This Is How It's Done

Our local news stations have been covering the story of Corporal Wassef Hassoun, the Marine who is being held hostage. (Here is the latest story.) This story is getting national coverage, but I have to say I'm extremely proud of how our local media have been covering the story. While I was in Club Med the hospital I got to watch the local coverage without having to stop and fill water bottles for kids who are supposed to be asleep, and I was very impressed. They called the Marine a Utahn, an American, and showed clips of his friends praying for him at his family's mosque, but they never once said that he was a Muslim.

Now some people might think that's not good journalism or that the local news was trying to be politically correct. But if you think about it, it's not really pertinent information, is it? He's a Marine serving his country. If the allegations of desertion are true, and if his religion turns out to have been a factor in that, then that information will be relevant. But unless that turns out to be the case, to us he should be first and foremost our American brother.