President Obama's Second-Term Team
http://thedianerehmshow.org/shows/2013-01-08/president-obamas-second-term-team
President Barack Obama picks former Sen. Chuck Hagel for defense secretary and John Brennan as CIA director. Diane and her guests discuss battles ahead as the president seeks to build his second-term team.
Guests
Rachel Smolkin
White House editor, Politico
Siobhan Gorman
Intelligence and Homeland Security Correspondent, Wall Street Journal
Tom Bowman
NPR Pentagon correspondent
Comments
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Hello Diane,
I was intrigued by the exchange between a caller who urged journalists to avoid the phrase "enhanced interrogation techniques" and Rachel Smolkin. Rachel defended the use of the phrase, saying that using the term "torture" was so strong that it implied taking a side against it. I can understand her point. However, the euphemistic "enhanced interrogation techniques" itself also implies taking a side for the people who coined the phrase. What I think we need here is a different phrase that does not obscure the truth, but also does not over-emphasize a point of view. I would leave it to the journalists to come up with such a phrase, but I think it is important to only report facts, not emphasizing or de-emphasizing them. The readers and listeners can then be free to decide for themselves what is the right policy.
Cordially,
Paul Pallansch
Hello,
I think the panelist who balked at using the term "torture" has balked in her duty as a member of the press to act as the watchdog of democracy. To avoid using the term because of an emotional or political charge attached is to simply diminish or or avoid the the issue.
See the movie 2016 Obama's America. Too bad conservative authors for the most part are unwelcome on this show.