The New York Times in the News ... Again

And now the most telling two minutes in television, the latest from the wartime grapevine:

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War Words
As if The New York Times (search) did not have enough troubles, one of its war correspondents delivered a graduation speech over the weekend so virulently anti-war that some students stormed up the aisles, one student threw his cap and gown to the stage, and the speaker's microphone was unplugged three minutes into his 18-minute speech. It happened Saturday at Rockford College in Illinois, where Times correspondent Chris Hedges compared U.S. policy in Iraq to the behavior of piranhas and to tyranny. According to the Rockford Register-Star, Hedges characterized U.S. soldiers as boys from such places as Mississippi and Arkansas who he said joined the military for lack of other jobs. He said, "War in the end is always about betrayal. Betrayal of the young by the old, of soldiers by politicians, and idealists by cynics." The remarks brought jeers and shouts of God Bless America and someone twice pulled the plug on Hedges’ mike. After that, college President Paul Pribbenow told him to wrap up his speech.

Bush Push?
Former FBI Director Louis Freeh (search) is saying today that the Clinton administration was so eager to protect what it considered to be a "relationship with Iran" that it refused to help the FBI get interviews with key suspects in the 1996 bombing of the Khobar Towers complex in Saudi Arabia. Nineteen Americans died in that attack, which led to the arrest in that country of three members of Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed terror group. But Freeh said the Clinton administration was "unable or unwilling" to push the Saudi government to allow FBI agents to question the suspects. Freeh writes in today's Wall Street Journal that out of desperation, he turned to former President George Bush who privately and successfully interceded with Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah, and the interviews happened. That led to recommendations for indictments, but the Clinton administration balked at that, too.

Agent Agitation?
U.S. border agents and airport inspectors are no longer allowed to use or even carry cell phones while inside inspection areas and one customs inspector at O'Hare International Airport says it's all because of Illinois Democratic Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky. The inspector tells WorldNet Daily that Schakowsky "wigged out" when another inspector with a cell phone told her to put hers away before going through customs. He said the congresswoman even threatened to "bring this to the floor of Congress." Schakowsky's spokesman says the congresswoman "vaguely remembers” the conversation.