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In 2004, Micah Garen was filming a documentary in Iraq when he was kidnapped by a Shi’ite terrorist group. The kidnappers released videos of Garen, threatening to kill him within 48 hours if the U.S. did not meet their demands. Garen talks about what it’s like when the press does report on your abduction, and discusses whether the media have two sets of ethics: one for their own, and one for everyone else.
It seemed to me that you were disrespectful of Micah Garen and insensitive to the life-threatening experience he survived when you posed a question referring to him as second-string in contrast to the NY Times reporter who was also kidnapped. I thought Garen was admirable to remain dignified and honest in his answers, especially in rising above the trap you set when he noted that news is supressed all the time -- and it has little to do with whether the subject is first- or second-string. If you think you're being clever, think again.
Have to second that motion, Bob, and the summary above continues the false implication that your interview subject, Mr. Garan, agreed with your insinuation.
Not only is news editing a difficult balancing act (ask Winston Smith circa 1984), it is an art not a science, especially with opponents we insist on viewing as inscrutable (sounds familiar, somehow). For myself, I view the complex cultural differences fascinating and have so since a small child when I began to examine my father's cigarette packages; Camel unfiltered, which I still smoke. (I know!)
Turkish and domestic tobacco, scenes first of the Egyptian desert with a camel, hence the name, two pyramids, and an oasis, then wrapped around with Muslim style architectural flourishes to a city clearly designed to facilitate the call to prayer. Long before my cousin went to Iran to design Pavlavi's island resort city off the coast, I had been considering the interrelationship of these worlds which have had repeated conflicts.
Needed negotiating strategies are unpredictable and must be flexible, though not necessarily inscrutable.
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