By
Matthew
Russell Lee
UNITED
NATIONS,
September 23,
updated -- As
the 68th UN
General
Assembly
begins, some
try to write
the script in
advance, just
as some big
wigs have
others write
even their
tweets for
them.
These
two trends
come together
this morning
in a vacuous,
unauthorized New
York Times
profile of US
Ambassador
Samantha Power,
quickly
re-distributed
by those who
cover her,
ostensibly
independently.
The
piece, not by
Times
UN
correspondents
Neil
MacFarquhar
nor his
replacement
Somini
Sengupta
but rather
Sheryl Gay
Stolberg, says
half way
through that
Power
"declined to
be interviewed
for this
article."
Oh. There
weren't enough
diplomats at
the General
Debate who
were willing
or eager to be
interviewed?
Instead,
the
Times uses
Power's
Twitter
account to
profile her.
There is only
one problem:
as Inner City
Press reported
yesterday from
the Social
Good Summit at
the 92nd
Street Y,
Power couldn't
say what her
Twitter
account handle
is, and
admitted that
it is a US
Mission to the
UN staffer who
read her @
replies and
"briefs" her
on them. (Some
quickly
defended or
justified
this; others
didn't,
including as a
use of
taxpayer money.)
From
the UN
Mission to the
UN's
transcript
of the event:
MR.
CASHMORE:
What’s your
handle?
AMBASSADOR
POWER:
What is my
handle? I
think
#AmbassadorPower.
Someone told
me it’s
#AmbassadorPower.
(Laughter.)
#AmbassadorPower?
So a profile
several times
using this
twitter
account is
dubious (as
for example is
CNN using a
dubious Al
Shabaab
account to
"report" the
nationalities
of Kanya's
Westgate Mall
attack --
which Power
did not
mention in her
Q&A with
Mashable on
Sunday.) [See
update below.]
The
Times collects
fawning
quotes. The
"former UN
Peacekeeping
official" it
uses, Ed Luck,
has been gone
for some time,
but says
urgently that
Power is a
"superstar" in
his former
venue. (He was
also before he
left a
"Responsibility
to Protect"
official,
part-time and
unpaid because
the office was
not agreed to
by the General
Assembly.)
None
of this is to
say that Power
is not an
interesting
person -- but
it is not
because of her
ghostwritten
tweets or
quotes from Ed
Luck.
Still,
the Times
snow-file was
quickly
re-tweeted by,
for example,
the 2013
president of
the UN
Correspondents
Association
Pamela Falk of
CBS, complete
with the
handles of the
US State
Department as
it to say:
see? I am
doing my job!
Under Falk, UNCA in
July hosted a
faux UN
briefing by
Saudi-sponsored
Syria rebel
box Ahmad al
Jarba.
Also
re-tweeting
was UNCA
former big wig
Margaret
Besheer of Voice of
America,
on whose
Broadcasting
Board of
Governor sits
John Kerry,
also Power's
boss.
UNCA
first
vice president
Louis
Charbonneau
of Reuters
tweeted that
"Syria's Assad
slams Western
powers on UN
draft
resolution;"
but a scribe
working for
him wrote
"Syria's Assad
says not
concerned
about UN draft
resolution" --
both based off
the same
interview (not
with Reuters,
but Chinese
television:
lost in
translation?)
This is the UN
and how it's
covered; these
are the scribe
to which the
UN and US
Mission most
like to give
access. And
no, Samantha
Power was not
interviewed
for this
article --
Inner City
Press didn't
ask. Watch
this site.
, 
