by Brent Baker
NBC's Saturday Night Live (SNL) last week opened with a skit making fun of the stupidity of questions posed by reporters at Pentagon briefings.
The skit featured a parody of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, complete with squinting and a hostile attitude toward the reporters. With C-SPAN graphics on screen, the fake reporters posed these questions:
— A male reporter: “We're getting reports of U.S. special op forces being dropped into Taliban areas with camouflage and night vision goggles. This means the Taliban soldiers won't be able to see our troops, but we'll be able to see them. Is that fair?”
— A female reporter: “With our military campaign stalled and the opposition forces seemingly bogged down in a quagmire, isn't there a danger the U.S. will look like a weakling and thus lose the support of the Afghan people?”
Rumsfeld character: “Isn't that the same question you asked last week?”
Reporter: “Oh, I'm sorry. Okay, with our military moving so rapidly and opposition forces easily overrunning Taliban areas, isn't there a danger the U.S. will look like a bully and thus lose the support of the Afghan people?”
A great lampooning of how reporters so often take an adversarial position to whatever is occurring.
— Another male reporter: “We're being told that Northern Alliance forces are firing back at Taliban troops who have fired on them even though the Taliban troops missed. Does the U.S. condone that?”
Rumsfeld: “Now what kind of question is that?”
Reporter: “Thought provoking?”
Rumsfeld: “No.”
Reporter: “Incisive?”
Rumsfeld: “No. Remember what I said about your question the other day?”
Reporter: “That it was idiotic?”
Rumsfeld: “And?”
Reporter: “And that I am an embarrassment both to myself and to my newspaper?”
Rumsfeld: “That's right.”
If only our real military leaders were that candid!
(This update courtesy of the Media Research Center.)