CBS Evening News anchor and managing editor Katie Couric is accompanying Secretary of Defense Robert Gates on a five-day overseas trip to several undisclosed countries. She is currently in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Look for her reports next week on the Evening News and on 60 Minutes.
We had a pretty turbulent flight to Riyadh, perhaps because it's 107 degrees!
Before we left Cairo, Secretary Gates met with Egypt's President Hosni Mubarak. He later told me they covered a lot of ground. Secretary Gates has known Mubarak for 20 years, so he said in a way it's nice not having to start at square one.
Part of the reason the Sec Def is visiting Cairo and Riyadh is to alleviate any concerns that the Obama administration's overture to Iran will affect the relationship with traditional U.S. allies. He also wants Saudi Arabia, which has a strong relationship with Pakistan, to exert its influence in that country where things have been pretty dicey lately.
So far the trip has been great. It's fun to be back working with people from the Pentagon, even though the personnel there has turned over many times since I covered the beat in 1989. The journalists on the trip are friendly and interesting to talk to, including Al, who's worked for VOA for 33 years. I misidentified him yesterday as working for CBS Radio. Blame it on the jet lag!
I interviewed most of them on my Flip camera. I'm sure they all think I'm bizarre! The interviews will appear later on CBSNews.com and my YouTube channel, as soon as I can upload them and get them back to our home office on West 57th Street.
Heading to the Souk, where I'm told I will have to wear my abaya if I don't want to be harassed. I'm thinking about not wearing it and catching the encounter on my Flip, but maybe that's not such a great idea!
Proves the dismal state of U.S. media & how the sheep are educated in worthless information.
Read: "A Peoples' History of the United States," by Howard Zinn
Find out what is really going on, not just what mind-numbing media feed you.
you have a chance to show the middle ground of this culture. So often we hear news that only gives one dimension of the situation. While I will NEVER defend the radical fringe.. it is usually representative of a minority. One of the other people who left a comment is right. There are decent people in KSA as well as the fringe.. I don't buy into the line that every woman is miserable or put down. America can hardly say they treat women with respect 100% of the time. There wouldn't be booming porn, prostitution, spousal abuse, not to mention all the awful things that are done to children...etc etc..
My point is that every society has a radical fringe..lets not base our understanding of a whole country on that fringe. Congratulations Katie on your continued work in reporting!
Things like child marriage and spousal abuse aren't *state-sanctioned* here. Saudi Arabia LEGALLY allows marriage of 50 year olds to children as young as 8 and then rejects their appeals on the basis of Islamic Sharia. Women are not legally allowed to drive there. Not just a fringe group of women - but all women. Polygyny is legal and even encouraged, while polyandry is punishable by death. If you want to know more about what living in Saudi Arabia is like, please read my last post on it.
A lot of liberals in the West take a very relativistic approach to countries like Saudi Arabia, under the umbrella of multiculturalism. Unfortunately, this inadvertently enables the gross human rights violations that occur in societies such as these, against the "decent" people in KSA that you're talking about. It's a dangerous approach to take. From my 11 years living and growing up there, I can tell you that what you see and hear about Saudi Arabia in the West barely scratches the surface, and if anything, is probably a more moderate view of the country than it really is.
Kudos for pointing out the connection to Pakistan, as well. Who do you think finances things like the Faisal Mosque or where many of the falconers who take leisure trips to Baluchistan are from?
Bad show, Couric, bad show.