Cutting the Biased Some Slack

Let’s say you want to get a quick shapshot of what folks in Arab countries think of America nearly five years after 9/11? Who might you ask to get a relatively accurate or objective view?

Why don’t we see who David Ignatius asked?

DOHA, Qatar — What do people in the Middle East think five years after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks? To get a quick snapshot, I paid a visit here to Ahmed Sheikh, the editor in chief of al-Jazeera television. It was reassuring, in a perverse way, that he views the situation in his region the same way that most Americans would — as a dangerous mess.

Well, of course he would head down to Al Jazeera. I”m fairly sure that it didn’t much occur to Ignatius that he might not get an objective answer there, because Sheikh and Ignatius are working off exactly the same page on this one and it’s the story that Al-Jazeera and the MSM have been feeding the world for at least the past three years. It’s all good. Same team and all, right?

Oh, I don’t mean the team that’s trying to help a few million folks live in freedom and peace. I’m talking about the World Journalist Team that takes no sides and cuts everything right down the middle.

Yeah, that team.

It’s interesting to me that Ignatius cuts Sheikh such slack for his network’s biased and frequently anti-American and pro-Islamist coverage. I’m sure that covering the news when you’re surrounded by decapitating child-bombing savages is a challenge. That doesn’t excuse you from reporting the news fairly and it certainly doesn’t excuse Ignatius from insisting that Sheikh at least make a game attempt at objectivity.

Speaking of teams and all, I wonder if he asked Sheikh if he had heard anything at all about Steve Centanni and Olaf Wiig, kidnapped over ten days ago>. I wonder if he’d ask Sheikh if Al Jazeera has covered the story even a little. I think those answers would be interesting to read.

Because journalists are on the same team, right?