[Media-watch] Newsnight / Comment on you exchange with David Edwards

[Darren Smith]

Dear Mr. Entwistle,

I read your exchange with David Edwards with interest. I welcome and
admire your willingness to engage with such strong, intelligent,
criticism.

I share a similar view to Mr. Edwards. I believe debates on selected
topics related to Iraq have been effectively absent on Newsnight by
their minimal coverage.

One topic is Iraqi cooperation with UNSCOM, leading to what the
Government would call their "expulsion" but others would call their
"pull out".  A theme of the Government's pro-war case is that we can
expect Saddam Hussein to obstruct weapons inspectors, a theme supported
by the "expulsion" version history, no matter how untrue.

Another topic is the present likelihood that Iraq possesses WMD. As
Mr. Edwards pointed out, credible sources say any remaining Iraq WMD
would now be sludge. Did Newsnight have a range of experts to examine
this very important claim?

One more topic is the huge success of the previous UNSCOM team, claimed
by credible sources, for example Scott Ritter, who says Iraq was
'fundamentally disarmed.' But yet pro-war spokespersons appearing on
Newsnight can, night after night, and without any hint of challenge by
your presenters, droll out the lie that Saddam Hussein has refused to
disarm for 12 years.

This criticism is not about the lack or minimal appearance of specific
figures: Noam Chomsky, George Monbiot, Edward Said, Denis Halliday, Rolf
Ekeus, Scott Ritter and so on. That's not the point. The point is that
crucial debates, ones utterly fundamental to rebutting the pro-war case,
were given next to no air time on Newsnight, were not treated
seriously. The reason I would like the previous listed dissidents to
appear on is because they would force these debates.

As Mr. Edwards very accurately observed, "we shouldn't even have to
discuss whether you have or haven't covered Ritter-type views." Lets
take another topic, a case in which Newsnight has performed very
well. Consider the topic of Britain going to war with or without a
second UN resolution. How many complaints have you received that this
was a debate not given any prominence, or not even covered all at?
Hopefully I'd assume very few, because that topic received a lot of air
time, I seem to recall. But the other topics?

Again, I'd echo Mr. Edwards point that this is not about any supposed
'conspiracy'. It's about Newsnight's unwillingness to move outside
excepted boundaries of debate, boundaries set by the powerful elements
of our society, boundaries patrolled by your presenters. On the wrong
side of that boundary you'll find the topics I listed above - no means
exhaustive - which have no powerful societal element as their champion,
which are treated as mere curiosities, suitable for an occasional
broadcast but considered insufficiently 'serious' to dominate the
agenda, and so effectively marginalised.

Regards,

Darren Smith

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