shane77m
09-07-2012, 03:56 PM
Ben is really getting noticed now.
Swann’s report generated a storm of links on Twitter, along with praise from The Huffington Post and civil libertarian journalists like The Atlantic’s Conor Friedersdorf and the Guardian’s Glenn Greenwald.
He also earned high marks from a pair of experts I spoke with on Thursday. Gregory Johnsen, a Near East Studies scholar at Princeton University whose book The Last Refuge: Yemen, al-Qaeda, and America’s War in Arabia will be released soon, called Swann’s interview unusual.
“In an election year dominated by the economy and typical political rhetoric that you hear from both parties, I was surprised to see the issue of drones brought up, especially since it is very popular with the American public,” Johnsen said. “This is an important issue that is largely overlooked, with the exception of only a few national media outlets.”
And Joshua Foust, a fellow with the nonpartisan think tank American Security Project who is leading a new study on the use of drones, said Swann highlighted the subject very capably.
“He raised these issues directly with the president, which few national security reporters have done. He was definitely asking the right kinds of questions,” said Foust, who is also a correspondent at The Atlantic and a former CJR contributor. “In terms of national reporting, I’d like to see more of this in the national press. Actually getting officials on the record is becoming more and more rare.”
The direct questioning of Obama is what made this interview go viral, but this week’s segment was just the latest in a series of kill list-related stories Swann has covered for more than a year, including the first failed attempt by the U.S. to take out Awlaki; the subsequent killing of Awlaki and a companion, Samir Khan, who was also an American; an exploration of the constitutionality of the president ordering the killing of a U.S. citizen; a segment related to other national reports about the kill list, and comments made by former GOP presidential candidate Newt Gingrich during a debate. That history of reporting likely equipped him with the traits that Friedersdorf of The Atlantic observed in the Obama interview: “deep knowledge, reflection, logical analysis, and a willingness to challenge authority.”
http://www.cjr.org/swing_states_project/ohio_reporter_goes_on_attack_over_drones.php?page= all
Swann’s report generated a storm of links on Twitter, along with praise from The Huffington Post and civil libertarian journalists like The Atlantic’s Conor Friedersdorf and the Guardian’s Glenn Greenwald.
He also earned high marks from a pair of experts I spoke with on Thursday. Gregory Johnsen, a Near East Studies scholar at Princeton University whose book The Last Refuge: Yemen, al-Qaeda, and America’s War in Arabia will be released soon, called Swann’s interview unusual.
“In an election year dominated by the economy and typical political rhetoric that you hear from both parties, I was surprised to see the issue of drones brought up, especially since it is very popular with the American public,” Johnsen said. “This is an important issue that is largely overlooked, with the exception of only a few national media outlets.”
And Joshua Foust, a fellow with the nonpartisan think tank American Security Project who is leading a new study on the use of drones, said Swann highlighted the subject very capably.
“He raised these issues directly with the president, which few national security reporters have done. He was definitely asking the right kinds of questions,” said Foust, who is also a correspondent at The Atlantic and a former CJR contributor. “In terms of national reporting, I’d like to see more of this in the national press. Actually getting officials on the record is becoming more and more rare.”
The direct questioning of Obama is what made this interview go viral, but this week’s segment was just the latest in a series of kill list-related stories Swann has covered for more than a year, including the first failed attempt by the U.S. to take out Awlaki; the subsequent killing of Awlaki and a companion, Samir Khan, who was also an American; an exploration of the constitutionality of the president ordering the killing of a U.S. citizen; a segment related to other national reports about the kill list, and comments made by former GOP presidential candidate Newt Gingrich during a debate. That history of reporting likely equipped him with the traits that Friedersdorf of The Atlantic observed in the Obama interview: “deep knowledge, reflection, logical analysis, and a willingness to challenge authority.”
http://www.cjr.org/swing_states_project/ohio_reporter_goes_on_attack_over_drones.php?page= all