JOHN BURNS

My friend Parley sends along a link to this interview with NYT reporter John Burns, who covered Baghdad during the war and who criticizes his colleagues for "sucking up" to Iraqi leaders and ignoring human rights abuses in Iraq. It's worth a read. Two of his claims should be highlighted: (1) members of the Iraqi regime did intimidate journalists (including Burns) -- and those officials probably also correctly noted the professional pressures that require journalists to gain "access" as their ticket to the story and used those pressures to their advantage, and (2) particularly resourceful journalists claim that they were able to evade reprisals and focus on the story as they saw it. It seems to me that an independent media would take both lessons to heart, and not just in covering future Baghdads.