Thursday, November 30, 2006

George Will's "Journalism" is worse than my "cooking"

George Will had a column today about how Jim Webb is an asshole who's disrespectful to the President. His main evidence is this account of an encounter between Webb and Bush:

When Bush asked Webb, whose son is a Marine in Iraq, "How's your boy?" Webb replied, "I'd like to get them [sic] out of Iraq." When the president again asked "How's your boy?" Webb replied, "That's between me and my boy."

So, Webb does sound a little curt. But here's how the original Post article, which Will cited as his source, described the encounter:

"How's your boy?" Bush asked, referring to Webb's son, a Marine serving in Iraq. "I'd like to get them out of Iraq, Mr. President," Webb responded, echoing a campaign theme. "That's not what I asked you," Bush said. "How's your boy?" "That's between me and my boy, Mr. President," Webb said coldly.

"That's not what I asked you"! Snap, Mr. President! You tell that man with a son whose life is put in danger every day by your policy decisions how he's allowed to feel about about it!

Kind of embarassing for George Will, though, that the actual facts screw up the point he was trying to make. You'd hope that after this snafu, the Washington Post will start to supply its writers with computers on which the cut-and-paste functions work, so they wouldn't be forced to resort to paraphrasing earlier news stories to themselves via smoke signals.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Sorta makes you wonder whether W took trial practice with me. The usual script during that class went something like:

Lawyer: Did you or did you not murder John Smith?
Witness: It's not that simple.
Lawyer: That's not what I asked you.
Witness: IT's not that simple.
Lawyer: Did you HEAR the question I asked you?
Witness: Yes.
Lawyer: Then hows about you answer it?

It seemed to be just 'bout as effective for W as it did for me when I tried it for real.

TA said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
TA said...

My preferred cross-examination technique is slightly more advanced than yours, Toolstein: I like to yell accusations at the witness in increasingly heightened tones. For instance:

Q: You did it, didn't you?
A: No.
Q: You just couldn't take it anymore and you SNAPPED!
A: No.
Q: DIDN'T YOU!
A: YES, YES, AND I'D DO IT AGAIN!

Works every time. Learn from the master, dude.