Playing Catch-up

The major league bloggers have posted about this already, so I'm sure anyone checking them out has seen the facts--to summarize, USA TODAY reports:

Muhammad Naeem Noor Khan, a 25-year-old Pakistani computer engineer, was nabbed in a July 13 raid in the eastern city of Lahore. He then led Pakistani authorities to a key al-Qaeda figure and cooperated secretly by sending e-mails to terrorists so investigators could trace their locations.

His arrest was first reported in American newspapers on Aug. 2 after it was disclosed to reporters by U.S. officials in Washington. Later, the Pakistan government also confirmed his capture but gave no other details.

Two senior Pakistani officials said the reports in "Western media" enabled other al-Qaeda suspects to get away.

"Let me say that this intelligence leak jeopardized our plan and some al-Qaeda suspects ran away," one of the officials said on condition of anonymity.

At this point, it appears that Condoleezza Rice was the one who revealed Khan's identity.

But the US media has, until today, been sitting on the sidelines. In fact, I searched around for information about this in the mainstream press yesterday, and found nothing. Billmon, Juan Cole, Atrios, and a number of others posted about this, but big media was for the most part silent. Perhaps they were busy lending credence to the anti-John Kerry organization Swift Boat Veterans for Truth (I'm not going to bother with finding a link for them). Nightline sure did, devoting the last night's program to asking in an exasperated tone whether or not we could finally get "beyond Vietnam."

The debate over Vietnam is relevant, yes, but the degree to which the facts have been obfuscated renders any meaningful discussion of the war almost impossible. But the issue here isn't Vietnam, but the degree to which the press is abrogating its responsibility as an independent voice. Sure, they've now FOLLOWED the lead of bloggers and the international media in reporting on the massive screw up perpetrated by the Bushoviks, but would they have done so if the lid HADN'T been lifted?

And imagine if, say, something like this occurred under Bill Clinton's watch. I can almost hear the dripping contempt that would emanate from the pie-holes of pundits like Robert Novak or George Will, and can visualize the shit-eating grin on the face of someone like George Stephanopolous as they'd contemplate whether or not "the president was fit for office." Where's the outrage about the incompetence of the Bush administration?

Throughout the last decade or so, the expression "three strikes and you're out" has been bandied about in regards to felons. In contrast, Bush has been playing home run derby with limitless strikes--he's whiffed on stem-cell research, the economy, 9/11, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the "war on terror," the environment, education, relations with our allies, nuclear profileration, North Korea, Iran, Haiti--you name it. Yet the press keeps acting like they're pitching batting practice--and continue to ooh and ahh whenever the dauphin simply puts the bat on the ball, crowing about foul tips and weak grounders as if they were towering long drives. Bush is below the Mendoza Line. But the press keeps acting like he's the political equivalent of Barry Bonds.