Since his capture, the news flow about what Saddam was saying was pretty slim. Considering his long relationship with the US I always found it a bit strange that suddenly the news was non-existent. I also thought it was strange that when the video footage was shown yesterday (afternoon my time) that there was no sound. Well, it's clearer today. Our friends at the Pentagon are giving us the information that they think we need to know.
"U.S. news networks agreed to let the American military censor out certain images of Saddam Hussein's court hearing Thursday in Baghdad, one in a bizarre series of events surrounding coverage of the session.
As the silent footage of Hussein began to air on U.S. networks around 8:30 a.m. ET, CBS News anchor Dan Rather explained that the tapes had been "taken to another location, edited, and what you're seeing is in effect a censored version" of what happened in court earlier today.
"And whether you will hear what happened in court is yet to be determined. We know that Saddam Hussein challenged the whole legitimacy of the court," Rather said.
It's also possible that some of the footage was supplied by Dept. of Defense cameras, which were allowed to record sound. Throughout the day, several news nets said it wasn't always clear which footage was from what source, and that it could have been DOD footage, meaning the Pentagon was directly controlling what was being heard.
