Journalist Jill Carroll has been released three months after her abduction in Iraq, leaving bloggers relieved and suspicious. And in chick-fight news, the blogosphere is ripping Rep. Cynthia McKinney after fisticuffs broke out between her and a Capitol Hill police officer. Meanwhile, supermodel Naomi Campbell was arrested for assaulting yet another assistant.
Free at last: Jill Carroll, a freelance reporter for the Christian Science Monitor, was kidnapped in January while covering a story in Baghdad. In an interview on Iraqi television after her release, Carroll said that she was treated well by her captors.
At Mental Mayhem, Jordanian-American journalist and blogger Natasha Tynes, a “very good friend” of Carroll’s, has been logging frequent updates during her captivity and has this to say about her release: “All the prayers and good wishes have been answered. We are simply overwhelmed by this amazing, fantastic, tremendously wonderful news!!”
Judd Legum on the lefty American Progress Action Fund’s Think Progress blog rails against a post by John Podhoretz on the National Review’s Corner blog that speculated that Carroll may have come to sympathize with her captors because she claimed to have been treated well (he seemed especially suspicious of her Middle Eastern garb). “It is totally inappropriate to assume that her description of how she was treated is motivated by anything other than a desire to tell the truth,” Legum argues.
The Jawa Report posts comprehensive coverage of the kidnapping saga. Poster WM is taken aback by Carroll’s claim that her captors did not mistreat her, since they’d threatened on video to kill her. “Jill is clearly compassionate but VERY misguided and unable to alter her basic convictions to accommodate reality,” WM clucks.
Jazz4Sale smells a conspiracy. “I don’t buy it. Everything about this makes me feel this is a PR campaign to make the same people that beheaded all those other hostages look like good, compassionate people,” Jazz posits. Matt on Wizbang is thinking along the same lines. “Super, now we can look forward to her articles telling us how nice and misunderstood the insurgents are,” he says.
“I have no doubt that … the media and far-left will be comparing Carroll’s royal treatment to the treatment of Iraqis at Abu Ghraib,” speculates conservative Iowan Ryan on MySpace. Meanwhile, Heidi on EuphoricReality seems to have little sympathy for Carroll. “My question is this: will she keep her hajib now that she’s free? Will she convert? I just can’t wait for the movie, y’all!” she deadpans. On a lighter note, the Codependent Collegian wonders if Carroll is free for a date.
For more on Jill Carroll’s release, click here.
Stop that politician: Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney of Georgia scuffled with Capitol Hill police after she reportedly refused to stop for an identity check by security. McKinney released a statement expressing regret about the incident, but bloggers are convinced she’s lost her marbles.
Reid Stott on The Daily Whim offers his slant on the confrontation and details a history of McKinney’s run-ins with Capitol Hill police. “Apparently, despite the fact Ms. McKinney wore no ID or even the discrete lapel pin given to Congresspeople, she expected the officer to recognize her as one of the ‘Elite 535,’ ” asserts Stott, who is one of McKinney’s constituents. He also criticizes the representative, who is black, for “playing the race card.”
Libertarian commentator Neal Boortz on Nealz Nuze says he predicted that McKinney would make race a central issue in the incident. “Race is pretty much all that Cynthia McKinney has had going for her for years. Race is why she is in the House of Representatives. Race is always at the center of McKinney’s life,” Boortz claims.
At Crime, Guns, and Videotape, a “conservative oasis with a libertarian twist,” Paul Huebl echoes the sentiment that McKinney is color struck but adds that he disagrees with blanket searches at government buildings. “I have to take sides here with McKinney. She should not be subjected to this kind of humiliation. Neither should any other American,” he argues.
McKinney shares a “Knuckle head of the Day” award on The Florida Masochist. Zontar on the D.C. insider blog Wonkette jokes, “This just in: Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney reportedly has taken two tourists hostages, vowing that ‘those coppers will never take me alive!’ “
For more on Rep. Cynthia McKinney, click here.
Hold the phone: Supermodel Naomi Campbell was arrested in New York for allegedly hurling a mobile telephone at an assistant. Campbell has faced similar allegations of violence in the past. Her representative claims the charge is retaliation for Campbell firing an employee.
Posters on The Cooler remind us that Campbell’s employees should anticipate catching a left hook once in a while. We Love Celebs expresses a similar sentiment. “We’re wondering how much money Naomi has spent paying off assistants she’s abused … damn,” they add. “What is this, like the third or fourth chick (we assume this one’s a girl, too) she’s gone ballistic on?” Jossip asks.
For more on Naomi Campbell’s assistant woes, click here.
