[PAA-Discuss] FW: UPDATE: NYT's Iran Missiles Walkback

[Lee Loe]

Shame on the NYT! Lee

  _____  

From: FAIR [mailto:fair at fair.org] 
Sent: Friday, December 03, 2010 1:33 PM
To: leeloe at igc.org
Subject: UPDATE: NYT's Iran Missiles Walkback



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Activism Update

NYT's Iran Missiles Walkback
Paper discovers reasons for skepticism

12/3/10

Certain editions of the New York Times (12/3/10
<http://salsa.democracyinaction.org/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=89PerUDULh1LHIowARKf
Y4p%2Bair57A6O> ) published today an update to its reporting on Iranian
weapons with a much more skeptical tone than its original article.

The first article (11/29/10), headlined "Iran Fortifies Its Missilies With
the Aid of North Korea," presented the case in definitive terms: Iran now
possesses powerful missiles with "the capacity to strike at capitals in
Western Europe." As a FAIR Action Alert noted (12/1/10
<http://salsa.democracyinaction.org/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=BK3LWUJZgxBBFQqGUxYz
hop%2Bair57A6O> ), the evidence to back this up was thin. 

And the paper decided, "at the request of the Obama administration," not to
publish the WikiLeaks cable that was the basis of the report. The cable was
posted by WikiLeaks, though, which gave enterprising readers a chance to see
the actual ambiguity of the evidence for themselves. 

The Washington Post produced a December 1 story that cast considerable doubt
on the U.S. allegations, pointing out that the evidence U.S. officials cited
in the cable amounted to a German newspaper article that did not corroborate
the U.S. claims. 

So today's Times report, "Wider Window Into Iran's Missile Capabilities
Offers a Murkier View," represents a significant climbdown--and a
disingenuous one at that. The piece calls the Iran allegations "one of the
most provocative assertions to emerge from the WikiLeaks cache," before
acknowledging that "a review of a dozen other State Department cables made
available by WikiLeaks and interviews with American government officials
offer a murkier picture of Iran's missile capabilities." 

The Times today suggests that the cables "can be glimpses of the American
government's views, sometimes reflecting only part of the story, rather than
concrete assertions of fact." But as FAIR and others have pointed out, the
original cable in question would seem to have provided plenty of reasons to
be skeptical. And it's unclear why the Times would discover only today that
U.S. government claims are just that, and not "concrete assertions of fact."


Today's report includes perspectives from various government experts and
outside analysts, who offer differing views on the alleged missiles. Their
conclusions vary, but what is abundantly clear is that the Times' original
report was fundamentally flawed, and it led many other outlets to treat this
new Iranian threat as a fact. Charlie Rose on November 30, for example,
stated: "Iran, the cables reveal, has obtained from North Korea 19 advanced
missiles capable of striking cities in Western Europe." 

The New York Times owes its readers, and the rest of the media, an editor's
note or correction acknowledging and explaining the problems with their
November 29 report. Readers who wish to make this case should contact Times
public editor Arthur Brisbane (public at nytimes.com). 


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