(Note to literalists: the Watched column presently contains only a smattering of 'warblogs' because the facilitator of the template-change--Dr. Menlo--is not very familiar with them, and will be adding more as they are sent to him. Also, this blog may contain areas of allusion, satire, subtext, context and possibly even a dash of the surreal: wannabe lit-crits beware.)
Control
[Watch this space for: Pentagon and Petroleum, The Media is only as Liberal as the Corporations Who Own Them, Wash Down With, and Recalcify]
WARBLOGGER WATCH
Tuesday, June 11, 2002
Sir:
A few inaccuracies on your part to address, shouldn't take long. First, when I stated that the majority of the big names remained unaccounted for, I was referring to our inability to put a dent of significant size in the list of 22 Most Wanted Terrorists, a high priority of any War Against Terror worthy of the name. You write "as of 15 January, one third of Pentagon's 36-odd Taliban most wanted, and 8 of its 20 Taliban most wanted, had been reported dead or captured, according to Carl Conetta." Ignoring the doubling-up of "Taliban most wanted" (you meant to type al Qaeda in the second instance), 8 of 20 works out to less than 50%, at least according to my abacus. You also stated that Abu Zubaydah's capture, which "was only possible once the war had rendered him a fugitive." This ignores both American suspicions against him for his part in the thwarted Millennium Attacks as well as his March 27, 2000 indictment by the Jordanians.
You also took issue with my statement that an undetermined number of Afghan civilians had died. True, the Los Angeles Times piece did reckon the number ("conclusively" in your telling) at 1,200, though theirs was just one of a number of estimates. Even ignoring the work of Marc Herold, the warblogger's go-to guy for dubious stats just a few days back gave a range of "between 600 and 1,500," which suggests that the statistics are anything but conclusive.
You further state that the Shlomo Ben Ami quote is off topic. Please re-read the piece, this time noting that Ben Ami's words are reproduced immediately after a sentence stating Arafat "never turned down '97 percent of the West Bank' at Taba." "The pressure of Israeli public opinion against the [Taba] talks could not be resisted" can be readily translated as "No such offer was made." Sadly for you and others unable to comprehend the import of so matter-of-fact a statement by an Israeli official, the times did not include any helpful onomatopoeia at the conculsion of Ben Ami's quote.
If you tabulate my score as "0 for 3 on his factual challenges" your innumeracy rivals your illiteracy in its severity.
