LauraSWashington@aol.com
Last Modified: Oct 9, 2012 0
This was no ordinary rubber chicken
affair. That was my reaction to the extraordinary keynoter at Tuesday’s
Better Government Association annual luncheon.
Lara Logan, a correspondent for CBS’ “60
Minutes,” delivered a provocative speech to about 1,100 influentials
from government, politics, media, and the legal and corporate arenas.
Such downtown gatherings are a regular on Chicago’s networking circuit.
(I am a member of the BGA’s Civic Leadership Committee, and the Chicago
Sun-Times was a sponsor).
Her ominous and frightening message was gleaned
from years of covering our wars in the Middle East. She arrived in
Chicago on the heels of her Sept. 30 report, “The Longest War.” It
examined the Afghanistan conflict and exposed the perils that still
confront America, 11 years after 9/11.
Eleven years later, “they” still hate us, now
more than ever, Logan told the crowd. The Taliban and al-Qaida have not
been vanquished, she added. They’re coming back.
“I chose this subject because, one, I can’t
stand, that there is a major lie being propagated . . .” Logan declared
in her native South African accent.
The lie is that America’s military might has tamed the Taliban.
“There is this narrative coming out of Washington
for the last two years,” Logan said. It is driven in part by “Taliban
apologists,” who claim “they are just the poor moderate, gentler, kinder
Taliban,” she added sarcastically. “It’s such nonsense!”
Logan stepped way out of the “objective,”
journalistic role. The audience was riveted as she told of plowing
through reams of documents, and interviewing John Allen, the top U.S.
commander in Afghanistan; Afghan President Hamid Karzai, and a Taliban
commander trained by al-Qaida. The Taliban and al-Qaida are teaming up
and recruiting new terrorists to do us deadly harm, she reports.
She made a passionate case that our government is
downplaying the strength of our enemies in Afghanistan and Pakistan, as
a rationale of getting us out of the longest war. We have been lulled
into believing that the perils are in the past: “You’re not listening to
what the people who are fighting you say about this fight. In your
arrogance, you think you write the script.”
Our enemies are writing the story, she suggests, and there’s no happy ending for us.
As a journalist, I was queasy. Reporters should tell the story, not be the story. As an American, I was frightened.
Logan even called for retribution for the recent
terrorist killings of Christopher Stevens, the U.S. ambassador to Libya,
and three other officials. The event is a harbinger of our
vulnerability, she said. Logan hopes that America will “exact revenge
and let the world know that the United States will not be attacked on
its own soil. That its ambassadors will not be murdered, and that the
United States will not stand by and do nothing about it.”
In the “good old days,” reporters did not advocate, crusade or call for revenge.
In these “new” days in a post-9/11 world, perhaps we need more reporters who are willing to break the rules.
1 comment:
way to go Laura, you are a tremendous reporter and I, as a journalism student, am inspired by your passion, your bravery and objectivity . Keep up the good work ! We need more reporters like you willing to stand up and take a stand for what they believe....It is hard to try and be that cool ,dispassionate, objective reporter all the time when we humans have hearts and apathy for the oppressed we need to vent these feelings, it is our nature and it is necessary for peace of mind and heart!
drew cunningham , Toronto, Ontario, Canada
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