Bromwich: Gitmo backlash on MSNBC

David Bromwich writes:

Annals of Broken Journalism: At 10:25 this morning (EST) the MSNBC News anchor Alex Witt broadcast a segment entitled "Terrorists in Your Backyard?" The subject was Guantanamo. The premise: can we afford to close it? The guest expert was Jack Jacobs. Witt asked Jacobs whether the 245 prisoners remaining at Guantanamo are all dangerous. Are they in fact "the worst of the worst?" Jacobs is a retired army colonel (according to the author's note at us.penguingroup.com) who "appears about 500 times annually on television, commenting on defense issues, terrorism, and international affairs." He replied to Witt's question: "They're bad." He made it clear that he meant every one of them.

Alex Witt offered no follow-up. The heading "Terrorists in Your Backyard?" had now become the crawl-script. A different kind of journalist would have asked the expert at this point: "Can you name ten of the prisoners for us, and tell us what they did?" Or, "What is the basis for your certainty that none of the 245 ought to be released?" Or, "Whom would you recommend that we speak with, if we want to know, in detail, the evidence of the threat posed by all 245 of the remaining prisoners?"

Alex Witt asked none of these questions. No other guest expert was brought in or mentioned. The viewer was left with the uncontested impression that Barack Obama has ordered the eventual release into American society of a great many prisoners known to be dangerous.