Oh, I agree that the ethical breech isn’t as huge as the overall story but it does point to a one ethical lapse, which in turn makes it that much more plausible that they knowingly printed a story they knew to be false, or at least suspected it was false as other news organizations did.

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Okay so the AP’s source exists (i.e. was not fabricated out of whole cloth) if you can believe the MoI. The AP has been using the wrong name all along, assuming they weren’t given the wrong name by the source who denies he is the source. If the AP used the wrong name, knowing it was the wrong name, then they are very much guilty of an ethical lapse. Why is it important to clearly identify a psuedonym as a psuedonym? When you say, in a news report, that Captain Jamil Hussein of the Baghdad Police reports or confirms some factual tidbit, we glean much for that introduction. First, the source is a police captain on the Baghdad Police Department. Second, since the source is named, the person is presumably authorized by his superiors to communicate with the press because he isn’t acting anonymously. Third, because he is not hiding his name, he is not afraid to be cross-examined regarding the information he is presenting. By using a pseudonym without admitting to it, he achieves all this without the danger of facing repercussions from his superiors or elsewhere, and he can avoid having to talk to anyone double-checking the veracity of his testimony.

Assuming the facts we know we know are in fact factual, AP either knowingly used an unacknowledged pseudonym, or was misled into using it. If the latter is true, I would expect AP to acknowledge it, aggressively investigate who that person really is, why they lied and also why their verification process failed to reveal that the good Captain wasn’t who he said he was. That is what bemuses me: how does a news agency validate an official government source? It shouldn’t be very easy to do or people would be doing it quite frequently. Perhaps markers that work in other parts of the world, such as presence and acceptance in a government facility, are sufficient in those places, but it would seem even then AP would want to know that they were talking to someone with a specific name.

I don’t think this is huge Curt, at least nowhere near as important as the impact of fabricated news stories. But as is often the case, it isn’t the crime but the coverup that screws the pooch. Unless the AP has knowingly perpetrated some fraud, they have much more to loose by being obstinate and evasive than by just owning up. The only good reason to resist that approach is that they will then be obligated to reinvestigate every story that Captain Jamil was a source for–a daunting task.

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Why am I not surprised? I excerpted and linked in Part 36 of my Jamilgate series.

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Very interesting … after several days of lower than average death tolls out of Baghdad, we have two large Baghdad Bodies reports from Reuters. Exactly 40 for yesterday and exactly 60 for today. As usual, one sentance, no specific source credited:

BAGHDAD – Police recovered the bodies of 60 people with gunshot wounds and signs of torture from various parts of Baghdad in the 24 hours to Wednesday evening, an Interior Ministry source said.

This puts the monthly body count back where it “belongs”.

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Great job. Thanks for the update. Keep after them. Wouldn’t it be imaginable that there is an terrorist working for the AP and he made up the whole story to begin with? Hmm…

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I think there is a very valuable piece of research which, unfortunately, I have neither the time nor resources to do.

As someone else has pointed out, virtually all of the 61 stories of Jamil Hussein have him claiming shi’ite on sunni violence. So here is my research project: go through the 61 stories, and count up the dead and wounded sunnis. Then go through all of the other AP stories of shi’ite on sunni violence through the same time period. What percentage of the shi’ite on sunni violence is simply the uncorroborated word of Capt Hussein?

The AP keeps trying to divert the subject into whether or not the AP invented Jamil Hussein. The real question here is whether or not the Iraqi “Civil War” is an invention — whether invented by AP or by propagandists using the AP as (willing or unwilling) dupes. And Jamil Hussein’s existence is only relevant to the extent that we’d like to ask him some questions that would give us a better idea of just how much of the reported shi’ite on sunni violence in Iraq really happened. If he does not exist, then probably most of the violence sourced to his reports didn’t happen. If he does exist, then we’d need to get some more information about him and from him to decide whether or not to believe that the events that he reported really occurred.

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Apparently AP seems to think that handing out such drivel for the world to suck up as undeniable truth is an accepted way of doing business.

I say it’s no way to run a news service that millions of people a day are exposed to and take outright lies and deception as fact, then go on and formulate governmental policy, form opinions and cast their fortunes upon such non news!

There has got to be some lawyering firm willing to take on possibly the biggest class action suit of the century! The harm they do with such disinformation, aka read as unverifiable, meaning rumor mongering causing millions of dollars daily of potential misspending by our govts, blown speculation by stock investors, not to mention the emotional distress caused to individuals as well!

No this a very good case to take up. First amendment only exists in the US! Take it to international court, (they hate everybody)!

Now I realize that verifying sources can be tough, especially within the borders of Iraq today, but they at a mininum have the responsibility to disclose that the source of the story may or may be speaking the truth and as such lable the report as rumor and file it correctly until it can indeed be proven.

But that young lady from AP so far, seems to have only the ability to change feet that protrude from her mouth. Quit a trick I will say, but I tire of it.

AP I suggest you find your cousin Vinnie. The claimant side will have one hella line up!

Then even the press industry can be taught a valuable lesson, if you can’t or won’t police your own industry, which is beyond obvious you lake the will or ability to do so, then others will. And we will use the WILL of the people to do so!

Who’s in?

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How retarded is this?

I challenge floppingaces to challenge AP to produce the audio or transcript of this interview.

Should I also whip out a velvet glove, slap them across the face, and challenge them to a duel?

Read the whole post and then get back to me, I posted the email I received from the CPATT rep, which explains everything. I also asked him to double check that this Jamil guy has NO Hussein in his name. When I hear from him I will post an update. If he does have a Hussein in his name then we have a Jamil Hussein who denies being the AP source. If he doesn’t have the Hussein in his name then we have a guy who denies being the source along with the fact that the AP used a pseudonym without disclosing that fact for a guy who denies being their source.

Either way you shake it, the AP is full of it.

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The AP has the admission by the Interior Minister official. Does Costlow have the audio or transcript?

I challenge floppingaces to challenge AP to produce the audio or transcript of this interview. AP will give it to you. Because apparently floppingaces now believes this Iraqi Ministry official was somehow lying, or never spoke the word “Hussein”.

Or another option is to lay the case to rest and avoid being embarassed by the AP once again.

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So, what they’ve done is gone from using questionable stringers to deliberately misquoting people in an attempt to cover a bogus source.

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