LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Don't judge writer by his letter

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To the editor:

(re: “Feel free to speak freely, as long as you say what we say,” April 5)

Your April 5 editorial was 100 percent correct that journalists should not be forced to give opinions that are not their own.

But what the Sinclair Broadcast Group did was unique only in how dumb they did it. Mainstream news organizations limit opinions and even what “news” can be reported. But they’re at least smart enough not to give every reporter the exact same script.

I get much information from independent publications via the internet, such as CounterPunch (which I subscribe to) and sources emailed to me by Reader Supported News. 

The recently deceased former Associated Press and Newsweek reporter Robert Parry was exiled from the mainstream media for being too truthful, so he formed his own publication, Consortium News.

From him and other independent sources, I learned details of the U.S.-funded February 2014 Ukraine coup. Briefly, a democratically elected president who was friendly with Russia was forced out of office and had to flee for his life. When Ukraine nationalists attacked the mostly Russian-populated Crimea, Russian forces already stationed there defended them. The Crimean people then voted by 90 percent to rejoin Russia.

Yet the entire mainstream media reported this as a Russian invasion. Just as in 2003, they almost unanimously reported that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. Just as in 1964, they reported that North Vietnamese forces attacked U.S. forces in the Gulf of Tonkin.

Since I’m not writing a book, I won’t go into all the other examples.

The Riverdale Press should be commended for being an open forum for all opinions, except for a brief aberration that thankfully lasted less than a year. But Adam Stoler seems to have a problem with this (re: “Response? Sorry, no one’s listening,” April 12), saying that Alvin Gordon’s letter (re: “Where was the liberal response?” April 5) should not be published.

While I am not a fan of Alvin Gordon’s or Paul Birnbaum’s writing, I can find no objection to their description of Hillary Clinton as crooked. Though I disagree with voting for Crooked Donald to stop Crooked Hillary.

The candidate who was honest, humane, intelligent and in possession of the best ideas was the Green Party candidate, Dr. Jill Stein.

The first big problem I have with Stoler’s letter is the hypocrisy of criticizing Gordon’s factually detailed letter as nothing more than a personal attack, when his own letter is nothing more than a personal attack on Gordon.

The second problem is his claim that Gordon’s letter is libelous. I Googled and re-read Gordon’s “Crooked Hillary” letter. Of the search for something libelous, I can paraphrase a George Kennedy line from “Cahill, U.S. Marshal” — “I looked, but it just wasn’t there.”

For all I know, Gordon might be the type of person I would not want to meet. But making that judgment strictly on political differences is questionable. I’ve often disagreed with Birnbaum, including a number of times in print. Yet I find him to be a pleasant person to carry on a conversation with.

Richard Warren

Richard Warren

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