Tempest in a teapot: Johnny Carson's big mouth

[dougie_monty]

From http://www.snopes.com :

On Feb. 1 host Johnny Carson opened the show with what he called a retraction. He recalled that some time previously his writers had manufactured a gag about an Iraqi announcer called “Baghdad Betty” telling soldiers their womenfolk were being romanced at home by “Tom Selleck, Tom Cruise and Homer Simpson.”
The story spread, Carson said, and soon it was being retold, even on wire services, as fact, with one change-- Homer Simpson, the father in The Simpsons animated cartoon series, was replaced by Bart Simpson, his 9-year-old son.
Said Carson: “It was a joke. We made it up. There is no ‘Baghdad Betty’.”
Another legend bites the dust.
War is hell. And sometimes the joke’s on us.

Acknowledgement to the Mikkelsons and the Urban Legend website for this one.
Isn’t this an indiscreet thing for Carson to do? I don’t recall that the U. S. Military asked him to butt in. It sounds like another illustration of the maxim from the book of James, “Well, the tongue is a fire…”
Any agreement?

[PlanMan]

Johnny said this on Feb.1? Has the signal been bouncing around the ether for (how many?) years?

Oh, checked Snopes, was way back in 1991.

[tomndebb]

Indiscreet to tell a joke that makes fun of the intelligence of one’s enemies? I would think it would be generally standard practice among all nations in any war.

BTW, at the bottom of each snopes page is a note indicating the URL for a direct link to that page. The URL for this story is
http://www.snopes.com/radiotv/radio/baghdad.htm