The self-centered mainstream American media has never impressed me. American people in general and American journalists in specific are so preoccupied with national issues or daily scandals that they are neither interested nor aware of happenings around the world. International issues don’t bother them at all.
On November 9, some Pakistani journalists in Washington were invited to the White House. We were told that President Bush would announce an important aid initiative for the Pakistani victims of the earthquake in the presence of the CEOs of five American industrial giants – Pfizer, General Electric, CitiBank, Zerox and UPS. These companies, prodded and encouraged by the President, committed to provide help and assistance in the reconstruction of the earthquake-devastated regions and the rehabilitation of the affected people.
A handful of Pakistani reporters reached the southeastern gate of the White House at the designated time. We were spared the body searches and led into the daily press briefing room. From there we were taken to the smaller Roosevelt Room. Here, chairs were arranged just like they are in a classroom and copies of the President’s speech were waiting for us. Chairs in the front of the room were for distinguished guests, such as Pakistan’s Ambassador to the United States Retired Gen. Jehangir Karamat, former Prime Minister of Pakistan Moeen Qureshi, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Christina Rocca and many more. The press sat in the back of the room.
Journalists who regularly attend White House press briefings, including Indian journalist Raghubir Goyal, known for his striking and dissenting questions, were also in attendance – he did not get a chance to display his acumen that day.
The President entered the room, followed by the five executives whose companies’ wealth far exceeds the joint fortune of at least half of the G7 [International Organization established in 1985 to facilitate economic cooperation among the world’s largest industrial nations – Canada, France, Germany, Great Britain, Italy, Japan, and United States] nations. Also present was Karen Hughes, who has been assigned the task of rebuilding America’s image in the Muslim world. An Arab newspaper, unimpressed with her recent visit to the Middle East, called her “Hurricane Hughes.”
President Bush, who looked gloomy and never smiled, calmly read out the statement and walked out of the room without saying anything else. As usual, members of the U.S. media asked questions that did not suit the occasion, totally ignoring the President’s special goodwill for Pakistan. One journalist asked Mr. Bush, “Will you meet Chalabi?” the Iraqi minister who happened to be in Washington that day.
His question felt as though Mohammad Ali had knocked me out with a left hook. Although the President did not entertain questions, this journalist made me wonder how he could ignore the deaths of 80,000 people so easily. Only moments after, Mr. Bush had recounted the horrors of the death and destruction caused by the earthquake.
This substandard practice has become part of journalism in the United States. Recently, during a joint press conference held by President Bush and visiting Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, the U.S. press displayed the same attitude, as the two countries announced their nuclear cooperation treaty. The journalists present ignored both the Indian Prime Minister and the significance of the treaty, instead asking President Bush questions concerning domestic politics. It was reminiscent of another such event when former Prime Minister of Pakistan Benazir Bhutto and former President Bill Clinton held a press conference at the White House, when, the U.S. media acted as though Bhutto was not physically present. The same thing happens when Gen. Pervez Musharraf visits the United States.
Indeed, this attitude of the U.S. media is very troubling. It is interesting to note that the media in India and Pakistan, unlike the press in the United States, cannot ignore any high- profile visit by a U.S. leader. I am sure Prime Minister Manmohan Singh must have felt quite helpless and humiliated as American journalists asked President Bush one irrelevant question after another.
I asked Iftikhar Ali, a veteran Pakistani journalist, who has for years reported from the United States for several Pakistani wire services, about the attitude of the U.S. media towards visiting foreign leaders. Ali said same thing happened during a joint news conference held by former President Ronald Reagan and Gen. Ziaul Haq, who was Pakistan’s military ruler during the 1980s, during one official visit to Washington and during the peak period of the Afghan war. During the conference, U.S. journalists asked President Reagan questions that only concerned domestic issues.
Ali also referred to the memoirs of Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, Pakistan’s former prime minister. Bhutto addressed an audience at the National Press Club in Washington during an official visit to the United States in 1973, soon after the Watergate Scandal had surfaced.
A journalist asked Bhutto what he thought about the Watergate cover up and Bhutto gave him a historic answer. He said, “I can tell you about water logging, because that problem is very important to Pakistan.”
The journalist had never heard of wasting of water in such a manner. Bhutto then gave a brief lecture on water logging, also explaining the nature of the larger environmental problem. The former Pakistani Prime Minister said, “Pakistan has lost five more acres of land to water logging during the few minutes it took for me to explain the problem to you.”
