Eliminate All The Witnesses

London, England
51° 32' North; 0° 27' West

Real journalists hold people accountable for their statements and their actions.

Which is what Naomi Klein did when she responded to the acting US Ambassador to Britain, David Johnson today in the Guardian.

Johnson, through a quisling (his faux Boswell?), had earlier taken Klein to task for having the temerity to suggest that US Forces and the ING had been eliminating civilians in Fallujah.

Klein came back with this, and more:

"US authorities have denied that hundreds of civilians were killed during last April's siege, and have lashed out at the sources of these reports. For instance, an unnamed "senior American officer", speaking to the New York Times last month, labelled Falluja general hospital "a centre of propaganda". But the strongest words were reserved for Arab TV networks. When asked about al-Jazeera and al-Arabiya's reports that hundreds of civilians had been killed in Falluja, Donald Rumsfeld, the US secretary of defence, replied that "what al-Jazeera is doing is vicious, inaccurate and inexcusable ... " Last month, US troops once again laid siege to Falluja - but this time the attack included a new tactic: eliminating the doctors, journalists and clerics who focused public attention on civilian casualties last time around."

Wonder if the good Mr. Johnson even knows that the remains of his former reputation have just been eviscerated.