Newmark: "What the New York Times won't print"

Sometimes there's nothing to do but copy, paste and say "thank you" to bloggers whose work gets the job done and you can't imporve upon it with further commentary.

This is one of those times. Asst. Secretary of Defence Smith's letter to the NY Times needs to be "out there" so people can see it. Betsy's brief comments nail the Times.

Here's Betsy Newmark's post, "What the New York Times won't print"

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Powerline has the text of a letter that Assistant Secretary of Defense Dorrance Smith sent to the New York Times to contradict errors that they had in their editorial. Smith's letter exposed all the errors in their piece which had said that, with the transfer of some CIA prisoners to Guantanamo, the US finally had some terrorists there.

The response of the New York Times to the exposure of how wrong they were: they neglected to print the letter. Here's the letter that the NYT didn't see fit to print.

September 7, 2006

Letter To The New York Times

To the Editor:

Your September 7, 2006 editorial, "A Sudden Sense of Urgency," asserts that the recent transfer of 14 CIA prisoners means that "President Bush finally has some real terrorists in Guantánamo Bay." This merits a correction.

Since its inception, terrorists that have been held at Guantánamo Bay have included personal bodyguards of Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda recruiters, trainers, and facilitators. One notable individual held at Guantánamo was Mohamed al-Kahtani, believed to be the intended 20th hijacker on September 11th.

That many of these men are terrorists intent on doing America harm is not a simply an assertion made by the U.S. government, but something many detainees themselves have claimed, indeed boasted about. For example, in open commission hearings on March 1, Mr. Al Bahlul boasted five times that he was a member of Al Qaeda involved in an ongoing war against America. In open commission hearings on April 27, Mr. Al Sharbi said, "I’m going to make this easy for you guys: I’m proud of what I did and there isn’t any reason of hiding...I fought against the United States. I took up arms."

It is unfortunate that one of America’s largest newspapers concludes these men are not "real terrorists."

Sincerely,

Dorrance Smith,
Assistant Secretary of Defense for Public Affairs

Perhaps they were just embarrassed about how wrong they'd been in their own editorial that they couldn't let the American people see that they, shock!, actually let their bias lead them into making such a mistake.
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Thank you, Betsy.

Thank you, Powerline.