Khadr: Extraordinary Excision of Crucial Passages By Media

"While Khadr insisted he was acting unprovoked to clear his guilty conscience, it seems beyond a reasonable doubt that a kid who had withstood years of torture and the best interrogation techniques imaginable without confessing would suddenly blurt out the truth as his trial was about to begin. Let’s not forget, this is the same Omar Khadr who was coerced into fabricating the nonsense that he’d actually seen Ottawa resident Maher Arar at a Pakistan training camp." Don Martin, online, but excised from National Post Tuesday print edition, and not for space. Yet this passage is one of the best at underlining how sick and absurd the whole thing is. I would have thought such writing, reminding everyone how wrong they were on Maher Arar, and baldly stating truth that Khadr was tortured, and that under torture anyone will say anything, no matter how ridiculous, such as that nugget they got Khadr to say, that he'd seen seen Arar at a Pakistan training camp,...I'd think that is precisely the sort of thing a supposed no-nonsense, rough & ready, free-speech fundamentalist paper like the Post would want to publish. Or is that considered too difficult for their conservative readers' delicate sensibilities? Awful when reality trenchantly contradicts one's world view, eh?

And the line I highlighted Monday, "a pledge never to take legal action against the United States" disappeared from the Globe and Mail's Tuesday print edition, as it has online, from all but a few reports. Is it because "the exact terms" are still to be verified? Still, there are at least four other outlets that have that crucial report up, using "reportedly", or "based on what his lawyer said Sunday", etc.. To wit, "As part of the deal, Khadr agreed to help U.S. terrorism investigators and to refrain from taking legal action against the United States, the Globe and Mail says", quoth Foreign Policy. The ABA Journal concurs. As does UPI. At the Huffington Post, Daphne Eviatar still says: "Although as part of his plea agreement Omar Khadr has waived his right to appeal his conviction or to sue the United States for his confinement or treatment, a dark cloud continues to shadow this case."

And maybe a dark cloud shadows the media too, again.