If you’re of a certain age, you’ll remember the infamous 18½-minute gap in Nixon’s White House tapes during the Watergate scandal (1973)—a gap that contained conversation between Nixon and H. R. “Bob” Haldeman, Nixon’s chief of staff. It’s thought that that gap contained conversation that incriminated Nixon (though he was incriminated anyway), and the White House “excuse” for the gap—that Nixon’s secretary accidentally erased the tape while answering a phone call—wasn’t widely believed.
Now there’s another White House gap—this time in a video, and not so serious. But it does appear to show that the White House will do anything to avoid implicating religion as a cause of terrorist acts by Muslims. As reported by pjmedia and other sources (see here, here, and here), the White House may have ordered some “scrubbing” of remarks by French President Francois Hollande made during the nuclear summit in Washington D.C. In particular, Hollande’s remarks about violence in Syria and Iraq being “Islamist terrorism” appeared to have vanished from the tape.
Below is the original tape released by the White House. At 4:47, you’ll hear a a gap during which Hollande’s remarks on “Islamist terrorism” are omitted, along with the English translation, and then the English translation resumes at 5:05:
Somebody noticed, however, that what disappeared on the tape was actually written down on the official transcript from the White House press office. A bit of the transcript is below, and I’ve put what’s missing on the tape (a gap in the audio) in bold, and have also put Hollande’s French remarks (given in the audio but not translated into English) in italics:
But we’re also well aware that the roots of terrorism, Islamist terrorism, is in Syria and in Iraq. We therefore have to act both in Syria and in Iraq, and this is what we’re doing within the framework of the coalition. And we note that Daesh is losing ground thanks to the strikes we’ve been able to launch with the coalition. We are continuing to support Iraq. This is also a decision we have taken, supporting the Iraqi government and making sure that they can claim back their entire territory, including Mosul.
Later on, the White House issued a “corrected” video with the following unconvincing explanation:
A technical issue with the audio during the recording of President Hollande’s remarks led to a brief drop in the audio recording of the English interpretation. As soon as this was brought to our attention, we posted an updated video with the complete audio here (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YoW61…) and on WhiteHouse.gov (https://www.whitehouse.gov/photos-and…), which is consistent with the written transcript we released yesterday.
In the version below, you can now hear Hollande’s remarks beginning at 4:48:
“But we’re also well aware that the roots of terrorism, Islamist terrorism, is in Syria and in Iraq. We therefore have to act both in Syria and in Iraq, and this is what we’re doing within the framework of the coalition.”
Was this really a “technical issue with the audio”? If so, how did they fix it? Normally I’d give Obama the benefit of the doubt about this, but his long history of punctiliously avoiding any mention of “Islam” in connection with terrorism makes this gap seem about as much a technical glitch as was the Nixon gap in September of 1973. Stay tuned.
So…you discovered this error both through the White House’s own original video and transcripts, and they then corrected it when they discovered it? Yup, sure sounds like government censorship to me.
Given Obama’s comments yesterday at the nuclear summit, I think he’s a tiny bit more concerned about the ignorant rhetoric coming from the other American political party than he is with the French leader’s word choices.
Yep, another rude newbie who comes over here without reading the rules, just wading in with guns blazing. Have you ever considered the possibility that it was fixed because the PRESS discovered it rather than the White House? And perhaps it wasn’t Obama who “censored” the photo, IF it was censored.
If you haven’t learned yet, this isn’t reddit or one of those other “let’s insult the host” websites.
When you apologize for rudeness, you can post here again (read the Roolz). Somehow, though, that doesn’t seem to happen with your type of person.
About the only issue the GOP gets right is calling out Islamic Terrorism or Radical Islamic Terrorism for what it is. The Dems fail miserably at this reality and I think it hurts them politically…actually, I know it hurts them politically.
The absurdity is that removing the English translation serves only to prevent Americans from hearing the words “Islamic terrorism”. No doubt some people in the rest of the world speak French….
A couple of the sources Jerry linked to say that the French words for “Islamist terrorism” were also removed, although the English version was missing more than that. (I don’t speak French and can’t confirm this myself, but perhaps somebody here can.)
The problem with the theory it was done intentionally is the fact that you can still hear him speaking, and clearly people who understand French would have pointed out what was missing. I think if we’re going to entertain the idea this was done intentionally, it’s more likely it was done intentionally to make it appear that the white house was trying to scrub his remarks.
I want to amend my comment a bit. I suppose it’s not inconceivable that some low level white house intern took it upon themself to edit the video based on his or her perception of white house policy regarding the use of the term Islamic Terrorism, but I’m convinced this was not an actual orchestrated policy decision.
Just to be pedantic, it’s “Islamist,” not “Islamic.”
Personally I think Obama’s constant failure to talk about this properly is why this distinction doesn’t come naturally sometimes in the US.
I think, as you say, there’s a strong possibility that someone thought this was the right thing to do. Much as I like Obama, it’s his fault because this is an area where he’s screwed up imo.
Just to be pedantic, it’s Islamic. I invite you to discuss the definition of this word from either the Oxford or Merriam-Webster dictionaries and explain why it fits none of the meanings or senses listed.
Ah, I see. You are correcting a slight misquotation, not disputing the word fits. Never mind.
The word Hollande used was Islamist, so it is important.
All Islamists are Islamic, but not all Muslims are Islamists.
Also, when that distinction is made, Islamic allies don’t get upset.
“Just to be pedantic, it’s “Islamist,” not “Islamic.”
Yes I meant to say Islamist. That being said outside of this context where I was quoting Hollande wouldn’t Islamic be better? Contrary to the impression many want to propagate not all Muslims who commit terrorist acts in the name of Islam are Islamists. Killing a cartoonist for blasphemy for example says nothing about your political position. It seems that the only reason to make that distinction is to avoid upsetting our allies. Also using that term supports the idea that it’s entirely politics that’s responsible for terrorism, and not religion.
Except Islamism is a religious movement based on Salafism. From my pov, the problem is that religion and politics are so intertwined in Islam.
I heard Hillary explain why she and the president avoid mentioning Islam. She said it’s because we are counting on Islamic states to help win the war against ISIS. By mentioning Islam there will be much offence taken and cooperation will be denied.
I think this is a reasonable approach, but it certainly is not in harmony with acknowledged facts. The administration risks damaging it’s general credibility by avoiding using the correct terminology. And, how effective can we be in fighting something we dare not name? It’s also doubtful to me how harmful it would be to mention Islam. Our Islamic allies certainly should understand the context and meaning. If they are so sensitive they can’t face reality without freaking out, then perhaps they will not be such good allies in the fight against terrorism.
It is the Voldemort effect The Ideology That Cannot Be Named.
Islamic allies understand the difference between Islamic and Islamist well. I think she’s being disingenuous.
I feel like the Democratic elite have a tendency to underestimate the ability of USians to understand subtle differences like that. Most people can and do – the difference is well understood in Britain and Europe for example.
Hollande clearly had no difficulty using the term, and he’s far more to the left politically than they are.
Perhaps Obama & Clinton need a brief education from Maajid Nawaz. However, if they can’t learn from the French president, why would they listen to a Muslim.
Well said 🙂
Is religion really why so many unemployed males especially have developed a rationale for taking over? Doesn’t the royalty co-opting of oil resources figure more in the violent use of religion for ideological leverage?
Anyhow, the same use of religion for ideological purposes happens in the States, that is for sure.
Now, that really is the talk they do not want you to be talking!
Obama has taken a pounding from all sides on this, certainly the republicans have blasted him on many occasions and most importantly, he is blasted from us, a portion of his so-called base. Just as Hilary is discovering in her attempt to run again, we see in Obama, what we do not like in our professional politicians. That they prefer political correctness over substance and they just cannot change their game. They can only wake up after the game is over.
I seriously doubt Obama himself was responsible for the translation drop-out, at least not directly. I would expect it was the action of some staff member who was following a general (wrong-headed) protocol of not calling ISIS Islamist.
But this is the kind of silliness that happens when your go out of your way to pretend that religion isn’t involved in religiously-motivated terrorism. Dumb, dumb, dumb.
I agree.
Certainly skepticism of the White House is warranted. At the same time, I believe that pjmedia is pajamasmedia, which I think is a right wing media group. Obviously, they’re not making it up, but their presentation of the facts might be less than fully accurate, given their views.
I looked at all four of the links provided (pjmedia, mrctv, The Political Insider, TownHall.com). Each of them seems to be a right-wing web site.
Yeah HuffPo described the idea that this was intentional censorship as a right wing conspiracy theory.
I don’t think Obama did this on purpose. I’m open to the possibility, but I’d think a purposeful act to delete it would also include altering the transcript as well.
It seems more likely to me that a glitch could have occurred than there is a campaign underway to delete any mentions of Islamic terrorism by other leaders. A purposeful campaign not to indict Islam himself? Absolutely. But I think anything further than that needs some more evidence of chicanery. A few more similar incidents and my opinion may start to change…
Well, as a recording engineer, I have frequent nightmares about this very sort of thing. And sometimes it’s a waking nightmare. I always run a backup when I’m making a critically important recording, but sometimes, embarrassingly, it’s the client who discovers a problem.
Of course, in this case, it’s quite a stretch to believe that only this inconvenient remark was affected, by coincidence. A Rose Mary Stretch (q.v.).
Well, as a recording engineer, can you think of any reasonable possibility that this could have been an accident? I’m not saying Obama ordered it, but given that it appears the audio was muted only for that brief moment and that they later restored the missing audio, and given reasonable assumptions about their setup (e.g. that they’re not splicing this video together from multiple sources or transmitting it from the microphone to the recording device over an unreliable network), I can’t think of any way it could have been a mistake.
So I believe the White House’s claim that it was caused by a “technical issue” is a lie…
I can, and I’ve done some lesser audio engineering work — though not nearly enough to consider myself a bonafide engineer. A lose connection on an analog audio cable while transferring a recording could cause that, which would also result in the sort of pop you hear when it starts. Audio glitches are actually fairly common, and this is the sort of minor video someone might post without performing a full quality assurance pass (watching it end to end with a notepad and a very focused attention).
There’s more left out in the brief audio silence than the word “Islamist terrorist”, and none of it seemed to me like it would be at all offensive to Obama’s positions.
The bigger issue is do you really think the White House would have something to gain from poorly censoring a closely allied country’s President in a YouTube video few people would even watch? Or that some audio engineer would risk his job censoring a foreign dignatary in such a meaningless way? It doesn’t pass the big conspiracy smell test.
Also keep in mind the background audio continues while the translator is silent, which means there’s a multitrack audio mixer involved. Those tracks have to get into the system from the original recordings, and it would be easy for an inattentive audio technician to simply hit ‘play’ and zone off while the tracks are being imported. For a long boring speech video I’d be more surprised if the techs were paying attention.
Setting it up and then letting it run is what I would expect too, but that’s part of the reason it seems to me unlikely to have been a technical issue. If it’s all working fine, it should keep working fine, or if something breaks it should stay broken. When the tech has “hit ‘play’ and zoned off”, you wouldn’t expect just a few words to go missing. Or at least I wouldn’t.
Reblogged this on The Logical Place.
If this is an attempt at censorship, it’s incredibly poorly done. (And for what gain?) I don’t think there’s really anything to see here.
Obama himself has avoided calling them “Islamic”, but what does he have to gain from pretending other world leaders do the same?
Great comments and a good read. I come away a little surprised at my own cynicism that I don’t hear in the comments: I assume that when a politician speaks – whether GOP, Dem, Tory, or Commie, that the message is crafted and sifted through whatever sieve the pol carries. I can’t say if this was intentional but it in no way surprises me. And it perfectly aligns with Obama’s oft-stated views.
It is of course extremely suspicious that his word about Islamist terror were the only words that were cut out.
With the number of people I’ve seen that denies that IS has anything to do with islamism, something like this shouldn’t surprise me.
On a related note, does anyone know about the website Loonwatch? I stumbled upon it yesterday and thought it was a parody page at first, but now I’m less sure. The people commenting there seem adamant on denying that Muslims are capable of doing something wrong. I saw people there claiming that Saudi Arabia is a secular state and that the Saudis are actually atheists. :O
Until our Leaders face upto the Fact that Islam is the problem, we will never be rid of this cancer on Society, below are the late great Christopher Hitchens remarks on Islam.