Thursday, February 02, 2006

No communication with Washington Post re: Toles cartoon

I can't sign in to the Washington Post.com page.
To our Readers:
washingtonpost.com is undergoing maintenance and some sections of the site are temporarily unavailable. We apologize for the inconvenience. Of course, the latest news and updates will continue to be available on our home page.
I know that WaPo published the letter from the Joint Chiefs of Staff as a letter to the editor without comment from the editor.

I know that Howard Kurtz has a piece published in WaPo today titled "Toles Pen Too Pointed" but I can't get the article to open. The first line is "Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff assails a Washington Post cartoon as 'beyond tasteless.'" I don't know if Kurtz is fer it or agin' it.

Does anybody have Kurtz's article anywhere besides washingtonpost.com?

Is everybody having the same problem with washingtonpost.com?

I should have posted about this hours ago but my LAN connection has been kaput. (My favorite line in Saving Private Ryan: the Germans in a town being besieged by the Americans were blasting propaganda at their attackers through loudspeakers. A German shouted, "Zee Statue uff Leeberty iss kapoot!" Hanks mutters, "The Statue of Liberty is kaput. That's disconcerting.")

Lack of communication with an MSM web service for which I pay nothing is, er, disconcerting.

UPDATE: I got it open through Memeorandum. Thanks, Gabe!

I see that Kurtz's opinion, while not stated outright, must support the WaPo's and Toles' opinions that there was nothing offensive about the cartoon and it accurately reflects the condition of the United States Army. Hmmm. Kurtz publishes ripostes by Toles and Fred Hiatt, The Post's editorial page editor, in a defense against the Joint Chiefs' letter. Kurtz makes no statement of opinion about the cartoon or the letter or WaPo's defense of the cartoon.

Kurtz also quotes Dave Autry, deputy communications director for Disabled American Veterans, as saying that he was "certainly not" offended by the cartoon.
"It was graphic, no doubt about it," he said. "But it drove home a point, that there are critically ill patients that certainly need to be attended to."
That was not the point of the cartoon at all. The point of the cartoon was to derogate SecDef Rumsfeld and his statements earlier in the week when he said the U.S. military is "battle hardened" and an "enormously capable force."

The cartoon had nothing whatsoever to do with wounded veterans except to use the caricature of a quadruple amputee to score a political point. Dave Autry needs to remove his head from his, er, kapoot. Political cartoonist Toles and editor Hiatt need to remove theirs from their respective kapoots, also.


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