Count on The New York Times to add Fuel to the Fire

What the editors of The New York Times are trying to accomplish, I wonder. I know they hide behind the "free press" angle to basically state they have the right to publish "all the news that's fit to print." I agree they have that right. We are America and our country is built upon such right. However, I question their motives. How they choose to handle their recent coverage of the Hussein execution is a perfect example.

Saddam Hussein is acknowleged as one of the greatest mass murderers of the 20th century. He was captured by the United States military after a decade of breaking UN sanctions and expelling UN inspectors from keeping track of his WMD programs. At the time the entire world believed him to be deeply involved in trying to develop nuclear weapons. He attacked neighbor's twice starting two regional wars and used chemical weapons on his own people. He was tried, convicted and executed by a democratically elected Iraqi government that sentenced him to death and carried it out. None of these facts are in dispute.

Now the "Arab Street" is once again enraged. What else is new. They were enraged this year over a Danish filmmaker; an Indian writer; cartoons in a newspaper; and comments by the Pope among a dozen other events. What concerns me is that rather than publish stories focusing on the exceptional achievements and potential positive directions that can result from them, our NYT again decides to focus on a negative. It always appears to be their intention to reinforce any negative strain they can on the issues of the Iraq War.

I find their choice of focus to be negative by design and serves no purpose to help this country in a time of war. I completely agree with a free press. However, this is purely biased reporting with an agenda attached.

Images of Hanging Make Hussein a Martyr to Many

By HASSAN M. FATTAH
Published: January 6, 2007

BEIRUT, Lebanon, Jan. 5 — In the week since Saddam Hussein was hanged in an execution steeped in sectarian overtones, his public image in the Arab world, formerly that of a convicted dictator, has undergone a resurgence of admiration and awe.

On the streets, in newspapers and over the Internet, Mr. Hussein has emerged as a Sunni Arab hero who stood calm and composed as his Shiite executioners tormented and abused him.

“No one will ever forget the way in which Saddam was executed,” President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt remarked in an interview with the Israeli newspaper Yediot Aharonot published Friday and distributed by the official Egyptian news agency. “They turned him into a martyr.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/06/world/middleeast/06arabs.html?hp&ex=1168146000&en=c2e8e35861a46754&ei=5094&partner=homepage