Let’s Review Strategy Before Attacking CNN

CNN has a history of making enemies in wartime. As it’s doing now.

During the Persian Gulf War in 1991, it was castigated in some quarters for Peter Arnett’s interview in Baghdad with Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, who talked peace and body bags on TV while benignly exuding a confidence and smooth charm that belied his ruthless agenda.

Arnett--the only U.S. reporter allowed to remain inside Iraq in the early weeks of the war--later found himself called a Saddam “sympathizer” by that showboating Wyoming demagogue, former GOP Sen. Alan K. Simpson.

Simpson accused Arnett of giving aid and comfort to the enemy in his reports from Iraq. Although Arnett’s reporting was soft at times, there was no evidence that he was pulling for Iraq. Despite the mean-spirited absurdity of the smear, however, Simpson was joined by actors Charlton Heston and Kurt Russell, who also publicly depicted Arnett as something approaching a turncoat.

In advertising their own dimwittedness packaged as patriotism, these loyal Americans may have been the ones giving aid and comfort to the enemy.

As is happening this month, perhaps, with some of the criticism of CNN’s pursuit of a Q&A; interview on videotape with Osama bin Laden, whose Al Qaeda network of “evildoers” President Bush blames for the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks that rocked the U.S. and triggered a massive military response in Afghanistan.

An opportunity for Americans to see the most notorious fugitive on the planet--the man Bush wants “dead or alive”--respond on camera to questions asked him by an independent news organization based in the U.S.? A chance to have this frightening character respond to us instead of vice versa, however flawed and unconventional the format for this dialogue? Two words apply here.

Do it! Word surfaced last week that CNN had been approached by someone claiming to speak for Al Qaeda, through the Arab TV network Al Jazeera, about the prospect of questions being given in advance to Bin Laden, who would respond to them, presumably on videotape.

In other words, there would be no contact between interviewee and interviewer, and naturally, no follow-up questions.

After thinking about it for a few days, CNN wisely voted thumbs up, submitting six questions, with nothing off-limits, and informing its viewers of the arrangement. In addition, it offered to share with other news outlets material it received from Bin Laden, without promising to air any of it itself.

What would be the value? Perhaps none. We’d have to wait and see. That CNN was even approached may indicate that Bin Ladin is still alive.

This is no ideal scenario--submitting questions in advance alone is forbidden by most news organizations--and in ordinary times should have been vetoed. Period, end of story. But neither the occasion nor Bin Laden is ordinary, which justifies cutting some journalistic corners as long as CNN maintains ultimate control and Bin Laden delivers something worth the compromise.

Anyone can appreciate queasiness about granting him, under any circumstances, the kind of TV access he and Al Qaeda have had on Qatar-based Al Jazeera in those videos that U.S. networks have agreed to no longer run live, if at all. And among CNN’s rivals, Fox News Channel said it would reject a Bin Laden interview under conditions agreed to by CNN.

But if you believe Fox or any U.S. journalist would not take Bin Laden’s call, I’d like to interest you in a luxury condo in Kabul.

The response to CNN was predictably shrill, though, from that farceur of media watchdogs, L. Brent Bozell, who charged that the Bin Laden interview plan “is truly outrageous, it is harming the war effort and it’s a slap in the face of the American people.” Yes, measured as always.

Outrageous? How? Harming the war effort? How? A slap in the face? How?

Bozell, who heads Media Research Center in Alexandria, Va., posed his own questions in a statement released last week. For example, if CNN had existed 60 years ago, he asked:

“Would it have interviewed and aired comments from Emperor Hirohito, the man who ordered the attack on Pearl Harbor?”

“Would it have given a forum to Adolf Hitler to explain his hatred of Jews and Christians?”

CNN’s questions to Bin Laden are tougher than Bozell’s no-brainers to CNN.

Hirohito and Hitler? The answer to both is yes--with the conditions guiding Bin Laden also applicable to the hypothetical that CNN would maintain the right to edit or not air whatever it chose.

It’s hard to imagine that any responsible news organization in 1941 would have passed on interviewing Hirohito or Hitler, or that doing so would have been treasonous or “a slap in the face of the American people.” In fact, the interviews would have been widely read and would have made banner headlines.

Another Bozell argument is that Bin Laden is a known “liar.” In other words, how can we believe what he says? Yet if deceit disqualified interview subjects, the Sunday morning interview shows would be out of business.

Bozell also noted, correctly, that “terrorists thrive on media exposure to spread their propaganda.” But Bin Laden has already reached his target audience abroad, thanks to Al Jazeera.

It’s useful to again review that basic media course covering mutual manipulation: Scratch My Back and I’ll Scratch Yours 101. Whether newsmakers are terrorists, U.S. presidents or watchdogs such as Bozell, the media use and are used.

This trade, which is fundamental to journalism, goes like this: I get your story or quote, you get my space. If what you provide is unworthy, no deal, no exposure.

So if Bin Laden fails to come through in a way meaningful to the U.S. public--inevitably a judgment call--CNN should flip him off.

That is, of course, if he doesn’t flip off CNN first by not responding to its questions.

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Howard Rosenberg’s column appears Mondays and Fridays. He can be contacted via e-mail at howard.rosenberg@latimes.com.