Downing Street Memo: Time To Deluge WashPost's Gettler With Praise

[althecat]

TO: [e-mail]

Dear Michael,

I figure your inbox is probably now full of glowing reports of your insight and wisdom. So let me add mine....

Your latest column was as fine an example of an honest reflection on a media failure as I have ever seen, and I commend you for it.

regards
Alastair Thompson
Editor
Scoop.co.nz


****


http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/05/14/AR2005051400705.html

News Over There, but Not Here

By Michael Getler

Sunday, May 15, 2005; Page B06

My e-mail in-box was once again inundated last week by write-in campaigns provoked by two self-described media watchdog organizations, both on the liberal side of things. The first critic out of its box and into mine is called Media Matters for America. The second one was FAIR (Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting), an organization that I wrote about last month.

....

I've said in earlier columns that I don't like massive e-mail campaigns. But I've always made clear that the points these challenges raise can often be legitimate, and that's the case here. I don't know how to say this without seeming defensive, but I do think the case against the paper is a lot stronger than the case against me.

....

How significant this memo may turn out to be is still to be determined. But the reaction to the failure to cover it, even with the hyperbole and worst assumptions about journalistic motives by some of the e-mailers, is understandable. It is a reminder of how powerfully the circumstances leading up to this war still reverberate within a sizable chunk of the population and why the press should not let go of any loose ends that may shed light on how this happened.

[slor]

1. I hate to give praise...

for some shit they should be doing anyway, but I will send a thanks...because you asked. But seriously, they need to do this for the damn good of the country, and what is left of its' credibility!

[DeepModem Mom]

2. I'm afraid I posted the article with a negative note...

about his dissing of e-mailers. You're quite right, though -- he made his point, and it's an important one.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=3660529&mesg_id=3660529

[althecat]

3. He is fairly subtle in his directness.. but he definitely takes our side

... and that is rather significant. Would be much easier for him to fudge it...

[BurtWorm]

4. Must read!

:kick:

[understandinglife]

5. Happy to thank him for doing his job, especially since he is one of the ..

.... very few corporate media types even trying.

Peace.


www.missionnotaccomplished.us

[understandinglife]

7. My email:

Good evening Michael,

Just want to acknowledge you because you are one of the very few corporate media journalist actually doing their job and reporting on the significant revelations of the leaked, classified "Blair-Bush" July 2002 memo.

Those words, covered exhaustively in a variety of blogs within hours of the release of the memo, "the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy," have such obvious implications that it should not be much of a challenge to bring all the jinvestigative journalistic scrutiny they deserve -- to the service of our Constitution, our fellow citizens who are dying needlessly in an illegal war, and to the countless number of innocent Iraqi's who suffer ever more because of America's illegal occupation of their sovereign nation.

Much more work to do.

Hope you win a Pulitzer, or two, for exposing to the masses what some of us already know.

It already is a story that should be covered not on page A18 or B06 of the WP, but on the front page, with aggressive, regular follow-up. Why don't you start tomorrow with a bold-faced headline: "the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy."

All the best,
xxxxxxxxx


www.missionnotaccomplished.us -

[laura888]

8. Bingo!

My request exactly! I'm emailing him now!

[CantGetFooledAgain]

16. Very good...

...took the words right out of my mouth. Great letter.

[steve2470]

6. emailed him, done nt

[annabanana]

9. Great!

I wrote and thanked him for a much needed first step.

[Robbien]

10. You are right. Email sent

And I pointed out in my email of thanks that this omission by corporate media allows Rice to get away with saying what she said about us not starting the fight.

[Melissa G]

11. called and left a compliment! n/t

[bleever]

12. kick

[Jade Fox]

13. email sent n/t

[vince3]

14. I just emailed him....

...and thanked him for his honest assessment. My last line was "now about these voting machines and these crooked elections...."

[oxbow]

15. Done

Just wanted to commend you for your comments about the Downing street memo today. You know, about 50% of the American people believe that we were either lied to or misled in the runup to the Iraq war. This is a sizeable portion of the public that was waiting for just such a leak to surface, and I suspect that many of them still don't know about this memo even. Of course, there is blame to go around for American's ignorance of what's happening elsewhere in the world, but I digress.

Perhaps your paper would be interested in interviewing one of those 89 Congressmen who have signed a letter to President Bush demanding some answers about this? It would do a lot towards getting your paper back on the good side of all those angry emailers, and I do think it's time for the next level of inquiry on this story. Why is it that the downing street memo directly contradicts the findings of the Presidential commision which looked at the intelligence used to justify the war, for instance? There are lots of unanswered questions here, and we in the public would really like to know more about this.

[althecat]

17. kick....