Can't say it ANY better than Shakespeare's Sister did with this one, why it matters if President Jr was joking about blasting al-Jazeera on soil friendly to the US


I have to go with the aforementioned Peter Preston on this one. Threatening journalists with the Official Secrets Act is either a ludicrous over-reach designed to help Bush save face over a thoughtless comment, in which case the British press ought to be outraged they are being silenced for such a stupid reason, or it’s a practical application, and Bush wasn’t joking at all. Which is it?

Americans need to be concerned with this story as well. If Bush was serious, we ought to demand accountability on behalf of the killed al-Jazeera journalist as well as those currently being held at Gitmo and in Spain. If he was joking, we ought to demand at minimum that he acknowledge it and apologize for it. A man whose job affords him the protection of having arrested anyone who makes even a joke about hurting him surely ought to understand that not every joke is so easily dismissed.

In either case, refusing to address the issues raised by the leak of these remarks will allow people to believe about them whatever they want to believe—or whatever their experiences predisposes them to believe. What will the Arab world believe?


So very well put by a true & eloquent wordsmith