Chasing Judith Miller (the NYT's neocon propagandist) Off the Stage

[JohnyCanuck]

Looks like if this account is accurate Judith Miller, NYT's Media Whore Extraordinaire and resident neocon propgandist, recently received a well deserved public ass kicking.

When I heard that the New York Times correspondent Judith Miller was going to be speaking at a local campus last week, I was eager to check her out. Ever since I read Pulitzer Prize winner Samantha Power's atrocious review of Noam Chomksy's "Hegemony or Survival" in the Times book review last month, I've been increasingly on the lookout for these intellectual-defenders of an "enlightened" imperialism . Moreover, seeing Judith Miller (also a Pulitzer winner) was especially enticing, as she has been embroiled in controversy for her role in the Iraq war.

Supposedly Miller, an expert on national security issues who has a hearty relationship with Iraqi National Congress leader Ahmed Chalabi, was allowed to accompany an Army unit searching for Iraqi weapons. In fact, she acted as a middleman between the unit and Chalabi, sitting in on an interrogation of Iraqi prisoners at Chalabi's headquarters which the unit was not assigned to do and which caused some to label it the "Judith Miller Unit". Further, when the Army commander threatened to withdraw the unit, Miller told him not to, suggesting that she'd write about it unflatteringly in the New York Times. The order to withdraw was dropped. All this led one officer to call the unit that Miller was embedded with a "rogue operation". Another officer commented: "this woman came in with a plan. She was leading them. . . . She ended up almost hijacking the mission." Another senior officer added: "It's impossible to exaggerate the impact she had on the mission of this unit, and not for the better."

<snip>

I doubt Noam Chomsky had Judith Miller in mind when he wrote these words, but he might as well have: "Rogue states that are internally free-and the United States is at the outer limits in this respect-must rely on the willingness of the educated classes to produce accolades and to tolerate or deny crimes." I had heard about these types of intellectuals, the "New Mandarins" that Chomsky so derided, but I had never seen one with so much influence up close. This woman knew damn well the history of US involvement in the region, and the devastation and anger this had caused. She was just lying. Once the question and answer session came along, she would regret this.

<snip>

After reaching the heights of hysteria in her response to me, Judith Miller ended the question and answer session prematurely and walked briskly off the stage. After wards, I talked to some of the other audience members who spoke up, and we naturally took some pride in chasing Miller off the stage. If there's one lesson I wish to get across in this article, it is this: we can't be intimidated by these high profile, glamour and glitz intellectual-lackeys. Our arguments are stronger than theirs, and if we stand up to them with confidence and tenacity, their posturing will be exposed. They might run away, like Judith Miller did, or they might stay for the fight, but either way people will begin to see what they really are: liars. The moral victories we gain from these public clashes provide important force and impetus for our movement.

http://www.counterpunch.org/seidman02202004.html

[Nlighten1]

1. ownt

Thanks for the link it was a great read.

[dae]

4. Good read, thanks. n/t

:)

[JohnyCanuck]

5. You're welcome n/t

n/t

[TacticalPeek]

2. I doubt she'll be taking any unscreened questions for a while.

I can just hear her heels click-clacking off the stage, probably headed for the nearest bunker.

.

[xchrom]

3. a satisfying read

[rasputin1952]

6. Excellent read...

thanks for the link.

I have always said, if you hold these people to task, they have nothing but hot air to defend. MAKE THEM answer questions; they can't, and every victory, regardless of how large of small, helps to bring the cabal down.

the only suggestion I have, is ALWAYS stick to the truth, it cannot be beaten.

O8)

[FrankBooth]

7. Awesome

Thanks for posting this.

[kaitykaity]

8. Great work.

:thumbsup:

Can cross that lying creature off of the list.

Now maybe the same thing can happen to Ceci Connolly, Katherine Seeyle, Richard Berke, Howard Fineman, Howard Kurtz, and that guy who's on Charlie Rose all the time, Adam Nagourney. Pro-Bush media whores one and all.

[MrPrax]

9. She is scum for sure...

Anyone want some background as to why some of us think Derek Seidman is a hero can get a great perspective from a Jack Shafer article from Slate...
http://slate.msn.com/id/2095394/
It is a great article and so is the Michael Massing piece from the Times that Shafer draws upon...

Miller should be fired as a minimum...

While were on the subject....
Her boyfriend Chalabi gave an interview yesterday

Chalabi stands by faulty intelligence that toppled Saddam's regime

February 19, 2004-An Iraqi leader accused of feeding faulty pre-war intelligence to Washington said yesterday his information about Saddam Hussein's weapons, even if discredited, had achieved the aim of persuading America to topple the dictator.

Ahmad Chalabi and his London-based exile group, the Iraqi National Congress, for years provided a conduit for Iraqi defectors who were debriefed by US intelligence agents. But many American officials now blame Mr Chalabi for providing intelligence that turned out to be false or wild exaggerations about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction.

Ahmad Chalabi: 'we've been entirely successful'

Mr Chalabi, by far the most effective anti-Saddam lobbyist in Washington, shrugged off charges that he had deliberately misled US intelligence. "We are heroes in error," he told the Telegraph in Baghdad.

"As far as we're concerned we've been entirely successful. That tyrant Saddam is gone and the Americans are in Baghdad. What was said before is not important. The Bush administration is looking for a scapegoat. We're ready to fall on our swords if he wants."

...a lot more arrogance from Ahmad here

http://www.axisoflogic.com/artman/publish/article_5231.shtml

As well as this great piece from Newsday...

Start-up Company With Connections
U.S. gives $400M in work to contractor with ties to Pentagon favorite on Iraqi Governing Council

Washington - U.S. authorities in Iraq have awarded more than $400 million in contracts to a start-up company that has extensive family and, according to court documents, business ties to Ahmed Chalabi, the Pentagon favorite on the Iraqi Governing Council.

The most recent contract, for $327 million to supply equipment for the Iraqi Armed Forces, was awarded last month and drew an immediate challenge from a losing contester, who said the winning bid was so low that it questions the "credibility" of that bid.

But it is an $80-million contract, awarded by the Coalition Provisional Authority last summer to provide security for Iraq's vital oil infrastructure, that has become a controversial lightning rod within the Iraqi Provisional Government and the security industry.

Soon after this security contract was issued, the company started recruiting many of its guards from the ranks of Chalabi's former militia, the Iraqi Free Forces, raising allegations from other Iraqi officials that he was creating a private army.
more...

http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/nation/ny-uschal083671397feb15,0,735950.story

Was she a Dupe or Dope?

Either way Miller (and the NYTimes) aided and abetted a multi-billion dollar embezzlement scheme and she must have known...

[reprehensor]

10. Kick, and links to more Miller-bashing.

There really is no substitute for watching a liar squirm under the cold glare of truth.

Now They Tell Us by Michael Massing
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/16922

'NY Times' Fails to Acknowledge Its Role in WMD Hype
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/columns/shoptalk_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=2093445

[buycitgo]

15. thanks for that......more

During the first U.S.-led war in the Persian Gulf, Miller co-wrote a book with Laurie Mylroie, titled Saddam Hussein and the Crisis in the Gulf.

Miller and Mylroie have both been clients of Eleana Benador, whose PR firm has represented many leading pro-war figures that have appeared prominently on television and in other public venues. She has also worked closely and uncritically with Ahmed Chalabi, the head of the Iraqi National Congress, in developing her reports on Iraq. In a May 2003 e-mail message, Miller stated that Chalabi "has provided most of the front page exclusives on to our paper."

http://www.disinfopedia.org/wiki.phtml?title=Judith_Miller

then there are these cornucopiae:

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=ISO-8859-1&q=judith+miller+unethical

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&ie=ISO-8859-1&q=judith+miller+liar

http://www.google.com/search?q=judith+miller+chalabi&hl=en&lr=&ie=ISO-8859-1

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&ie=ISO-8859-1&q=judith+miller+propaganda&btnG=Google+Search

get the idea?

here's an amusing apologia from the Times, with analysis posted here...not going to bother with the Times letter....too annoying

I got this lame reply from the New York Times' new "public editor" in response to my comments on Times reporter Judith Miller's peddling of disinformation for the Bush/Chalabi gang. Note executive editor Keller's attempt to portray criticism of Miller's propaganda work as
"conventional wisdom," and to claim for himself the role of "skeptic."

Keller sees no "prima facie case for recanting or
repudiating the stories," presumably because he believes the Times merely relayed information from "official sources" to the public, without endorsing the WMD claims. That's the self-serving excuse the mainstream US media use when faced with the charge they act as de facto state propaganda channels. For the Times, to admit that reportage like Miller's was "insufficiently skeptical" would be to adopt the fringey, unacceptable notion that their pages are routinely filled with official lies.

http://lists.econ.utah.edu/pipermail/marxism/2004-January/002596.html

what's funny is that just about the only place in the "mainstream" media I've heard references similar to the one bolded above was from JON STEWART, who's talked about it a bit, even made "pen to paper" motions, as he used the word STENOGRAPHER in referring to the supine media!

[Nlighten1]

11. Wouldn't it be great if Chimpy would be subjected to this?

[AP]

12. David Kelly & Judith Miller: "friends." Was she one of "dark actors" he...

mentioned in his email to her?

"Judy I will wait until the end of the week before judging - many dark actors playing games. Thanks for your support. I appreciate your friendship at this time."

- E-mail Dr Kelly sent shortly before going missing

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/3076634.stm

Buried in a July 19 New York Times article ("British Arms Expert at Center
of Dispute on Iraq Data Is Found Dead") by Warren Hoge and Judith Miller
was a cryptic allusion: Dr. David Kelly referred to "many dark actors
playing games" within military and intelligence circles of the British
government. Kelly's remarks were included in an e-mail message to a
reporter, sent shortly before Kelly committed suicide. The reporter, later
identified in news reports, was none other than Miller, a friend of the
deceased. As in the hunt for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq this past
spring, she had become a subject of the news, not just a reporter of it.

The following day, the Times published a story by Miller under her sole
byline for the first time since she departed the war zone in May. Entitled
"A Chronicle of Confusion in the U.S. Hunt for Hussein's Chemical and Germ
Weapons," the lengthy analysis amounted to a mea culpa on the part of the
star reporter and an attempt by "the newspaper of record" to play catch-up
in covering the most controversial issue following the U.S. invasion of
Iraq -- the search for the weapons of mass destruction (WMD) that had been
cited by the Bush administration as an imminent threat.

In effect, Miller substantially revised her first draft of history,
written when reporting from the field as an embedded part of a Central
Command search unit, some two months after her widely criticized stories
had made the case that evidence of Saddam's unconventional weapons was
being found.

...


http://www.tjm.org/articles/msg00263.html

[otohara]

13. Excellent Read

She popped up on a Discovery/Time episode recently called Saddam. It was the worst hour of propaganda I have ever seen. I will never trust another show on the channel again. There was Judy, spewing the same old BS. She doesn't come off in person as very smart.

Ha, ha, - loved to have seen her scurry off the stage

[Elidor]

14. Oh, to have been there!

Spouting that bullshit in public is a very different game from writing it for publication.

OWNED.