We’ll Cover the News, Let Viewers Make the Final Call

A minute or two after 6 on the morning of Aug. 28, the now-familiar woman’s voice from Iraq Television in Baghdad told Will King of the CNN international desk in Atlanta that in three hours they would be offering an hour of President Saddam Hussein and some French and American “guests.” And did CNN think it would be carried on its international signal? King pressed the contact on when these “guests” were taped but got only what sounded like a second reading of the information just given.

I discussed the Iraq TV offering, known internally as “The Uncle Saddy Show,” with CNN Vice President and Senior Executive Producer Bob Furnad. We agreed to recommend carrying it to CNN President Tom Johnson, who concurred, with the usual disclaimers presented by anchorman Reid Collins from the Washington bureau at the beginning and conclusion of the tape.

Why? Why give over an hour’s air time on a global television signal to a man who has invaded a neighbor, taken tens of thousands prisoner, caused economic dislocation and prompted this country’s government to commit to risk the lives of thousands of men and women? Why does CNN glamorize, elevate, promote and dignify this man?

Because it is news. Awful and painful, disgusting and contrived, or insightful and significant. It is because it is the first opportunity for a long look at American and French hostages. It is news because what this man, Saddam Hussein, says and does is, for now, important, perhaps even life-and-death important. No one doubts he has the potential to cause war. And, yes, there is the fascination one feels in passing a multicar accident along the highway.

More profoundly, one asks, is our society, the global culture, not strong enough to see this tape and make independent judgments? Are values so loosely in place that they can be dislodged, that by watching this tape men and women can have their free will taken from them? We have concluded that while there will likely be an emotional erosion of sorts, the point of a free press is to present that which is significant and important, qualify that with responsible analysis--the why, the how--and let viewers of the world make the final call.

The technology to present President Saddam will not be disinvented. It’s there and it will be used. The issue is to what end shall the technology be turned and who will control it.

Our place in the wired universe is unique. CNN is the only live (and delayed) worldwide television news service. Although our audience is primarily in the United States, we have an estimated 10 million viewers in other countries, some of them the people who set policy, fix agendas and run governments. We realize we are being used. However, this does not necessarily mean we are being manipulated. Public figures and those aspiring to become well known have tried to use the media since the first newspaper was circulated. Presidents and paupers have sought the frenzy of renown. Some receive it for a lifetime, others never get their fabled 15 minutes. But, most of the time, we remain careful, diligent and vigilant as to the use of the using.

I mention the technology and what it can do; it is also true for the format. The game is no longer the same when the dictates of time cease. A 30-minute news program may not be a world player. The hardware brings it in, the format lets the story unfold. The tale will be told. And it seems to us who work at CNN that it is better to provide too much than too little. It is wiser to over-inform than under-inform. If misinformation passes across the screen then there will be an opportunity to correct and explain, to bring the armies of institutional memory to march. Harm can happen. But a great good can occur.

U.S. observers who went to Timisoara to watch the Romanian elections told of a guide who said during last winter’s collapse of Eastern Europe that the people in this town where the revolution began frequently watched CNN as broadcast across the border on Yugoslav television and from it drew strength and hope that their cause would triumph. It was very nice to hear.