlie Glass, and Seymour Hersh on the failure of the world’s press
By Sophie McNeill
06/03/06 “Information Clearing House” — — The late journalist Edward R. Murrow might well have been rolling in his grave on April 21. That’s because Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice gave a lecture that day in Washington, DC to journalists at the Department of State’s official Edward R. Murrow Program for Journalists.
For the Bush administration to use the memory of a person who stood up to government propaganda is ironic to say the least. Secretary Rice told the assembled journalists that “without a free press to report on the activities of government, to ask questions of officials, to be a place where citizens can express themselves, democracy simply couldn’t work.”
One week earlier in New York City, Columbia University hosted a panel on the state of the world’s media that would have been more in Murrow’s style than the State Department-run symposium. Reporter and filmmaker John Pilger, British Middle East correspondent for the Independent Robert Fisk, freelance reporter Charlie Glass, and investigative journalist for the New Yorker Seymour Hersh appeared together at this April 14 event.
Before the afternoon panel began, I met up with John Pilger at his hotel. He’d just flown in from London and was only in New York for the panel before flying to Caracas, Venezuela the next day. A journalist for over 30 years, Pilger has reported from Vietnam, Cambodia, East Timor, Palestine, and Iraq—to name a few of the countries to which his investigative reporting and filmmaking had taken him.
Pilger told me that he’d never been as concerned about the state of the media as he was today. “I think there’s a lot of reasons to be very concerned about the information or the lack of information that we get. There’s never been such an interest, more than an interest, almost an obsession, in controlling what journalists have to say.”
Despite the fact that the war in Iraq is reported daily in most U.S. newspapers and networks around the world, Pilger didn’t think the world’s press accurately conveyed the reality of life for Iraqi civilians. “We get the illusion that we are seeing what might be happening in Iraq. But what we’re getting is a massive censorship by omission; so much is being left out,” he said. “We have a situation in Iraq where well over 100,000 civilians have been killed and we have virtually no pictures. The control of that by the Pentagon has been quite brilliant. And as a result we have no idea of the extent of civilians suffering in that country.”
I asked Pilger what the untold story of Iraq was that’s just not getting through. “Well, the untold story of Iraq should be obvious,” Pilger said. “But it never is. The untold story of Vietnam was that it was an invasion and that huge numbers of civilians were killed. And in effect it was a war against civilians and that was never told and that’s exactly true of Iraq.”
With the majority of the world’s press holed up behind 4.5 miles of concrete barrier in the green zone, it seems impossible for the standard of reporting to improve anytime in the near future. I asked Pilger if he blamed journalists for not wanting to put their lives at risk? “No, I can’t,” he said. “But I don’t see the point of being in the green zone. I don’t see the point of wearing a flak jacket and standing in a hotel in a fortress guarded by an invader.
“But there have been journalists—and others—who have actually gone with the insurgents; who have reported about them. One of them, for instance, is a young woman named Jo Wilding, a British human rights worker. She was in Fallujah all through that first attack in 2004. Jo Wilding’s dispatches were some of the most extraordinary I’ve read, but they were never published anywhere.”
Pilger said the mainstream press needs to get over its hang up of “our man in Baghdad” and prioritize whatever information can be obtained by whoever is brave enough or has the best contacts. “There are sources of information for what is happening inside Iraq. Most of them are on the web. I think those who give a damn in the mainstream really have to look at those sources and surrender their prejudice about them and say we need that reporter’s work because he or she has told us something we can’t possibly get ourselves. And I think that’s the only way we will really serve the public.”
We had talked too long and had to quickly jump in a cab to make it to the panel on time. The hall was packed with university students, professors, and the public.
Charlie Glass
The event quickly got underway with Charlie Glass as the first speaker. A former ABC America correspondent in the Middle East, Glass drew laughs from the crowd when comparing his experience to the other panelists. “When I began journalism I approached it in the way a lot of young naïve people do, in that it was a vocation, a higher calling to tell the truth. My three colleagues up here have managed to do that throughout their careers. I tried very hard to do that throughout my career…but I worked for an American network. It’s not easy,” joked Glass.
Glass spoke about the censorship he had encountered as an American TV reporter covering the Middle East, referring to a story he filed during the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982. There had been rumors of Israeli Shin Bath death squads murdering Lebanese civilians in the South and Glass and his crew had managed to film the evidence behind these killings. “We nailed this story. We folded one of the death squads. We got to the palace where they had assassinated a man half an hour after he had been killed. We filmed it. We filmed the eyewitness. We filmed UN soldiers, who had seen the same things, discussing it,” recalled Glass.
“ABC news didn’t broadcast it. But they won’t tell you they’re not going to broadcast it because they’re afraid of losing advertising. They won’t tell you they won’t broadcast it because they’re afraid of the public reaction. They tell you they just didn’t have room that night or the next night or the next night. And that’s just the way it is. That is why very few people in this country have any idea what’s going on in the Middle East.”
Glass believes this kind of censorship has led to a chasm of misunderstanding within the U.S. public. “You don’t understand what’s been going on in Iraq because you’ve been lied to again. Just like you were in Vietnam. Just like you were in Lebanon and just like you were in the West Bank and Gaza,” he said.
“Nobody has a clue why things went wrong in Iraq. Well, I’ll tell you why. They were always going to go wrong in Iraq. It wasn’t because Bremer screwed up. It wasn’t because the U.S. pilfered the Iraqi treasury, which is true. It wasn’t because some soldiers misbehaved and shot some people in cars. It was because it could never go right in Iraq,” Glass insisted. “The U.S. was not trusted by any Iraqi because the U.S. history in Iraq was so reprehensible—from the betrayal of the Kurds in 1975 when Henry Kissinger sold them out and they were massacred in the tens of thousands by Saddam, from the time they aided Saddam during the Iran/Iraq war, from the time they betrayed the Kurdish and Shia rebellions in 1991, from the sanctions regime that followed.
“Who would trust a power to liberate them who had already behaved like that? It isn’t a question of what happened after; it’s a question of what happened before. We had an obligation to tell what happened before and we didn’t,” Glass said, before pausing to take a moment. “I’ve lost my vocation. I actually don’t really like this profession anymore,” Glass said regrettably.
Robert Fisk
Next to speak was Middle East correspondent Robert Fisk, arguably th
e world’s most experienced Western reporter in the region. Fisk pulled out a copy of the New York Times and spread it out on the lectern. “This is from this morning’s paper: Al-Qaeda’s man in Iraq gets encouragement from HQ,” Fisk read aloud. “An interior minister official said, officials said, the American military said, the Iraqi government said, some American officials here observed, and some military officials have said, two American intelligence officials said, one Pakistani official said, and I’ve only got to column two,” Fisk exclaimed. “I’ve always believed that your major newspaper should be called ‘American Officials Say.’ Then you can just scrap all the reporting and have the Pentagon talking directly.”
Fisk expressed outrage at the semantics of language that occurs within much of the reporting in the Middle East. “In the American press the occupied Palestinian territories become the disputed territories, a colony becomes a settlement or a neighborhood or an outpost. Here semantically, we are constantly degrading the reasons for Palestinian anger. Over and over again the wall becomes a fence. Like the Berlin fence— had it been built by the Israelis, that’s what it would have been called. Then for anyone who doesn’t know the real semantics of this conflict, the Palestinians are generically violent. I mean who would ever protest over a garden fence or a neighborhood? The purpose of this kind of journalism is to diminish the real reasons behind the Middle East conflict.”
Fisk went on to explain why he thinks the manipulation of language in reporting skews the truth. “We have another phrase we are introducing now. Have you noticed how these extraordinary creatures keep popping up in reports from Baghdad? ‘Men in police uniform’ took part in the kidnapping. ‘Men in police uniform’ abducted Margaret Hassan. ‘Men in army uniform’ besieged police stations,” Fisk said, somewhat exasperated.
“Now do the reporters writing this garbage actually think there is a warehouse in Fallujah with eight thousand made to measure police uniforms for insurgents?” Fisk asked, then answered. “Of course there aren’t, they are the policemen.”
Fisk’s main criticism was reserved for television coverage of the conflict. “Television connives at war because it will not show you the reality. If an Iraqi is lucky enough to die in a romantic position he will get on the air,” Fisk said. He then added, “But if he doesn’t have a head on or if he is like most of the victims, torn to bits, you will not see him.”
Fisk talked of his television colleague’s pictures being routinely censored by producers and editors back home. “I’ve heard them say this down the line, ‘It’s pornographic to show these pictures. We’ve got people at breakfast time; they will be puking over their cornflakes… We can’t show this.’ My favorite one is ‘We’ve got to respect the dead.’ We can kill them as much as we want, but once they’re dead we’ve got to respect them, right? And so you will be shielded from this war. You will be shielded from this reality.”
Fisk believes having journalists holed up in the green zone suits the military forces in Iraq. “The Americans, and to a lesser extent the British, like it this way. They do not want us moving around. They do not want us going to the mortuaries and counting the dead.”
Fisk told of an experience he had when visiting a Baghdad mortuary in August 2005. “The mortuary officials, against the law of Iraq, which doesn’t count for much at the moment, let me see the Ministry of Health computer that American and British officials have ordered the ministry not to allow Western journalists access to…which showed that in July alone last year 1,100 Iraqis had died by violence, just in Baghdad.”
Fisk challenged the standard reporting conventions hammered into journalism student’s heads around the world. “There’s one that comes up from the journalism school system which is you’ve got to give equal time to both sides,” explained Fisk. “To which I say well, if you were reporting the slave trade in the 18th century, would you give equal time to the slave ship captain? No. If you’re covering the liberation of a Nazi camp, do you give equal time to the SS spokesman? No. When I covered a Palestinian suicide bombing of a restaurant in Israeli west Jerusalem in August 2001, did I give equal time to the Islamic jihad spokesman? No. When 1,700 Palestinians were slaughtered in the Palestinian refugee camps of Sabra and Shatila in 1982, did I give equal time to the Israeli spokesman, who of course was representing an army who watched the massacre as its Lebanese Phalangist allies carried it out? No. Journalists should be on the side of the victims,” Fisk said.
He closed with a sober warning to viewers and readers closely following the Iraq war coverage. “We have a real disaster on our hands because the American project in Iraq is dead and don’t believe anything anyone else tells you in any newspaper. It is a catastrophe and every reporter working in Iraq knows it, but they don’t all tell you that,” Fisk said, pausing. “And that is our shame.”
John Pilger
John Pilger addressed the audience next by challenging the very idea that America and its allies are at war. “We are not at war. Instead, American and British troops are fighting insurrections in countries where our invasions have caused mayhem and grief…but you wouldn’t know it. Where are the pictures of these atrocities?”
Pilger referred to the first wars he covered, Vietnam and Cambodia, and compared the role of journalists then to today. “The invasion of Vietnam was deliberate and calculated—as were policies and strategies that bordered on genocide and were designed to force millions of people to abandon their homes. Experimental weapons were used against civilians. All of this was rarely news. The unspoken task of the reporter in Vietnam, as it was in Korea, was to normalize the unthinkable. And that has not changed.”
Pilger went on to explain his reaction to current reporting of events in Iraq. “The other day, on the third anniversary of the invasion, a BBC newsreader described the invasion as a ‘miscalculation.’ Not illegal. Not unprovoked. Not based on lies. But a miscalculation. Thus, the unthinkable is normalized. By concentrating on military pronouncements. By making it seem like it is a respectable war, you normalize what is the unthinkable. And the unthinkable is a war against civilians. It’s a war that has claimed tens of thousands of people. There are estimates that put it well over 100,000. When journalists report it as a respectable geopolitical act and promote the idea that it was to bring democracy to this country, then they’re normalizing the unthinkable.”
Pilger turned his attention to the BBC. Generally accepted worldwide as a reputable and independent source of information, Pilger rejected this notion outright. “In Britain, where I live, the BBC, which promotes itself as a sort of nirvana of objectivity and impartiality and truth, has blood all over its corporate hands.” Pilger cited a study conducted by the journalism school of the University College in Cardiff that found in the lead up to the war, 90 percent of the BBC’s references to weapons of mass destruction suggested Saddam Hussein actually possessed them.
Pilger added, “We now know that the BBC and other British media were used by MI-6, the secret intelligence service. In what they called Operation Mass Appeal, MI-6 agents planted stories about Saddam’s weapons of mass destruction, such as weapons hidden in his palaces and in secret underground bunkers. All of these stories were fake. But that’s not the point. The point is that the role of MI-6 was quite unnecessary because a systematic media self-censorship produced the same result.”
To Pilger the most significant way journalists are used by government is in what he
calls a “softening up process” before planned military action. “We soften them up by dehumanizing them. Currently journalists are softening up Iran, Syria, and Venezuela,” Pilger said. “A few weeks ago Channel 4 News in Britain, regarded as a good liberal news service, carried a major item that might have been broadcast by the State Department. The reporter presented President Chavez of Venezuela as a cartoon character, a sinister buffoon whose folksy Latin way disguised a man, and I quote, ‘in danger of joining a rogues gallery of dictators and despots—Washington’s latest Latin nightmare.’
“Rumsfeld was allowed to call Chavez ‘Hitler’ unchallenged. According to the reporter, Venezuela under Chavez was helping Iran develop nuclear weapons. No evidence was given for this bullshit.” He cited a recent report by the media watchdog FAIR, which found that 95 percent of the 100 media commentaries surveyed expressed hostility to Chavez, with terms such as “dictator,” “strongman,” and “demagogue” regularly used in publications such as the Los Angeles Times and the Wall Street Journal. “The softening-up of Venezuela is well advanced in the United States. So that if or when the Bush administration launches Operation Bilbao, a contingent plan to overthrow the democratic government of Venezuela, who will care? We will have only the media version, another lousy demagogue got what was coming to him. A triumph of censorship by omission and by journalism,” he concluded.
Seymour Hersh
The last speaker, Seymour Hersh, had just published his report on the Bush administration’s secret plans for an attack on Iran, which he spoke about. “Here we’ve got a situation, which is really unique in our history. This is a president who is completely inured to the press. It doesn’t matter what we write or say. He has got his own vision, whether he’s talking to God or doing things on behalf of what his father didn’t do or whatever it is. He has his own messianic view of what to do and he’s not done,” warned Hersh.
The moderator questioned Hersh about his use of anonymous sources and the possibility that his Iran story was from a government plant. “It’s an appropriate question,” he remarked.
“People would say are you part of the process, trying to put pressure on the Iranians by using psychological warfare and planting the story? I really wish they had that kind of cunning…that they would think in a Kissingerian way,” he laughed. “But the fact is with George Bush, it’s been very consistent. What you see is what you get.”
“It was not a plant,” Hersh explained. “This [report] came from people willing to take bullets for us… willing to put their lives on the line, who understand combat and who are scared to death about this guy in the White House.” Hersh went on to warn the audience about what he thought would happen with the Bush administration and Iran; “Folks, don’t bet against it because he’s probably going to do it; because somebody up there is telling him this is the right thing to do.”
Hersh considered the damning words of his colleagues. “Yes, it’s important to beat up on us. As usual we deserve it. As usual we failed you totally,” Hersh remarked wearily. “But above and beyond all that, folks, by my count there are something like 1,011 days left in the reign of King George the Lesser and that is the bad news. But there is good news. And the good news is that tomorrow when we wake up there will be one less day.”
To a large round of applause, the afternoon ended. I asked Pilger his final thoughts. He paused and then replied, “Journalists, like politicians, like anybody really, should be called to account for the consequences of their actions. Journalists have played a critical role in sustaining wars. Starting them and sustaining them. And we have to face that discussion. There’s nothing wrong with journalism, it’s a wonderful privilege, it’s a craft actually, and I’m very proud to be a journalist. But it’s the way it’s practiced. It’s as if it has been hijacked by corporatism and we should take it back.”
Sophie McNeill is a freelance video journalist whose work regularly appears on Australia’s SBS Television “Dateline” program. She lives in New York.
Anonymous says
Francine if you so strongly disagree with what is said in this blog and you despise Americans so much and we are “are all-knowing, all-seeing and incredibly smug.” Why come on this site at all?
It is in fact GREAT being me but I can only imagine what a miserable, sad life you lead!!! And even if you do not make the “racist” comments, as everyone else on this site probably believes, I still feel that you are the author of those distasteful comments and why you ask because you are a coward, a coward that hides behind aliases and attacks the credibility of a man that has voiced informed and rather witty posts daily!!!!! Ones that I might add keep idiots like you informed, and what a hard job that must be!!!!
You are what you claim to despise, ignorant, self-knowing, self-absored and a RACIST. And as for the French riots obviously you aren’t as intelligent and well-informed as you pretend to be because if you were you would have at least made a comment on the situation other than to say that you do not care, but oh wait its ONLY Americans you seem to like bashing!!!
I pray to God you are NOT an American, and I also pray that you ARE NOT in our country and that they never let you in!!! It’s people like you we need to steer clear of!!!
Go and have a drink francine and stay off this blog because frankly we are all quite tired of your tirades!!!!
Francine says
No.