Howard Kurtz weighs in again today on the story that a soldier in Iraq who wrote a series of articles about his deployment for The New Republic was making things up. Kurtz says that Pvt. Scott Beauchamp’s “writing was challenged by The Weekly Standard and conservative bloggers after he wrote vividly, and profanely, of soldiers mocking a woman disfigured by an injury, getting their kicks by running over dogs with Bradley Fighting Vehicles, and playing with Iraqi children’s skulls taken from a mass grave.”
The idea that Beauchamp claimed to find a “mass grave” has gotten a lot of traction, and leaving aside whether or not his story is true, choosing those two words twists what he actually wrote. For a refresher, lets look at how Beauchamp phrased it in his piece:
We spent a few weeks constructing a combat outpost, and, in the process, we did a lot of digging. At first, we found only household objects like silverware and cups. Then we dug deeper and found children’s clothes: sandals, sweatpants, sweaters. Like a strange archeological dig of the recent past, the deeper we went, the more personal the objects we discovered. And, eventually, we reached the bones. All children’s bones: tiny cracked tibias and shoulder blades. We found pieces of hands and fingers. We found skull fragments. No one cared to speculate what, exactly, had happened here, but it was clearly a Saddam-era dumping ground of some sort.
It might seem nitpicky to argue over one phrase, but putting words in someone’s mouth—especially when those words are written down—is lazy. What’s more, anecdotal evidence (which should be taken with a large grain of salt) shows that maybe there was indeed an unmarked children’s cemetery near the base. Someone writing in to the Weekly Standard blog claiming to be a soldier at FOB Falcon “who asked that his name be withheld” writes that “I recall the child cemetery that was uncovered in our sector while constructing a Combat Outpost.”
Does this small point move the debate forward? Not really. But language matters, and if we can’t rely on press critics to get it right, then we’re all in trouble.
More Liberal Hackery From Paul McLeary
What we have here is a UNCORROBORATED claim from a LIBERAL ACTIVIST who has publicly announced his ANTI-WAR position and who (as Mr. McLeary refuses to acknowledge) is either MARRIED or soon to be MARRIED to an editor at the LIBERAL MSM MOUTHPIECE who published his silly claims which are now UNDER INVESTIGATION by both the military and The New Rupublic...
Any honest "watchdog" of "professional journalism" should be afire with skepticism over the utter silliness of this moonbat's claims... And also hopping all over The New Rupublic for publishing such single-sourced silliness as "news" without checking the facts...
Yet, Mr. McLeary has dumped THREE defensive articles here, nearly tripping over himself to shield the liberal nutjob and his MSM handlers from scrutiny...
NOTE TO MR. MCLEARY.....
Why don't you look out for the integrity of your profession instead of parroting liberal nonsense?....
HUH?...
It's your job, after all....
Posted by padikiller
on Fri 27 Jul 2007 at 05:55 PM
Another “small point” for McCleary, far from reinforcing Beauchamp's BS stories, the "soldier at FOB Falcon" completely debunks Beauchamp's "fun with kiddies skulls" story:
Second: There was a children's cemetery unearthed while constructing a Combat Outpost (COP) in the farm land south of Baghdad International Airport. It was not a mass grave. It was not the result of some inhumane genocide. It was an unmarked commentary where the locals had buried children some years back. There are many such unmarked cemeteries in and around Baghdad. The remains unearthed that day were transported to another location and reburied. While I was not there personally, and can not confirm or deny and actions taken by Soldiers that day, I can tell you that no Soldier put a human skull under his helmet and wore it around. The Army Combat Helmet (ACH) is form fitted to the head. Unlike the old Kevlar helmets, the ACH does not have a gap between the helmet and the liner, only pads. It would have been impossible for him to have placed and human skull, of any size, between his helmet and his head. Further more, no leader would have tolerated this type of behavior. This type of behavior is strictly forbidden in the U.S. Army and would have made the individual involved subject to UCMJ actions.
Perhaps you should follow your own advice McCleary: "putting words in someone's mouth--especially when those words are written down--is lazy". but as the standard bearer for journalism excellence and ethics, I guess you all at the CJR get to play by a different set of rules.
Posted by TDC
on Mon 30 Jul 2007 at 11:23 AM