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On
Syria,
Rose Ignores
Qatar, Saudi
Bahrain,
Leers about
Gaddafi

By
Matthew
Russell Lee

UNITED
NATIONS,
September 10
— On Syria,
PBS at 11 pm
on Monday
belatedly
ran the full
hour of Charlie
Rose’s Sunday
morning
interview with
Bashar
al-Assad.
Much had
changed in the
interim, not
least the
proposal
that Syria let
the UN oversee
or destroy
chemical
weapons.

 
But there was
Charlie Rose,
reading
questions off
a list with
little
follow up. And
here Inner
City Press is
putting online
a transcript
— with a few
lines in
Russian — of
Russian
Ambassador
Vitaly
Churkin’s
response.
Talk about
weird timing.

  
Rose
repeated that
Syria delayed
the UN
inspectors,
with Inner
City Press’
follow
up questions
with the UN
showed that
the UN only
formally
requested
access to
Ghouta on
August 24,
granted the
next day.

  
In
a telling
moment, when
Assad noted
that the US
used depleted
uranium
in Iraq (the
effect in
Fallujah were
shown by VICE
last season)
and
Israel used
white
phosphorus in
Gaza, Rose
just moved on
to the next
question.
Next!

  
Same
when Rose
intoned that
people don’t
want one
family running
a
country. What
about Saudi
Arabia? What
about Qatar?
What, as one
Inner City
Press follower
chimed in,
about the
Bushes?

  
Rose
seemed to leer
when he asked
Assad if he
was worry
about what
happened to
Gaddafi —
visions of gun
butts dancing
in his head.
Is
this the
West’s
accountability?

Showing
his
crack
knowledge of
Syria’s
divisions,
Rose called it
a minority
sect
dictatorship.
But what about
Bahrain?

Anyway,
the
news cycle had
moved on. Here
though is a
transcript of
Churkin
with some
Russian. Here
now is PBS’,
to watch.
Watch this
site.