What do you think he would have said if he’d received the death penalty? ::open secret:: The same thing “America, you lost…I won” ::open secret::
He spun life in solotary confinement into a propaganda headline.
And made the feds look like dummies.
But if it had gone the other way he still would have acted the winner. He clearly wanted to take credit for killing people. He would have.
But anyone following the trial knew that they had caught a terrorist wannabe, not anyone actually connected with those particular crimes. An accomplice at most.
I blame the press for his winning the spin. Of course, had he just sat there and the DA made a spin announcement, they would have trumpeted that as well.
I guess this is Yellow Journalism’s inverse: instead of the days when newspapermen like Hearst would spin the news, now the newsmakers spin the news. Does that put us ahead in any way? No, it’s still spun news.
Of course. That’s the news. But who really believes that Moussaoui “won” anything besides him? All I have to say to him is “So spending the rest of your life in solitary is ‘winning,’ eh? Well, congratulations. Hope that career choice works out well for you, dude.”
Nah. The right wing has so cowed the press over the past couple of decades that they’re afraid to do anything but simply report what others say, context be damned!
Or maybe it’s because the shocking comment by Moussaoui “I won” is an eye-catcher, and will sell papers. No one seems to realize that if Moussaoui had been sentenced to death he’d be proclaiming, “I won!” because he’d be martyred for his part in this noble plot. See? He’d be spinning it either way. He’s got a winning line, and there’s no way to spin it otherwise.
It’s not hard to argue that Moussaoui is right, though. The fact is that by elevating a two-bit player like him to the status of Terrorist Mastermind Extraordinaire in order to keep more Americans in a panic over the White House’s program of Permanent War, al Qaeda and groups like it are enjoying an achievement they wouldn’t otherwise have managed. In that sense, Moussaoui has accomplished far more for al Qaeda than someone of his caliber is likely to manage, all thanks to the wonderful PR our politicians and their compliant press have given him.
I disagree. Not about the spinning, but about the remark that no one realizes it. I realize it. You realize it. The people in the vox-pop column in this morning’s paper made the same observation. Everybody realizes it. Just because the papers are duly reporting Moussaoui’s ranting doesn’t mean that the wack-job has anyone bamboozled.
So what was the government supposed to do? * Not * put the jerk on trial? Then leftie twits could complain that the poor precious misunderstood baby was being denied his human rights and make a fuss about that. Moussaoui’s trial was bound to attract press attention no matter what.
I can’t believe anyone would be so fucking incredibly stupid and mean-minded as to believe that the administration was trying to spin the trial to generate mass paranoia.
I dunno about the Moussaoui case, but those Raelians sure had the press eating out of their hands with that clone bs they were spinning. With no proof, the press was treating them like they weren’t some stupid jackass cult and might have actually cloned a person.
Sure, put him on trial. But call a spade a spade. I mean, if you catch a shoplifter, you don’t try him as if he were some kind of major crime boss. Unless you have difficulty with keeping things in perspective. Like the people who think Moussaoui was an ingenious terrorist mastermind instead of a low-level flunkie, for example.
By the way: if it’s the “lefty twits” who stand up for the human rights of “jerks” in this country, then count me among the “lefty twits.” How can you expect a country that won’t defend its worst citizens to come through for its best citizens?
And I can’t believe anyone would be so fucking incredibly stupid and naïve as to put total trust in an administration that’s been so obviously treating a two-bit criminal like he was Osama bin Laden himself. So I guess we’re even.
They should’ve tried him as the low-level Al-Queda operative he was, instead of over reaching with all the “20th hijacker” stuff and the idea that the obviously unhinged Moussaoui was some sort of key Al-Queda player.
The national press is ‘spun’ by almost everybody at this point (or perhaps it’s better to say it’s spinning itself). The name of the game, particularly in television, seems to be “speed,” not “information.” It has nothing to do with Moussaoui; if anything, I’d say he’s being given a skepticism that we don’t see often enough.
No matter how you slice, Moussaoui was in on the conspiracy. He knew what was going on, the other conspirators knew he knew, and he tried to take part. No matter how you look at it, he was an accomplice, and that makes him one of the conspirators. I don’t think the prosecutors overhyped their case very much, if at all. (Of course, attorneys in high profile cases do often overhype their cases.)
Maybe you follow different media. All the reports I read or saw spent far more time on Judge Brinkema’s retort to him, with which I’m sure we all agree. They couldn’t have reported that without reporting what she was retorting to, could they?
If that is true, then explain to me how you can prosecute someone for failing to provide a full confession and incriminate themselves by exposing the conspiracy to which they were a part? I think there is an amendment about that…
As a member of the national press, I can confidently say that anything said about Moussaoui is done with tongue firmly in cheek. The man’s a nut, everyone knows he’s a nut. Think of the trial as a portrait of insanity.
Even the courtroom illustrator appeared to be making fun of him on his last day in court. He made Moussaoui look like a fat schlub who really needed a shave.