Debbie Schlussel introduces her readers to someone who claims to know released hostage and Christian Science Monitor reporter Jill Carroll.
The picture of her he paints isn’t very pretty. Especially if you happen to deplore anti-semitism and find distasteful Americans who rail against their country as “imperialists” and not a force for good in the world, even as its armed forces are fighting to free an entire population from under the boot heel of a (first) a tyrant, and (second) terrorists (which need not be the primary reason for the war, naturally; but it certainly should be a welcomed side effect).
I was taken to task (and rightly so, in some cases) by some visiting leftwing readers for appearing dubious, in an earlier post, about Carroll’s statements made directly after her release.
When she retracted them, I was glad—particularly as they’d come on the heels of the CPT hostages who only grudgingly thanked the US military for their rescue, and continued to hold America at fault for their having been taken captive in the first place. And so I apologized for getting out ahead of the facts.
But these new revelations, if true, are something to add back to the mix. Which is to say that while it should need no pointing out that I’m happy Ms Carroll is alive, surviving captivity alone shouldn’t grant her automatic sainthood—particularly if the characterization of her presented by Mayer Abrahams turns out to be fair.
(h/t Allah)
I add my “mea culpa” for “jumping the gun” but not for the opinion I expressed based on the information at hand. I did not know that the remarks she made were under duress (if they were).
That said, I am going to reserve judgement until more information appears. And it will.
Well there’s the rub: Carroll controlled and continues to control “the information at hand.”
Carroll should answer some questions. Her public statement was too carefully worded. I don’t trust her as far as I can spit.
Who gives a shit anyway. The only the thing I care about is that the photos that appeared in the press were flattering…she is not hot at all. And yes I’m a pig.
I’m interested to see what she’s going to have to say after her private time, to which she’s entitled.
I wonder what she’s learned, and how it has impacted her view of things. Maybe there’s an instructive before-after scenario in this.
tw: service, as in “If I were in the service, and had escorted Ms. Carroll on her way home, would have told me how awful what I’m doing is?”
Nuff said.
The problem is the descriptions used for people like Jill Carroll and Guiliana whatshername and the CPT, that they were unbiased observers, there for the TRUTH, that they are on the side of the Iraqi people- have all become code words for anti-war anti-Bush. Jill Carroll’s own father had some harsh words for Bush during her captivity.
It is a huge problem that the anti-war opinions of these people is what is used as an argument to convince the kidnappers to release them. Globally, that’s the argument we hear over and over again. As if it would be ok to kidnap a pro-war journalist, or at least understandable to not release him.
I have no problem believing that she was vehemently anti-war and yet did not wish her words to be used as propaganda by insurgents, especially not when she agreed to tape them as a way to earn her freedom.
I’m with Pablo, though, on finding out what she had learned from her experience, or if she’ll be among the many that seem to believe Arab people are unable to be responsible for their own actions and are only able to respond to the actions of Jews and Westerners.
Someone I know from school knows her. Finds her to be a fantastic and brave person. But we just NEED to find her otherwise. And are willing to link to nutcases like debbie schlussel in order to have it so. At least as far as ‘sainthood’ is concerned.
Whatever happened to that stoptheaclu opposition motion she was going to file in the wiretap acase?
actus- can one not be fantastic and brave and anti-war anti-Bush anti-Israel?
Sure. And make sure that those things are ‘revelations’ to ‘add back to the mix.’ Specially if if the mix is surviving captivity.
The mix is made more interesting by all of those things, however. Does her opinion change once those she felt were victimized by the big bad US and Israel murder her beloved bodyguard and keep her captive at gunpoint?
Surviving captivity is interesting, but is it a good idea to flaunt the captive’s anti-war feelings to garner her release?
All interesting and in the mix. Why not?
Ask this guy that took a course with her in cairo a long time ago. He seems to be a good source on her.
I’d rather hear from her. She is, after all, a journalist. Her ‘thing’ was telling the whole story, right? I’d love to hear her whole story -from her. But there’s nothing sacred about her that keeps people from telling their stories about her.
Of course not. Add it to the mix of her captivity. Link away to debbie schlussel.
actus,
We therefore have no right to discover her true opinions of the war? Or what “truth” she is after in Iraq? Or if the statements in the Arab TV interview after she was released may actually be her true feelings?
Anyone who also knows her and has a somewhat different opinion of her is automatically discredited?
Jill Carroll is indeed fortunate to have survived her ordeal at the hands of a criminal gang that has clearly demonstrated its ruthlessness, but that does not make her completely off-limits. Australian Douglas Wood was taken captive by the “insurgent” jihadis and was rescued and then heaped praise on the American troops that rescued him. For this “crime” he has been vilified by the internet left. He is certainly not “off-limits”, now is he? Or is his case entirely different?
BTW, we don’t “need” anything, your side is the “needy” one: anything to prove the elections were “stolen”, anything to prove “Bush lied”…
Objection. Hearsay. Double hearsay.
Sustained.
Debbie Schlussel’s source. Objection. Hearsay. Double hearsay.
Sustained.
Please disregard both statements, members of the jury. We’ll wait to hear from the witness at a later time. Perhaps.
I find the continued smearing of Jill Carroll to be pathetic. She renounced the statement on the video. If she truly believed that she would not have renounced it. I guess the truth is too obvious for some people.
You’re desperate. Desperately needing this.
Keep reaching for that rainbow.
Haven’t we already?
I don’t know. I have been smelling fish during this whole episode. Some of the chapters in this story just don’t seem to fit together. I can’t tell where it’s coming from, but there is definitely a fishy odor here.
Lost Dog, actus ate ten pounds of lutefisk before he crapped on the thread. That’s what you smell.
How exactly is this a smear, Don? I linked to somebody who claims to know Ms Carroll and her political leanings. I passed no judgment; I was simply fleshing out the story more.
Here’s more breaking news for you: some people who were killed in the concentration camps? Weren’t saints either.
You think she’s told the story? She’s happy to be home, she thinks kidnapping and killing civilians is bad and she said what her captors wanted to hear in order to get released. That’s enough for you?
She’s a journalist, actuse. There’s a lot more story, and we expect to hear it from Jill Carroll, the journalist who went to Iraq in search of stories to tell us.
For one so willing to ask questions, you’re magnificently uncurious about this story. What is it you need not to hear?
How dare you take Jill Carroll to task for saying under duress what Dean, Pelosi, Reid, Kucenich et al. would say in order to get their depressed yet bloated mugs on the tele.
Double my headache powder Manuel.
Or should that read: How dare you take to task those who take Jill Carroll to task……?
Despite the beatification efforts, (“Someone I know from school knows her… fantastic …brave…†is so lame as to be embarrassing) there are legitimate questions that one can ask about Jill Carroll. In a father long post HERE, I voice my own concerns:
“Now I’ll show you how an Italian dies.†Fabrizio Quattrocchi
sorry, “father” should be “rather”
I’m skeptical, personally. If this is actually how Carroll feels – fine, whatever. Wouldn’t be surprising considering who she works for. But Debbie Schlussel has a way of blowing things way, way out of proportion…to put it mildly.
I doubt we’ll hear anything from Ms. Carroll until the libs underwriting her book deal and speaking tour have “properly” vetted her story to reflect poorly on the administration.
How exactly is this a smear, Don?
It’s the worst kind of smear. It’s a non-leftwinger, telling leftwingers that someone is spouting the leftwing line without authorization.
“She was under duress goddammit!! You can’t call her one of us until we know she’ll say these things without a gun pointing at her head. So until then, I’ll thank you to reserve your lumping her in with the rest of us whackos.”
It’s nucking futs.
I wouldn’t be too surprised if she said she couldn’t report on this story as a journalist, it being too personal. She’ll probably tell it eventually though
But for now:
The keyboard kommandoes are going to have to keep adding things into the mix in face of her silence.
This sort of junk.
Why do you guys think Jill has to justify her opinions to a bunch of internet e-thugs? “We HAVE to find the truth!” you shout. She retracted what she said and that is that. You just wont be satisfied until you have another person to hate on. More grist for the lame-joke and backslapping mill!
Unless she is a very good actor I found her nervous laughter and smiling on the video very convincing that she does believe the things she said.
lol failure at posting
She expressed the sort of opinions which you would hear from [Noam] Chomsky…
Now THAT’S some solid journalism.
Jeff links to Debbie Schlussel – but does so with absolute neutrality and no opinion as to whether or not the “facts” presented are true…
Debbie presents semi-anonymous material from someone who claims to have attended a class with Carroll two years ago – and presents his opinions as facts.
1. Jill refused to utter the world Israel? Does anyone here actually believe that? I could see her being anti-Israel, but refusing to even utter the name of the state? Please.
2. She was pleased to have been misidentified as a Canadian. How does this person know that? He misidentified her as Canadian and her response was to embrace him and say, “Thank you – I love being misidentified as a Canadian. It makes me feel better about myself.”
3. I’m anti-religious as are many of my friends. I have never heard anyone refer to the bible as “That Shit Book.” Do you really think that this is true? The implication is that she abhored the bible but simultaneously worshipped the Koran. Does that make any sense?
4. She worked for the Christian Science Monitor in Iraq. Do you think that she pretended not to be American while working for the monitor? Do you think she confessed a hatred for Israel and all things Christian to her employers there? I’ve seen interviews of her from before she was captured where she was identified by name and as working for the Monitor. Should I have been fooled into thinking that her American accent was actually Canadian and that in reality she hates America?
Come on, folks. Grow up. Especially you, Jeff.
Take some responsibility for the bullshit you pass along.
I am convinced you meant something by this… It escapes me, however. Perhaps my back was not slapped enough?
I still say throw her back. She made her bed…
Well we really won’t know for sure whether she’s an America hating left-wing nutcase until she appears as a guest on Huffington. Guess we’ll have to wait until then.
– I got the distinct feeling Daddy was laboring very hard to control his anger in his “after” the release news conferences. I’m betting he told her to quit running around Iraq and get her skinny little ass home where she belongs. The sequence of events are curious at best, but one thing that stands out is she made no mention of her murdered translator in any of her statements until way way after the fact, which I saw as telling.
– In spite of her declarations about to wanting to be “fair and balanced”, my take is she’s just another lying closet Liberal bitch, who hates America like all her Marxist friends on the left, and would rather be thought of as Canadian, where they grow their weeney, dictator loving shitheads, from birth.
– Oh, and for the asshat trolls, I don’t think we need even one more idiotarian, so no Conservative I know is “wishing” she’s a Liberal moron, but the way things played out I wouldn’t be all the surprised to find out later the whole fucking deal was contrived. As too the translater, even for a feckless Liberal, “collateral damage” can be nettlesome.
New on NBC this fall: “I was a Hot-Shot Journalist”, starring Jill Carroll, Jeanene Garolfolo, and Randi Rhoades (as Granny). In the first episode, we find our heroes planning a “fake but accurate” document detailing McChimpy’s plan for world domination. Hilarity erupts when their zany neighbor, Chucky (played by Charlie Sheen) shows up with a half ounce premium Columbian blow. After a few snorts, and shots of Patron Silver, the girls absent-mindingly forget their plan, and pass out on the couch. Chucky rummages through their underwear drawers.
The whole thing was staged as a propaganda exercise. There will be no “truth” forthcoming.
Move along.
Well, looks like Jeff’s really drawn some hummdingers with this one!
Which goes to prove the old adage. The ability to swallow a broomstick without gagging isn’t always enough to get one’s book published.
Sorry. Let me know what information I SHOULDN’T link to. I don’t want to appear intolerant or childish for providing links to additional information for readers to use (or not use) to formulate their own opinions.
After all, everyone knows that I’m supposed to shape things to tell a story—not present a series of competing assertions / facts.
We can’t afford to empower the rubes with all this uninterpreted information…
well, yeah, Jeff, what am i supposed to think if i have to follow other links? you’re supposed to tell me what i can mentally regurgitate other places. it’s not like i have a brain or anything.
Oh, I did, but, as you have clearly shown, you’re really not interested in taking the folks here as anything but caricatures, so I feel no need to expend effort on you. Hence, an all lower-case post mirroring the amount of thought put into yours.
Not wanting to start a witch-hunt or anything, but I’m dropping $5, says this poster is a Doug-style Koskid troll playing “OMGEVILRETHUGLIKKKAN”
Turing word “brown,” as in: “THATHATESTEHBROWNFOLK”
Was I just insulted?
Anyway, I seriously question whether I am anything implied by OHNOES.
What is a “Doug-style Koskid troll”?
For chrissakes, what’d you expect? Her Daddy is an adult living in Pinko Hill (thanks Jesse, BPUH). Had this one pegged as an AQ SUV fundraiser from the gitgo.
So I got my 25 year HS reunion this summer and I want to be able to fit into my CHiPs “Ponch” outfit for the mixer.
Needless to say I’m going to have to drop about 20+ to be credible in the pants. Thought I’d have my Mother-in-law drop me outside the Swords of Revenge camp; if she gets capped – that’s a bonus. I’ll stay there as a hostage until the weight is gone.
So I get there and these dudes are all “We are going to saw your head off” and all “your terrorist president can’t save you now” and all “we will relieve our stress and muscle tension headaches on your infidel poopchute”. Then I put the hands up in an unthreatening manner: “Whoawhoawhoawhoa fellas. Stand down for a second. I’m here on the Jill Carroll plan. You know – couple small meals a day, shower, a little light conversation?”
Was my face red.
I knew Jill Carroll while we were in driving school one summer in Ann Arbor.
I remember Jill making nasty comments about redheads, OBVIOUSLY directed at my hairdo. And my feelings about my hairdo. Trust me, even though NOTHING she has written as a journalist reflects those opinions, even though she has been praised by US military officials for her unbiased reporting and professional demeanor, trust me, those are her opinions. I alone know.
Trust me. Trust Debbie to trust me. Trust Jeffie to trust Debbie to trust me. And my opinions.
Once again Jeffie makes us redefine the term bottomfeeder.
Moneyrunner:
Oh honey, do get your facts straight before foaming away.
She made that video BEFORE she was released. Remember? It was in all the newspapers:
http://www.csmonitor.com/earlyed/earlyWO0331a.html
You know what facts are, don’t you?
Some dumb fuck wrote:
New on NBC this fall: “I was a Hot-Shot Journalistâ€Â, starring Jill Carroll, Jeanene Garolfolo, and Randi Rhoades (as Granny).
You misspelled “Janeane,” “Garofalo,” and “Rhodes.” Somehow you managed to get “Randi” right. Even a blind squirrel, etc.
Hey, OHNOES, you asshole! Answer my question.
I can’t help but notice that the trolls here always seem to make their political points by addressing me as “Jeffy” or “Jeffie.” Why the diminutive? Don’t you trust the force of your arguments.
Itsmeagain —
If that’s how you want to couch Abraham’s impressions of Carroll, more power to you. But are you honestly saying that it’s “bottomfeeding” to make you aware of them?
As someone asked upthread, what else do you not wish to know in order to draw your own opinions?
Perhaps what you really need is a filter that blocks out anything that doesn’t meet the key nodal points of the narrative you’re already committed to. In which case, one thing you might try is staying away from this site.
My post in no way either endorses nor criticizes what Mr Abrahams said. Someone emailed the link to me, I passed it along to my readers. I did so because it seemed appropriate to do so in light of our previous discussion on Ms Carroll.
I note, too, that you’re here piping in on the subject. But that makes you a protector of Truth (as it has already been decided) rather than a bottom feeder, I suppose.
How clean you must feel!
Walter, oh, sorry. I was simply implying that you were a KosKid type person pretending to be an eeeeevil parody of a Rethuglikkkcan so the KosKid could go back and proudly proclaim that “LOL I PRETENDED TO BE A RIGHTIE ON PW.”
If you weren’t, then no offense meant, except that “throw her back” is a bit harsh, man.
I dunno Jeffie, there’s just something very diminutive about your thinking.
No, you don’t endorse or criticize the purported Mr. Abraham’s claims. You just give them an audience.
Debbie Schlussell lives on the bottom. That makes you – and your site – a bottom feeder.
Actually, re-reading your original post, I take back what I said about you not endorsing or criticizing the claims.
You are sooooo full of shit.
Right. And you are no longer welcome here. Take off, okay?
Awww, Jeffie has to ban dissent again.
[“Dissent”? Uh, I wouldn’t call your comments “dissent.” I’d call them ad hominem attacks on the site’s host. No, “Jeffie” requested that you stop using the diminutive; and then “Jeffie” was greeted with it again, along with the suggestion that he’s full of shit and his site is a “bottom feeder.” “Jeffie” simply believes you belong on a site where people will respect your prodigious intellect. Which is to say, “Jeffie” is engaging in a bit of social engineering.
As a left-liberal, I’m sure that’s something you can appreciate. You should be thanking “Jeffie.” But then, that’s not how these things work, is it? – ed]
These are pretty serious accusations against Carroll. Shouldn’t they be double-sourced? Abrahams could have gone to school with Carroll–we don’t have confirmation of that–but even if he did, couldn’t he have a grudge against her for unknown personal reasons? Couldn’t he be making this stuff up?
If Carroll was as openly hostile as she sounds, there should be someone else to confirm this; the fact that there isn’t makes me a little suspicious; Schlussel shouldn’t be printing this stuff unless she can confirm it with another source.
Duuude! She refused to use the name “israel.” What else do you need for a credibility determination?*
*(this comment not meant to endorse nor deride the statements on debbie schlussels blog)
[ed – but it IS made to suggest that the commenter is unreliable, whereas Jill Carroll, by virtue of her being held captive, is of necessity a saint. Like Cindy Sheehan, she has the absolute moral authority to now do whatever it is she wants, and no one—especially some Jew on Debbie Schlussel’s blog—is allowed to provide any anecdotes that fuck with Carroll’s beatification.]
My grandson is doing his second tour with the Marines in Iraq. I have no love to spare for those who go over to the enemy in opposition to my grandson. Carroll is an admitted enemy of the United States and throwing her back is not as harsh as hanging her for treason. I know what it is like, from Korea, to be on the line and know that homefolk are trivilizing your efforts.
“moral authority”? Do whatever she wants? she wants to be with her family after being held captive. We want to project our biases on her captivity.