This comes from the Family Research Council.
'The Sacrifice, Bravery, and Piety of the American People'
Today Robert Reilly, former director of the Voice of America (VOA), the overseas broadcast service of the U.S. Government, writes about a missed opportunity in the Middle East. During a visit to Baghdad in 2003, Reilly, who also served as senior adviser to the Iraqi Ministry of Information during Operation Iraqi Freedom, was approached by a young Iraqi journalist who pleaded with him, "Why did you [Voice of America] stop broadcasting substance and substitute music?" The journalist was referring to the VOA Board of Governors' decision to replace most of its Arabic- and Persian-language service with pop artists like Eminem and Britney Spears. Gone were the Arabic and Farsi features on American life, political discussions, and editorials that had been the lifeblood of VOA and its Arabic version, Radio Sawa. Reilly, who left the VOA in August 2002, cites the role of media mogul Norman Pattiz, a Clinton appointee to the VOA Board who said that it was "MTV that brought down the Berlin Wall." No mention of Ronald Reagan, Vaclav Havel, Lech Walesa, or John Paul II. The truth, as Reilly underscores, is that American culture is building a wall in the Middle East as our cultural vulgarity offends millions of people who are learning nothing about our founding and form of government. Instead of portraying "the sacrifice, bravery and piety of the American people," Reilly writes, VOA has been tragically offering the Muslim
world a "caricature of ourselves."
