MARGARET WARNER'S STORY ON IRAN DETAINING MS. ESFANDIARI

I watched Margaret Warner's discussion last night on The NewsHour with her two guests Lee Hamilton and Karim Sadjadpour about Iran's holding 67-year old Ms. Haleh Esfandiari, director of the Middle East program at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, after she went back to Iran to visit her ailing 93-year old mother. As I indicated in my post on May 11, 2007, on the same subject, I am against Iran taking Ms. Esfandiari into custody and detention without any evidence she did anything wrong.

I am also against a decision by Bush and Cheney to arrest the five Iranians in Iraq in January 2007, and in deciding to keep them in custody even though there is no evidence they did anything which would justify their imprisonment, other than being Iranians.

I think the way to secure the release of Ms. Esfandiari is for the United States to sit down and negotiate with Iran over these detainees.

I heard nothing from Margaret Warner or her guests remotely suggesting this diplomatic stategy. Nor did anyone mention the obvious connection between the detention by the U.S. of the five Iranians with Iran's detention of Ms. Esfandiari.

THE NEWSHOUR ON THE 15 BRITISH SAILORS

I listened to Margaret Warner on The Newshour last night interview a former U.S. military officer as to the propriety or impropriety of cooperating with the Iranians in the way that the released group of 15 British sailors/marines did recently. But for me that was not the main story. Rather I wanted The Newshour to investigate the discrepancies between the captured sailors' statements while in Iranian custody and their statements at the news conference yesterday in England.

Margaret Warner kept asking the same question, "what may soldiers say or do while in captivity?" This was not arduous reporting. I wanted her to do some hard reporting. As I suggested in a previous blog, I am most suspicious of governments, including that of Tony Blair, spinning what really happened for political or domestic gain. Why wasn't there any report on The Newshour about only six sailors/marines in attendance at the news conference? Why didn't Margaret Warner investigate why Faye Turney was not present to answer questions?

NEWSHOUR STORY ON BUSH IN LATIN AMERICA

One of the Newshour's stories tonight was by Margaret Warner on Bush's tour of South and Central America, visiting those countries Bush thinks are not 100% against him. I have several objections to the report. First, Bush suggested in a video clip that poverty in Latin America turns people away from democracy. I would have liked Margaret Warner to critique Bush's statement and object to it. But she let it go. This is why we left-leaning bloggers take umbrage at times with the work of certain MSM journalists. They seem to permit themselves to be used by those currently in power. Show me one Latin American country that fits Bush's thesis. Certainly not Venezuela where Hugo Chavez was recently re-elected president with over 70% of the popular vote. Not Bolivia. Not Brazil. Not Ecuador. Not Mexico.

Now on other facets of the report. Okay, Chavez called Bush "Satan." So what? There are a lot of us Americans who think Bush is a devil.

Chavez nationalises Venezuelan telephone and oil companies. So what? Vladimir Putin does the same thing.

The main point should have been the depth of animosity of the Latino hoi polloi against Bush even in the "safe" countries, such as Uruguay or Colombia. This animosity is not "anti-United States," contrary to what the Newshour report stated. Rather it is anti-Bush. There is a big difference.

Finally, Margaret Warner gives me the impression that she does not hear the answers which her questions elicit. No matter what a guest answers, Margaret Warner seems to forge ahead with her pre-determined questions. Do any of the answers really matter?