Oreilly article on media
, February 25, 2005
By Bill O'Reilly
Hi, I'm Bill O'Reilly, reporting from Los Angeles. Thanks for watching tonight.
CBS News says a Fallujah Marine will not be formally charged, but charges have been leveled against a Muslim American who the government says wanted to kill President Bush. And that is the subject of this evening's "Talking Points Memo."
You remember this tape a corporal in the Marines shooting a wounded Iraqi combatant in a Fallujah mosque. Some human rights groups immediately condemned the Marine. The elite media pretty much ignored him. But ?The Factor? said the shooting appeared justified.
Now I formed my opinion after seeing the tape and hearing the Marine yell out "he's blanking faking." And our investigation showed that other members of his squad have backed him up. They all felt threatened.
Now "Talking Points" is happy this young Marine reportedly will not be court martialed, although he still might be punished by the [Marine] Corps. I believe soldiers in combat must be given the benefit of the doubt. And there was plenty of doubt in this case. The U.S. military must be allowed to fight the war on terror without second guessing by anti-war people.
Oversight's necessary. We all know that. But so is the benefit of the doubt.
Compare that situation to Abu Ali (search), a 25-year-old Virginia man who the FBI believes was working with Al Qaeda and who is now charged with conspiring to kill President Bush.
Ali was arrested in Saudi Arabia. He says he was tortured there. And his case is engendering some sympathy. So let's put this in perspective. The young Marine ? pretty much ignored by the elite media. But Abu Ali gets editorials today in The Washington Post and The New York Times.
The Times says, "What we can say now is that [Ali's] case seems to be another demonstration of what has gone wrong in the federal war on terror."
So what we have now is the benefit of the doubt for Ali and silence for the Marine. This, ladies and gentlemen, is why I believe the American print press has lost perspective.
Let's look at this at Ali guy for a minute. He attended a militant Islamic school in Alexandria, Virginia. He then went to Saudi Arabia to study. FBI agent Tim Saubcheck (search) has testified under oath that Ali has participated in jihad training. A search of Ali's home found documents praising the 9/11 attacks and audiotapes in Arabic promoting violent jihad and the killing of Jews.
Now I'm not going convict this Abu Ali on ?The Factor?, but this stuff is pretty damning. Contrast that to the Marine who obviously felt he was in danger by his own words on tape.
The point here is that too many in the U.S. media are anti-military and sympathetic to suspected terrorists. Period. And that's the Memo.
Washing Post caught once again in deceit---
Post-ing a Complaint
House Armed Services Committee Chairman Duncan Hunter (search) says that the Washington Post "did a disservice to the truth" in a front-page article criticizing Donald Rumsfeld for walking out of a hearing early after deciding he'd "had enough."
Hunter says Rumsfeld hadn't "had enough," but had agreed to testify for three hours, and had to leave to attend another hearing, and that this was all understood ahead of time. What's more, The California Republican says Rumsfeld invited those committee members who hadn't asked questions to a private breakfast at the Pentagon.
Hunter says he sent a letter to the editor of the Post a week ago, but that it has yet to be published
