ABC Nightline Friday: the Baghdad Blogger (Salam Pax)

[Bozita]

daily email:

Nightline Daily E-Mail
January 16, 2004


TONIGHT'S FOCUS: The final part of Nightline's week-long series: "Report from Iraq." Tonight Ted Koppel tours a Baghdad that few ever see with a man known around the world by his pseudonym and by his internet diary. Seeing Iraq through the eyes of the Baghdad Blogger--tonight.

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With all due respect to William Safire, first, a brief lesson on language. A blog is a colloquial term used by the web-savvy to refer to an Internet diary known as a web log. Blog for short. A blogger is someone who keeps a web diary and therefore invites millions of strangers to read his or her otherwise personal thoughts. Its like an instant column with no editorial or space restrictions--written by anyone who wants to write one. If you have never heard of bloggers, well, be assured, they are a very big deal.

And one of the most-read bloggers in the world is the Baghdad Blogger known by his pseudonym, Salam Pax, which means peace in both Arabic and Latin. Since 2002, from the grim final days of Saddam Hussein's dictatorship, through the 'shock and awe' bombing campaign that rained down on his home, and up through today's continuing violence and chaos, he has aired his observations and opinions. He was the digital voice of the average Iraq. And many of those missives ended up in an international best-seller last year.

Today Ted Koppel got a tour of Baghdad from Salam Pax and saw a Baghdad few western journalists ever see. It was from this vantage point that Nightline is able to show you how Iraqis are coping with the many newfound freedoms and challenges that the war has brought: freedom to open businesses, freedom of religion and freedom of speech.

This broadcast will conclude this week's five part series: Report from Iraq. We hope you'll join us.

Sara Just and the Nightline Staff
ABCNEWS Washington bureau

[buycitgo]

1. anybody been watching this week?

I've only seen brief snips, mostly last night, with Bremer, and each time, he was lobbing big, fat softballs at Bremer, then not following up.

was it just anomaly raising its head, or was he giving him the same kind of knobjob he gave Bush during the selection campaign in 00?

that was one of the most disgraceful performances I've ever seen by a "journalist"

[Clark4VotingRights]

2. I guess you didn't see Koppel's disgraceful Dem "debate"

I rarely watched him since coup2k, because he refused to report on it
(nothing to see here, move along).

After infomercial 2003, I'll never watch him again.
There can be no remaining doubt that he's the foremost media whore.
What you saw was no "anomaly."

[buycitgo]

3. you get no disagreement from me

don't forget one of his close pals is Kissinger

that says it all for me.....it's like the premier radio journalist in Germany was a dinner partner of Himmler

nobdoy cares, though

it's all just a game; a popularity contest, if it's the poshparty in power, that is. they MUST be included in the inner social circles.

if they DARE expose the dire reality of life here, they'll be......banned!


no parties, and, worse than that, no access to the liars who hand out the press releases, and whisper sweet less-than-nothings in their ears.

where would sleazy hacks like Novak be without their precious dinner parties, their priceless ACCESS?

[TheDalaiMama]

4. I have been watching and saw some unflattering things shown

about the situation in Iraq...it has been interesting to see how the real Iraqi's are living and not the secured fat cats in the green zone.

I don't think he has been flattering.

dalai

[Bozita]

5. ten minutes to airtime

[jab105]

6. kick...

never seen his face before...

[Robbien]

7. He does not look like I pictured him in my mind

He has such a light breezy way of writing that I imagined him to be of slighter stature. I am wondering how much of this is being edited out.

[Robbien]

8. You can hear the desperation in his voice

as he talks about how the governing council took away family law and put Iraqis back to secular law. This is so wrong.

[buycitgo]

9. he used the FREEPER death stat!

the one about fewer US deaths in Iraq than murders in Chicago or New York!

uhhhhh, Ted, how many people live in NY? how many soldiers are in Iraq? just for starters.....

how DARE you use such spurious, simplistic analogies?

[Robbien]

10. That's when I hit the off button

Ted Koeppel has sold out. Definately.

To wrap up, it is definately getting better per Ted.

Unless you are a women, a store owner, a shiite, a Kurd, or need electricity. Jeeze, didn't the man listen when Salam talked to him?