NY Times Questions 'Rush' to Hang 'Mr. Hussein'
Noel Sheppard (Hat tip: Ian Schwartz)
Assume for a second that it is 1945, and it has just been learned that Adolf Hitler is dead. Would America’s media offer this madman the respect of referring to him as “Mr. Hitler?” Well, if the newspaper in question was the New York Times, the answer might definitely be “Yes,” for in a New Year’s day article about the supposed “rush to hang” the former genocidal leader of Iraq, the Times regularly referred to the now demised despot as “Mr. Hussein” (emphasis mine throughout):
With his plain pine coffin strapped into an American military helicopter for a predawn journey across the desert, Saddam Hussein, the executed dictator who built a legend with his defiance of America, completed a turbulent passage into history on Sunday.
Like the helicopter trip, just about everything in the 24 hours that began with Mr. Hussein’s being taken to his execution from his cell in an American military detention center in the postmidnight chill of Saturday had a surreal and even cinematic quality.
Fascinating. So, in the Times’ view, “Mr. Hussein” is a legend? How marvelous. The article continued:
Iraqi and American officials who have discussed the intrigue and confusion that preceded the decision late on Friday to rush Mr. Hussein to the gallows have said that it was the Americans who questioned the political wisdom — and justice — of expediting the execution, in ways that required Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki to override constitutional and religious precepts that might have assured Mr. Hussein a more dignified passage to his end. ...
