Not to lean on Katic Couric this morning, but she deserves this one, too… She had a story this morning on Jill Carroll, the American reporter kidnapped in Iraq by insurgents. She interviewed a fellow journalist (a pretty level-headed guy) about her, and he spoke well of Jill and her style of reporting. And she had an FBI analyst on to talk about Jill’s prospects for freedom. What made me do a spit-take was Katie’s statement to the FBI guy —
“how likely is it that Jill will be freed, since America has a policy of not negotiating with terrorists?”
What? Um, Katie. You’re getting real life mixed up with the movies again. That was Harrison Ford, not George Bush. We negotiate with terrorists ALL THE TIME. That “missing” 8.8 Billion dollars was passed out as cash payments to insurgents, Katie, to pay them to clear a green zone in Baghdad. America traded prisoners from Abu Graib for kidnapped contract mercenaries — paid killers — at more than one time. America traded for guns, money, oil, roads, towns, Halliburton. America paid the insurgents not to attack before both of the elections, Katie. George Bush is a whore who’s slept with every criminal in Iraq. The only dirty, filthy thing that George won’t do is negotiate for an actual American citizen. Because they’re expendable.