Arnett fired by NBC, Geraldo kicked out of Iraq by US Military

[Tanager]

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmp...ia_arnett_dc_7

By Derek Caney and Mark Wilkinson

NEW YORK/WASHINGTON (Reuters) - American television network NBC said on Monday it had fired veteran reporter Peter Arnett after he told Iraqi television the U.S. war plan against Saddam Hussein (news - web sites) had failed.

Arnett, who as a CNN reporter in 1991 was one of the few Western journalists reporting from Baghdad during the first Gulf War (news - web sites), said in an interview on Sunday with state-owned Iraqi television that the U.S. military would need to rewrite its war plan following Iraqi resistance.


"America is re-appraising the battlefield, delaying the war, maybe a week, and re-writing the war plan," Arnett said in the interview. "The first war plan has failed because of Iraqi resistance now they are trying to write another war plan."


Arnett, who won a Pulitzer Prize for his coverage of the Vietnam War, told NBC's "Today" show, "I said in that interview essentially what we all know about the war, that there have been delays in implementing policy, there have been surprises.


"But clearly by giving that interview I created a firestorm in the United States and for that I am truly sorry. My stupid misjudgment was to spend fifteen minutes in an impromptu interview with Iraqi television," he said.


His assignment with NBC and National Geographic (news - web sites) represented a chance for redemption after he was fired from CNN in 1998 after the network retracted a documentary, in which Arnett alleged that U.S. commandos had used sarin gas on American defectors in the Vietnam war.


NBC said in a statement it was wrong for Arnett to grant an interview with state-controlled Iraqi TV at a time of war and chastised him for making personal observations and opinions.


"His remarks were analytical in nature and were not intended to be anything more," the network said.


On Sunday, Arnett told Iraqi television that American war planners had underestimated the determination of Iraqi troops to fight U.S. and British troops and that the Pentagon (news - web sites) seemed to be amending its original strategy.


PATRIOTISM IN FOCUS


MSNBC, which had been using Arnett's reports, also severed ties with him. "I'm not aware of anybody in the journalism community who has seen the war plan, much less Peter Arnett," said Erik Sorenson, MSNBC president and general manager.


"It's just inappropriate and arguably unpatriotic for an American to be communicating these things to the Iraqi government and the Iraqi people," he added.


Asked how much of a priority patriotism should be for an objective journalist, he said, "When you go on state-controlled television after Iraq (news - web sites)'s vice president promised to send terrorists into your country, I do think some patriotism is appropriate in this instance."


On Saturday after a suicide car bomb that killed at least four U.S. soldiers, Iraq's vice president Taha Yassin Ramadan said it would use any method that "stops or kills the enemy."


Arnett also said there was a "growing challenge to President Bush (news - web sites) about the conduct of the war and also opposition to the war."


That view echoed similar comments in many U.S. media after the rapid advance of U.S. forces through southern Iraq slowed south of Baghdad amid disruptive attacks on its long supply lines and persistent resistance, particularly in the towns.


Arnett's remarks were received with anger by the administration in Washington. One White House source said they were based on "a position of complete ignorance."





In another media development, veteran reporter Geraldo Rivera, a correspondent for Fox News, is being removed from Iraq by the U.S. military for reporting Western troop movements in the war, the Pentagon said on Monday.

Hundreds of reporters from around the world are currently assigned to U.S. and British military units to report the war in Iraq under ground rules that allow them freedom to report without compromising the security of the troops.

Arnett, while apologetic on NBC, said he has granted many interviews in the past and that his remarks were not "out of line with what experts think."

"Maybe some people think I'm insane, but I'm not anti-military," he added. "This is the biggest story of my life." Asked what the future held for him, Arnett said: "There's a small island, inhabited in the South Pacific that I will try to swim to."

"I'll leave, I'm embarrassed," he said.

[Tanager]

Personally, while I think reporting troop movements while in Iraq is pretty shitty, I think Geraldo's getting kicked out is kind of funny. I don't why anyone keeps hiring that clown...maybe the networks kind of hope he gets shot.

[Clay Fink]

Just sending Geraldo almost raises the whole thing to the level of farce - that is only if people were not getting killed.

If he was broadcasting troop movements, isn't that illegal or something?

[patricia]

Originally posted by Tanager
Personally, while I think reporting troop movements while in Iraq is pretty shitty, I think Geraldo's getting kicked out is kind of funny. I don't why anyone keeps hiring that clown...maybe the networks kind of hope he gets shot.

I don't think that the networks want Geraldo to get shot, but there is a segment of the country which seems to want a tabloid oriented slant. I believe that Geraldo will always be looking for that "big scoop" as evidenced by his Al Capone's vault disaster.
He's looking for legitimacy and, sadly, if he doesn't change his attitude, he could be working at a 7/ 11. I understand he has a law degree. Maybe he'll go into personal injury law.

[Monte Smith]

Haven't heard confirmation on Geraldo getting escorted out, but the Arnett flap is appalling. A reporter can have his opinions, but those should really not be expressed in an interview on Iraqi state TV. (Journalism 101). He gave encouragement to the enemy by suggesting that the American war plan had "failed," and that encouragement is only going to lead to greater resistence by Iraqi irregulars and fedayeen and less of a willingness for Iraqis themselves to face down the dying regime. Thanks, Peter. We call that aid and comfort.

I don't think Riveria's reporting was malevolent. Just a mistake.

[Clay Fink]

What's the difference if Iraqis hear it on Iraqi TV if it's more or less the truth? I've heard the same talk in the US media all weekend and I'm sure a lot of Iraqis (including the ones shooting at our troops) have too.

At any rate, I wonder how many Iraqis are as suspicious of their own official media as we are of ours?

[Tanager]

Originally posted by Monte Smith
I don't think Riveria's reporting was malevolent. Just a mistake.

I'd agree, but it's a pretty egregious mistake, nonetheless. He's pretty lucky he didn't get left in the desert with a single canteen.

I won't comment on Arnett, b/c I am not at all aware of any more details than the story gives, and I am entirely unfamiliar with most journalism ethics guidelines. I just figured folks here would find it interesting and good fodder for discussion.

Lemme say again: Geraldo is a clueless clown.

"What's the difference if Iraqis hear it on Iraqi TV if it's more or less the truth? I've heard the same talk in the US media all weekend and I'm sure a lot of Iraqis (including the ones shooting at our troops) have too." - Clay Fink


There is no difference. Thats the problem with all these liberal networks who have decided that since the war itslf has slowed and there are no longer compelling pictures to show the salivating tv audience, this war has officially become a bother to them. So when they(and it should be noted here that THEY, the media, were always the ones trumpeting how short this war was going to be, and not President Bush as it has eroneously been pointed out by others)saw that nothing they had predicted and shoved down the throats of the American public were coming to full fruition, they decided to do their own bit of damage control and start quietly badmouthing a war that they so gloriously heralded when it first started.

Damage control? Surely not, right? From Newsmax.com. Read on McDuff:



15 Stories the Embedded Journos Got Wrong

Editor & Publisher's Greg Mitchell reports that "the war is only a week old and already the media has gotten at least 15 stories wrong or misreported a sliver of fact into a major event."

Hey, wait a minute. Weren't all of those embedded journalists suppose to give us the "real" story of the war – without censorship and spin?

Here's Mitchell's list of stories the major media, well, simply got wrong:


Saddam may well have been killed in the first night's surprise attack (March 20).

Even if he wasn't killed, Iraqi command and control was no doubt "decapitated" (March 22).

Umm Qasr has been taken (March 22).

Most Iraqi soldiers will not fight for Saddam and instead are surrendering in droves (March 22).

Iraqi citizens are greeting Americans as liberators (March 22).

An entire division of 8,000 Iraqi soldiers surrendered en masse near Basra (March 23).

Several Scud missiles, banned weapons, have been launched against U.S. forces in Kuwait (March 23).

Saddam's Fedayeen militia are few in number and do not pose a serious threat (March 23).

Basra has been taken (March 23).

Umm Qasr has been taken (March 23).

A captured chemical plant likely produced chemical weapons (March 23).

Nasiriya has been taken (March 23).

Umm Qasr has been taken (March 24).

The Iraqi government faces a "major rebellion" of anti-Saddam citizens in Basra (March 24).

A convoy of 1,000 Iraqi vehicles and Republican Guards are speeding south from Baghdad to engage U.S. troops (March 25).



And I actually witnessed Peter Arnett's 'commentary' that first day when our forces heavily bombed the capital. Did anybody else here this? That sick sadistic bastard thought he was off mic and was laughing and saying how great all of this was!! YAHOO!!! I'm for this war, but there's nothing funny about it. And when he was busted doing this, ultralib Brian Williams covered for him by saying that 'in all fairness, Peter doesn't know we can hear him right now'. Great, well, can't fault ole Pete for that now can we? Both of those dipshits should have been fired on the spot!

[Monte Smith]

Hearing an Iraqi government figure proclaim that the American war plan has failed is one thing--and would probably be met with appropriate scepticism. Hearing a world-famous Western journalist say the same thing? Priceless--if you are the Iraqi Ministry of Information. Arnett crossed a line.

I have no problem with Geraldo. He's got an outsized ego, it's true, but I do like the way he refers to America's enemies as "bastards" (as he did in Tora Bora). He's fair and balanced. Yuk yuk.

[clinthopson]

This morning CNN rebroadcast Arnett's weasely apology which appeard on the Today show. What a yutz!

Christiane Amanpour kicks everybody else's butt.

[Ron Thorne]

Rivera kicked out of Iraq

Tuesday 1 April 2003, 6:30 AM

Celebrity television journalist Geraldo Rivera, who has been on assignment covering the US-led war in Iraq, has been told by US military officials that he is no longer welcome to accompany US troops there.

"I can confirm that it has been done," said military spokesman Navy Lieutenant Commander Charles Owens today, contacted at Central Command headquarters in Qatar.

Owens said Rivera, a star of the Fox News television network, was not embedded with troops, but had been "asked to leave the unit he was with."

Military officials were short on details about reasons for Rivera's dismissal, but according to US news reports, Rivera was told to leave Iraq after an on-air appearance during which he drew a map in the sand revealing information about US troop locations.

Military officials would not confirm the reason for the move however.

"We're suggesting that people call Fox News to get details," Owens said today.

Officials at the network did not return phone calls for comment.

Rivera, a fixture on the US media scene for decades, is a veteran foreign correspondent who has received some of television's highest honours, including the prestigious George Foster Peabody Award and several Emmy awards, given for excellence in television reporting.

He has become best known in recent years however for tabloid fodder, particularly during a stint several years ago as host of the prime-time "Rivera Live" talk show, when he catapulted to national celebrity for his coverage of the OJ Simpson trials.

©2003 AFP

[Monte Smith]

Actually, I think that guy chucked out of Iraq was one of Geraldo's body doubles.

[Uli]

Originally posted by Monte Smith
Arnett crossed a line.

Shudder. You're gettin mighty touchy in your old days, Monte.

[Monte Smith]

I must be getting soft, Uli.

But this is rich. This is from the current issue of TV Guide, according to AP:


--Arnett said he felt he had found redemption reporting on the current war.

"I was furious with Ted Turner and (then-CNN chairman) Tom Johnson when they threw me to the wolves after I made them billions risking my life to cover the first Gulf War," Arnett told TV Guide. "Now (Turner and Johnson) are gone, the Iraqis have thrown the CNN crew out of Baghdad, and I'm still here," he said. "Any satisfaction in that? Ha, ha, ha, ha."

He said the Iraqis allowed him to stay in Baghdad because they respect him and "see me as a fellow warrior."--





Ha, ha, ha, ha, indeed. Looks like Arnett is enjoying that popular hot cup of shut the fuck up.

[Al in NYC]

I don't like Arnett at all as a reporter, and CNN fired him because his ego was clearly running amok, but am I the only one here who sees a little problem with a reporter getting fired for telling the truth as he sees it?

Whatever you think of Arnett, the comment from the MSNBC president about patriotism shows just how it has trumped objectivity for our news media in this conflict. Some "liberal" media huh??

[Monte Smith]

"Am I the only one here who sees a little problem with a reporter getting fired for telling the truth as he sees it?"

Nope, Al. But that's not the issue here. Arnett wasn't opining on the pages of the NYT or in his own free and open broadcast. He was propagandizing against the United States on Iraqi state media, saying the US army plan was failing and detailing how broadcasts could be used effectively to encourage anti-war protests in the West. Basically, he was strategizing for Saddam.

See a line anywhere between that kind of "free speech" and responsible journalism?

Of course you must. Its unworthy of an argument.

[Al in NYC]

FWIW I've always found Arnett to be a bit dim, and I hardly think that this was a real bright career move. One does have to wonder why the hell he did it.

But the question remains: does the venue in which one says the truth matter, or is the truth the truth, no matter where you say it? And, if the answer is the latter, then how can an organization that claims objectivity, as I presume NBC News does, fire someone for saying the truth?

[Tanager]

Arnett might well have been exercising his right to free speech. Noone has argued that what he did was illegal, as far as I know. And I'd disagree with anyone who did.

Having said that, employees of a commercial entity can and often do have limits placed on what they can say in public when representing that entity, and I think it can be reasonably argued that Arnett was "representing" his employer when he appeared on a news broadcast, since it was his status as an NBC reporter that got him on that broadcast.

[Salvador Dali Lama]

Arnett is a great big pussy.

Did you see him on TV today kissing ass up to NBC? what bullshit!! if I was in his position, I would be telling NBC to get fucked.

So now he's sans job AND dignity.

But being a bitch-made reporter for NBC, he probably didnt have much dignity to begin with.

what a hump.

[Uli]

Illegal how? He just gave an interview and did not say anything that one can't hear on cnn.


"He was propagandizing against the United States on Iraqi state media, saying the US army plan was failing and detailing how broadcasts could be used effectively to encourage anti-war protests in the West. Basically, he was strategizing for Saddam."


Woohahaha!

[Tanager]

Originally posted by Uli
Illegal how? He just gave an interview and did not say anything that one can't hear on cnn.

Uli, to whom were you replying?

[Uli]

Originally posted by Tanager
Uli, to whom were you replying?

I was replying toyou because you sed what he did was illegal as far as you know.

[Tanager]

Originally posted by Tanager
Noone has argued that what he did was illegal, as far as I know. And I'd disagree with anyone who did.

Uli, reread. I think it's pretty clear I was arguing that it was not illegal. I'm a little surprised at you.

[Ron Thorne]

Even if every executive at National Geographic and NBC news also felt that Peter Arnett was speaking the "truth", they still probably have justifiable reasons for firing him. He wasn't on their payrolls to extoll his opinions about U.S. war plans, and grant interviews with the government-run broadcast arm of a current enemy.

I don't think for one moment that he was fired for telling the "truth". I think he was fired for not being a professional journalist in his current setting. Imagine a network trying to explain why Arnett was still on-the-air after this story broke.

Arnett has always struck me as a bit of a dim bulb and off-center weirdo with far too high an opinion of himself. I well remember Peter Arnett and Bernard Shaw broadcasting from their hotel in Bagdad in 1991 when they both sounded like they were "in their cups" on several occasions. I think this recent situation is a painful example of Arnett's out-of-control ego biting his ass and pocketbook simultaneously.

[Monte Smith]

Where and how you "speak the truth" has no bearing? Then I guess embedded reporters SHOULD be able to give detailed information about troop movements, readiness, capabilities, and logistics. Why not? If its the truth.

Not that Arnett did that.

Arnett allowed himself to be used by the Saddam regime to get the message to those who would resist Saddam that the Americans were failing (false) and that they are scrambling to come up with a plan B in the face or overwelming Iraqi resistence (false). Arnett also volunteered that reports on civilian casualties can be used to help anti-war forces abroad "formulate their arguments." In other words, Peter Arnett is saying to Saddam Hussein, "Here is how I am prepared to help you."

It goes without saying that none of this is journalism. Peter Arnett has no business cosying up to the Baath regime by appearing on official Iraqi media. I guess you can accept the "truth" of his bullshit, but you might also note that making his commentary available to the Iraqi machine at this time in that medium helps the regime discourage civilian uprising and encourages what resistence there is to keep fighting. It also encourages the putting of civilians in harm's way as a strategy to aid anti-war forces "formulate their arguments."

Disgraceful.

[Uli]

Originally posted by Tanager
Uli, reread. I think it's pretty clear I was arguing that it was not illegal. I'm a little surprised at you.

Sorry, I indeed read something completely different. Must have been the gin (with coconut water mmmmh).

"Where and how you "speak the truth" has no bearing? Then I guess embedded reporters SHOULD be able to give detailed information about troop movements, readiness, capabilities, and logistics. Why not? If its the truth."

That's a completely different issue. They may know things like detailed troop movements that are secret.

"This being wartime, however, maybe there are concerns over and above a casual celebration of self-expression. Arnett allowed himself to be used by the Saddam regime to get the message to those who would resist Saddam that the Americans were failing (false), that they are scrambling to come up with a plan B in the face or overwelming Iraqi resistence (false), and that reports by Arnett on civilian casualties can be used to help anti-war forces "formulate their arguments." In other words, Peter Arnett is saying to Saddam Hussein, "Here is how I am prepared to help you.""

If it was all false, he should be celebrated as a patriotic hero for setting traps for Saddam.

[Tanager]

Monte, I know I challenge your opinions at my own peril, but I disagree that what he did amounted to any sort of aiding and abetting. He worked for a large US-based corporation, and, as Ron rightly notes (and I noted in my earlier post), corporations are fully within their rights in restricting what their employees may say when acting as representatives of those corporations. Arnett shot his mouth off and got his just desserts.

But I think that to argue that he somehow entered the fray and used his bully pulpit to help out the Iraqis/Saddam is a bit tenuous. Obviously, you're going to disagree.

[Tanager]

Originally posted by Uli
Sorry, I indeed read something completely different. Must have been the gin (with coconut water mmmmh).

No sweat. I do, however, have to take issue with your choice of drinks - I cannot abide the taste of gin. (Of course, I'm a total wuss when it comes to booze, I can't take anything stronger than wine.)

[Monte Smith]

I do disagree, Tanager, for the reasons I think I have spelled out above. Being an interviewee, not an interviewer, on Iraqi state media means that Arnett's reputation is going to be used by the Saddam regime to bolster their case. His reputation as a world famous journalist is going to be applied to Baath aims--survival. Nevermind that from his stationary position in a Baghdad hotel room, Arnett knows about as much about what is happening in the Iraqi desert as you and I do.

His comment that his broadcasts can be used to formulate anti-war arguments show his committment to journalism.

Did he do anything illegal? He won't be prosecuted for anything, that I know.

[Ron Thorne]

It was just reported moments ago on the Wolf Blitzer Network (CNN) that Peter Arnett has been hired by the London-based tabloid The Mirror to be their Bagdad correspondent.

It was also reported that Geraldo may not have been kicked out of Iraq afterall, but Central Command said they had more important things to tend to than answer questions concerning this. DUH!

Stay tuned.