Monday, January 29, 2007

Yesterday I Was A "Star"

And so what, today I'm chopped liver?

I was a "star" yesterday as reported to me by an Action Point listener, because Firedoglake (FDL) was linked to this site for the streaming of my interview with FDL editor and co-founder of Vaster Books, Jane Hamsher and Marcy Wheeler ("emptywheel") author of Anatomy of Deceit, Vaster's first book release.

Anyway, the interview was fast and I managed to NOT ask Marcy to comment on any specific content of the book, somehow--just skipped it--but maybe that's coz I always feel that when folks read the book they'll know the content so hey, let's take the interview time to get the 'behind-the-scenes' skinny. Like the Star or Inquirer, People or Time, okay any good interview magazine, were there any, geared especially for the blogosphere. Oh, there aren't. Hey--that's why it was my job!

And I did that fairly well. Listen to it here.

For those who DO want a sample of the content, Anatomy of Deceit covers the major characters like Dick Cheney, "Curveball", Judith Miller, Robert Novak, Patrick Fitzgerald and Karl Rove, etc., involved in media leading up to the invasion of Iraq and beyond: what the media did not report or how individual investigators appeared to intentially avoid or leave out or in some cases were not even privy to, specific items of related information.

For example, and one of my favorites, is how Judith Miller breathlessly covers the opening of a water filled Iraqi military operations station (complete with floating dead animals, stench and filth) to find a seventh century Talmud (great human interest--we 'liberated' a Muslim country to save old Hebrew texts). She creates a scene absolutley sounding as if this was the location's first exploration. And voila--in another room they find some documents suggesting uranium connections--oh, and she also leaves out removal of 60 TONS of documents in the days before she arrived. Oops (blush).

Great book. Fun read (I was laughing anyway).

Anatomy of Deceit: How the Bush Administration Used the Media to Sell the War and Smear a Critic