May 19, 2006 ☼ Foreign Affairs
This is an archived blog post from The Acorn.
Today’s edition of Times of India carries a report filed by Chidanand Rajghatta, its Washington correspondent, on that matter of Clinton’s foreword to Albright’s new book (via Swami Iyer and Gaurav Sabnis). Chidanand went about seeking comment from Clinton, Albright and HarperCollins, the book’s publisher.
Clinton’s office did not return calls seeking comment or clarification, but the book’s publishers Harper Collins routed a correction through Albright’s office acknowledging the error, which was first highlighted on the blog The Acorn (http://www.nitinpai.in/).
Page xi of the Mighty and the Almighty contains a reference to ‘Hindu militants that will be deleted in subsequent printings, both in America and in internation al editions. This error was due to a failure in the fact-checking process,’’ Harper Collins said in a statement e-mailed to TNN by Albright’s office Albright herself was busy promoting her new book on CNN on Wednesday. [Times of India Cutting/Link]As Chidanand points out in his article, the former US president has resolutely refused to blame that massacre on jihadi groups. Well, that’s Clinton’s call. But if it is his intention to lay the blame at anyone’s door, he cannot do it surreptitiously. The massacre of innocent people is no trifling matter, and he is a former president of the United States and remains a very public figure. The only honourable course open to Clinton is for him to either make public the basis of his allegation, or simply acknowledge his mistake. Silence won’t do.
It is encouraging though, to see how a tiny bit of unstructured collaboration between blogger and journalist secured that correction from HarperCollins in a matter of days.
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