L.A. Times Editors: Mystery Al Qaeda Guy to Remain a Mystery, If We Have Anything to Do with It (UPDATE: OK, Fine, We’ll Show Him to You)
[UPDATE: This post is kind of a dud, because I jumped on the paper for not doing something obvious, and within hours they did it — almost certainly not due to my complaint. These things happen when criticism occurs at blog speed; perhaps I should have simply waited a few hours before posting. In any event, the underlying story, about a shadowy Al Qaeda figure on the run, continues to be interesting.]
The L.A. Times reports:
Two years later, the FBI put out an urgent all-points bulletin for [Adnan Gulshair Muhammad el] Shukrijumah, depicting him as one of al-Qaida’s most well-trained, intelligent and deadly operatives. He was described as the ultimate “sleeper agent,” intent on attacking the United States, possibly with weapons of mass destruction.
Law enforcement officials and terrorism experts now believe Shukrijumah is one of a handful of young, street-smart leaders of al-Qaida handpicked by Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks, to keep the terrorist network alive and humming in the face of U.S.-led efforts to unravel it.
. . . .
Terrorism officials inside and outside the government say they believe Shukrijumah is a major al-Qaida figure, and the hunt for him is intense, with an FBI team tracking him virtually full time. So far, their quarry has remained elusive.
Nice story.
But really . . . would it kill you to publish a picture of the guy?
UPDATE: Patterico demands results, and gets them! There is now a picture of the guy next to the story.
(Yes, I know — they almost certainly didn’t do this because of me.)
UPDATE x2: Nels Nelson reports that the dead trees edition has a prominent front-page above-the-fold picture — making the post an even bigger dud.
Oh, well. Instapundit once said blog posts just don’t work out sometimes. This is an example . . .
P–I think there is a picture of the guy, off to the right. Compare it to the FBI photo.
Of course, they don’t identify it as such.
See Dubya (93ba81) — 9/3/2006 @ 12:40 amCould you pass me the Real Estate section?
Jerry (04b468) — 9/3/2006 @ 7:35 amSee Dub: it’s there now. It wasn’t when I wrote the post. (I wrote it a couple of hours before I published it, and time-delayed it to appear after midnight.)
Patterico (91fd36) — 9/3/2006 @ 8:05 ami think we can guess why the times didn’t run a pic originally.
assistant devil's advocate (48228c) — 9/3/2006 @ 9:34 aminteresting article – as long as he stays in waziristan, he can’t hurt us, and he won’t be joining me in the libertarian wine bar (or blowing it up).
the article said shukrijumah was nurtured in radical islam from childhood, and identified his family home as being in miramar, florida. if there’s a family in florida serving as a nest for high-ranking al qaeda guys, it would not offend me if public spirited floridians acted outside the public sector to neutralize the threat. depending on what happened, there might even be grist for another jury nullification post.
on a related note, check out the front page of the san francisco chronicle…
http://www.sfgate.com
i stopped at the photo of the muslim guy and the headline “the new jews”. without bothering to read something this preposterous, i can only guess that the article omitted to mention that jews never converted anybody at swordpoint.
I just wanted to add that the print article features a picture of the guy, on the front page of the paper, above the fold.
Nels Nelson (7a2ebc) — 9/3/2006 @ 3:21 pmPatrerico,
This is Off Topic, but I haven’t found a place to send you email, so I’ll try this.
I found the discussion of jury nullification that you’ve been running quite enlightening though my schedule has not allowed me the time to read ALL of the comments.
I just wanted to make one comment that I didn’t see in the ongoing discussions, though the point mayh have been missed.
YOu raise a good point about honoring your oath, BUT you also equate the oath in California which, if I undertood you correctly is to “follow the instructions of the court” as being the same as an oath to obey the law. That is, I think, a non-sequitor. IF jury nullification is a constitutional right (I’ve not made up my mind as to my opinion yet) then no “instruction of the court” has the authority to override that right.
There would appear to be something of an analogy to the situation of some one serving in the miltary. He is sworn to obey orders, but is actually required to NOT obey an illegal one. IF the court’s instructions were to be attempting to deny a constitutional right, then they woujld have no authority, and it would seem to me that you would be actually compelled to ignore them.
An oath to obey the “instructions of the court” would appear to be to be rather different from an “oath to obey the law.”
Just something to think about.
Thanks for all of the stimulating discussions you trigger!
All the Best,
Ralph
Ralph (4694db) — 9/3/2006 @ 7:33 pmLeave it to the Smell A Times to be so left-wing and the west coast version of the NYTs
krazy kagu (52a738) — 9/3/2006 @ 8:13 pm