(Erehwon is a faraway land described in the novel of the same name by Samuel Butler. Erehwon spelled backward is the source of network nightly television news according to the early but still definitive study by Edward Jay Epstein.)
The interview of Washington Post Managing Editor Philip Bennett by China's People's Daily Washington correspondent Young Tang just linked by Drudge is a bit too much for me to comment on right now.
(Aside from the title of this post, and a few asides below.)
Interesting questions from People's Daily correspondent:
. How does the [Post] view the image and role of America in the world?
. How does [the Post] perceive China as Chinese people march forcefully toward a market economy?
. How does the [Post] struggle to maintain the glory of Watergate amid strong resentment from the Bush administration?
Interesting statements from the Post Managing Editor:
. I don't think [the United States] should be the leader of the world
. But it is important for Chinese to understand that the image of America is many things, not just the image of the government. American culture, as expressed in Movies and music etc, is still quite popular in the world today. [[After explaining the many ways in which the actions of the administration have made America very unpopular in the world today.]]
. I don't think there is much evidence that promoting democracy is what the US is doing. It is what it says it is doing.
. We have a little bit different roles in newspapers compared with our counterparts in Europe and other countries. We don't have any political point of view that we are trying to advance. We don't represent any political parties. We are not tied to any political movement. On the news side of the paper we try not to give opinions. [[Has this man shown any other signs of being delusional?]]
. So I think the role the Washington Post should play is to hold the government accountable for decisions made by it. [[And I thought the government was accountable to the electorate, and that newspapers were to report facts and opinions, not judgements.]]
. One of the jobs of our correspondents in Baghdad is to tell our readers what the Bush administration is trying to hide. [[Without, of course, actually committing treason.]]
. As you said, we are not aggressive enough in challenging and testing the statements the government is making. For me, this episode is a good example of how difficult it is to independently verify the government's claims when the government is lying to you. [[The episode of "lying" appears to be the opinion at the time held by every intelligence service in world that Sadaam had WMD.]]
. Neither The Washington Post, nor the New York Times, nor any other big newspapers, refer to China today as a dictatorship regime. We don't use these words on the paper any more.
