Iran Dictates Media Selections to the UN
Ahmadinejad may speak at the UN and say anything he damn well pleases, but not everyone's allowed to listen.
The Media Accreditation and Liaison Unit desk at the United Nations, dispensing with any ambiguity and taking orders directly from the Iranian delegation, forcibly evicted a Jerusalem Post reporter and another journalist who had the temerity to attempt to hear Ahmadinejad's post-General Assembly-harangue press conference.
“We have every right to stay,” Dave said. “This is the United Nations. This is America.”
But this isn’t really America, I thought, as the thuggy guy, hands on his hips, breathed heavily in my face.
This is not America. This is the basement of a multinational complex, where a staggeringly high level of deference is being paid to the whims and fancies of a man being protested against by hundreds outside. This is a place where the regular rules don’t matter, and where regulations and standards are easily trumped by fear and cowardice. This is an underworld.
The woman came over. “I’m sorry,” she said to me. “They know who you are, and you have to leave.”
That’s the problem, I thought as I was escorted out. We all know who we are. We just don’t agree on who has to leave.
- Comment (10)
- · Quote
- · UnfollowFollow (2)
Comments :
Re: Iran Dictates Media Selections to the UN
Am I alone in hoping for the day when this motley body of thugs, autocrats, and misfits relocated to, say, Tehran?
Jun '10
Re: Iran Dictates Media Selections to the UN
In the end, only other journalists, as a group, can protect real freedom of the press. Otherwise, the freedom to ask hard questions will just flow away quietly, drip by drip. Openness is never the natural order.
Jul '10
Re: Iran Dictates Media Selections to the UN
The U.S. out of the U.N., the U.N. out of the U.S.
Back in my liberal days, I used to give those bumperstickers a scornful smile. Stupid Birchers, I thought.
What a young fool.
May '10
Re: Iran Dictates Media Selections to the UN
We're wasting our moment as the world's sole superpower. Instead, we defer to an institution whose purpose is to dilute our strength and allow nations who are antithetical to our values to punch above their weight.
Nuts.
Jun '10
Re: Iran Dictates Media Selections to the UN
Does anyone know of anything that the UN has done lately that could not have been done, or more like should have been done, by an ad hoc collection of interested nations acting in concert. It is long past time to dismantle the UN, especially when viewed through the prism of value per US dollar spent. These hypocrites don't even pay their City of New York parking tickets. I still bristle at the fact that this supercilious Iranian popinjay struts and frets his hour upon the world stage only because Jimmy Carter didn't have the guts to invite Khomeini to play pick a city back in the day. Had Carter dispatched a carrier group or two accompanied by some boomers into the Persian gulf, this dog squat wouldn’t even be an afterthought.
Edited on Sep 26, 2010 at 8:44amMay '10
Re: Iran Dictates Media Selections to the UN
I agree, Cas. Dismantle the U.N. or at least let some other country host the farce.
Jul '10
Re: Iran Dictates Media Selections to the UN
etoiledunord: In the end, only other journalists, as a group, can protect real freedom of the press.
Absolutely, but how likely? Journalists, particularly those covering the Middle East, have been complicit in the media manipulation by rogue regimes for some time now. Through intimidation, ideology, or just concern about keeping their bureaus open, they've been providing uncritical, distorted pictures of their host countries; the more brutal the regime, the more cowardly the reporting . It was only after the fall of Saddam Hussein, e.g., that CNN admitted how skewed its coverage of Iraq had been. And when did we last read about human rights abuses, corruption, in-fighting among various Palestinian factions?
The incident at the UN is shameful but not surprising.
May '10
Re: Iran Dictates Media Selections to the UN
So Al Jazeera, The Guardian, The NY Times, Star Tribune, CNN, NBC, all walked out of that interview in protest at this outrage? Don't bother, I know the answer.
I am sure if Julius Streicher was still alive, he would still be allowed in with the A'Jad for a one-on-one interview.
Edited on Sep 26, 2010 at 11:10amJul '10
Re: Iran Dictates Media Selections to the UN
Why is the UN still in New York? Can someone please tell me why?
Aug '10
Re: Iran Dictates Media Selections to the UN
Regaining sanity concerning what must happen between the US and the UN will have to come from this and many fora like it raising the issue over and over again. It will have to happen at the idea level first: what the lefties mean when they enjoin the occupants of the car behind theirs to "Envision Blah Blah..." Well, we can do some serious "envisioning" of our own with out the sanctimonious bumper stickers. As Your Grace noted, the John Birch Society carried this torch heroically for decades (I am not, nor have I ever been, a member of JBS, b.t.w.). We need to mainstream this sentiment especially as the evidence rapidly accumulates before a public whose attention now has become engaged. UNvision UN! Okay, okay…give me credit for trying.