Mike Wallace does not deserve to “RIP”
Before you weep crocodile tears over the passing of Mike Wallace, just a reminder of who he was, and more precisely, who he THOUGHT he was:
From the April 1989 MediaWatch: Peter Jennings and Mike Wallace Agree — Reporters First, Americans Second
In a future war involving U.S. soldiers what would a TV reporter do if he learned the enemy troops with which he was traveling were about to launch a surprise attack on an American unit? That’s just the question Harvard University professor Charles Ogletree Jr, as moderator of PBS’ Ethics in America series, posed to ABC anchor Peter Jennings and 60 Minutes correspondent Mike Wallace. Both agreed getting ambush footage for the evening news would come before warning the U.S. troops. For the March 7 installment on battlefield ethics Ogletree set up a theoretical war between the North Kosanese and the U.S.-supported South Kosanese. At first Jennings responded: “If I was with a North Kosanese unit that came upon Americans, I think I personally would do what I could to warn the Americans.” Wallace countered that other reporters, including himself, “would regard it simply as another story that they are there to cover.” Jennings’ position bewildered Wallace: “I’m a little bit of a loss to understand why, because you are an American, you would not have covered that story.” ”Don’t you have a higher duty as an American citizen to do all you can to save the lives of soldiers rather than this journalistic ethic of reporting fact?” Ogletree asked. Without hesitating Wallace responded: “No, you don’t have higher duty… you’re a reporter.” This convinces Jennings, who concedes, “I think he’s right too, I chickened out.” Ogletree turns to Brent Scrowcroft, now the National Security Adviser, who argues “you’re Americans first, and you’re journalists second.” Wallace is mystified by the concept, wondering “what in the world is wrong with photographing this attack by North Kosanese on American soldiers?” Retired General William Westmoreland then points out that “it would be repugnant to the American listening public to see on film an ambush of an American platoon by our national enemy.” A few minutes later Ogletree notes the “venomous reaction” from George Connell, a Marine Corps Colonel. “I feel utter contempt. Two days later they’re both walking off my hilltop, they’re two hundred yards away and they get ambushed. And they’re lying there wounded. And they’re going to expect I’m going to send Marines up there to get them. They’re just journalists, they’re not Americans.” Wallace and Jennings agree, “it’s a fair reaction.” The discussion concludes as Connell says: “But I’ll do it. And that’s what makes me so contemptuous of them. And Marines will die, going to get a couple of journalists.”
Colonel Connell made it clear here, just who our American troops are. And Mike Wallace (and Peter Jennings) made it clear who the majority of American journalists are. So please, save the crocodile tears for our troops.
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I need no more reason to not mourn Mike Wallace than he was a part of the complicit media that supported the overthrow of the US government by foisting the usurper Barry Soetoro on us.
There is a special place in hell for all “journolists” that participated in the scamming of America.
I remember that TV show; I was thinking about Mike Wallace this weekend as I heard he’d passed away. With the low esteem we hold most journalists in these days, I thought there was something bad about him I’d heard. You just reminded me what it was. Mike Wallace had the good or bad fortune of having lived a long life. But along with that life are responsibilities that go with it, in your profession and your personal life. I don’t think he lived a responsible life.
Regarding the other person, Peter Jennings. While I don’t know him as well, I understand he was a Canadian citizen originally, he may have been an American citizen later in life, but I don’t know. He also should be ashamed for his remarks.
Perhaps both of these people rethought their answers to that question later in life and repudiated them…we don’t know. But from those answers I don’t believe I’d want to entertain either of these people in my home.
Glad to see someone finally remembers who the ‘real’ Mike Wallace was.
US Attorney General Eric Holder’s Ballot to Vote Offered to Total Stranger
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=P5p70YbRiPw
“No, you don’t have higher duty… you’re a reporter.” That may be the crowning statement of this entire piece – and the reason the press is held in such low esteem by the majority of Americans.
There have been far better journalists who have passed away recently. One such person was a woman who was killed in Syria. She had compassion for the oppressed people and could not stay away. Yes she was giving news reports. The Assad regime was after her and they killed her along with a French photographer.
Similar things happened in Libya where the journalists were killed by Gadhafi goons, and the deaths were intentional. I would think that these people would have secretly given information to those in danger. As it was, they were with the opposition to Gadhafi.
Many years ago 5 Australian journalists lost their lives in East Timor. The Indonesians had invaded East Timor and they were killed, but it was not in the cross-fire per the official explanation.
All of these journalists are of a far better quality than Mike Wallace.
Can you imagine being a serviceman and having to deal with an embedded reporter? They not only have to fight the war, but they have to protect the stupid reporters who are traveling with them – reporters who would sell them out for a good story in a heartbeat. Then, when a reporter DOES begin to see the reality of the military situation, and begins to form sympathy and affection for these men who fight and die to ensure that that same reporter can continue to report those stories, when that reporter begins to report on the military in a positive way, they are criticized and ostracized by others in their profession for “selling out.”
These people are largely ignorant scumbags who think they are so much smarter than the rest of us and so much better than we are.
Leftism is medical psychopathy; the real question is why must we deal with mad-men and mad-women?