This past Sunday evening, I watched the CBS’s 60 Minutes interview with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and was stunned by what I witnessed. In fact, I was so stunned, I went into the “live blogging” mode at Daily Kos for nearly four hours, just to calibrate my own reaction, and see if I was being overly sensitive. Thankfully, it appears that I wasn’t losing my political bearings, as my opinion was mirrored by many others who watched the show.

The reporter who conducted the interview, Scott Pelley, sat down with Ahmadinejad in Tehran before the Iranian president left for his controversial trip to New York. Now, let’s be clear - I’m not a fan of Ahmadinejad - quite to the contrary. I think the guy is a dangerous fruitcake. The fact that he’s a holocaust denier (and sponsored a conference of like-thinking anti-Israel opinion leaders from around the world, including David Duke) tells you everything you need to know. Plus, I think he’s got a bit of Saddam in him. By that, I mean that he’s going to show a brave and bellicose face to the world, and not blink at George Bush’s empty threats. In fact, if George Bush was making anything more than empty threats, Ahmadinejad would probably be more conciliatory.

Anyway, it wasn’t Mahmoud Ahmadinejad answers to Pelley’s line of questioning that got me going. It was Scott Pelley himself. From the very outset, Pelley was posing confrontational statements (not questions) as “fact”, and was flat out insulting to the head of state of a foreign nation. We’re not talking about hard questions here, but his body language, his tone and his presentation. We’re talking about Pelley catapulting Bush regime talking points as “fact” - unsupported statements rather than questions - when in fact, nothing could be further from the truth. Here are a few examples:

PELLEY: Mr. President, you say that the two nations are very close to one another, but it is an established fact now that Iranian bombs and Iranian know-how are killing Americans in Iraq. You have American blood on your hands. Why?
…
PELLEY: Mr. President, American men and women are being killed by your weapons in Iraq. You know this…the American Army has captured Iranian missiles in Iraq. The critical elements of the explosively formed penetrator bombs that are killing so many people are coming from Iran. There’s no doubt about that anymore. The denials are no longer credible, sir…

PELLEY: Mr. President, you must have rejoiced more than anyone when Saddam Hussein fell. You owe President Bush. This is one of the best things that’s ever happened to your country…

PELLEY: I asked President Bush what he would say to you if he were sitting in this chair. And he told me, quote, speaking to you, that you’ve made terrible choices for your people. You’ve isolated your nation. You’ve taken a nation of proud and honorable people and made your country the pariah of the world. These are President Bush’s words to you. What’s your reply to the president? …

The transcripts above (from CBS’s website) can’t begin to convey the absolute disrespect and disregard that Pelley exhibited during the course of the interview. More importantly, it seemed clear to me that Pelley’s statements and words were both suggested and vetted by someone in the Bush regime.

I complain frequently about the U.S. legacy media, as do most bloggers on both the right and left. But at the end of the day, most broadcast news reporting is more focused on the entertainment value (and advertiser draw) than it is on investigative journalism or getting the story correct.

But Pelley’s interview was so far over the top, and so obviously scripted by the Bush regime, that my concern becomes: the Bush administration is now practicing diplomacy via a reporter, and using a popular news show to catapult propaganda that can’t be proven, and present the propaganda as “fact”.

It was scary. I have never witnessed the U.S. media being so totally co-opted by the Bush regime.

We entered a new phase in the saber rattling on Sunday evening.

And, interestingly enough, just about the time that the 60 Minutes interview was airing, the following story was posted by Associated Press, and was the number one story on Yahoo!’s front page immediately after the interview aired:

BAGHDAD - The U.S. military accused Iran on Sunday of smuggling surface-to-air missiles and other advanced weapons into Iraq for use against American troops. The new allegations came as Iraqi leaders condemned the latest U.S. detention of an Iranian in northern Iraq, saying the man was in their country on official business…

Coincidence?? Isn’t it just a bit interesting that Pelley brought up these same allegations in his interview with Ahmadinejad, which was taped in Iran days before the AP story?

There may also have been some “translation issues” with the interview. I received an email from a reader of my Daily Kos live blogging:

One of the questions Pelly asked over and over again concerned the “bomb”. Ahmadinejad’s answer are in Farsi. My husband is Iranian, and of course speaks Farsi. The answer was edited by 60 Minutes to give an incomplete quote. Ahmadinajad said: “The day of the bomb is over. Now is the time for dialog.” The part with “now is the time for dialog” was edited out of the English translation. The full translation is on CBS.com/60 Minutes. [linked above - ed.] It did not appear there either. There was an agenda there.

Indeed. That was obvious to the most casual observer. Also, let’s be clear, the transcript does not convey the confrontational nature of the interview. So, if you can, watch the video of the interview on CBS’s website.

Jill from Brilliant at Breakfast has more…and there’s more here.