Just got off the phone with Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.), who spoke with me about Easongate. Rep. Frank was on the panel at Davos.

Rep. Frank said Eason Jordan did assert that there was deliberate targeting of journalists by the U.S. military. After Jordan made the statement, Rep. Frank said he immediately “expressed deep skepticism.” Jordan backed off (slightly), Rep. Frank said, “explaining that he wasn’t saying it was the policy of the American military to target journalists, but that there may have been individual cases where they were targeted by younger personnel who were not properly disciplined.”

Rep. Frank said he didn’t pay attention to the audience reaction at the time of the panel, but recalled that Sen. Dodd was “somewhat disturbed” and “somewhat exercised” and that moderator David Gergen also said Jordan’s assertions were “disturbing if true.” I have a call in to Sen. Dodd’s office and sent an e-mail inquiry to Gergen.

I asked Rep. Frank again if his recollection was that Jordan initially maintained that the military had a deliberate policy of targeting journalists. Rep. Frank affirmed that, noting that Jordan subsequently backed away orally and in e-mail that it was official policy, but “left open the question” of whether there were individual cases in which American troops targeted journalists.

After the panel was over and he returned to the U.S., Rep. Frank said he called Jordan and expressed willingness to pursue specific cases if there was any credible evidence that any American troops targeted journalists. “Give me specifics,” Rep. Frank said he told Jordan.

Rep. Frank has not yet heard back from Jordan.

***

Jay Rosen interviewed BBC director Richard Sambrook, who was also on the panel, and has significantly different recollections of what Jordan said.

Captain Ed, intrepid Eason-watcher, reacts to the Sambrook statement with proper skepticism and once again puts Jordan/CNN’s stake in proper perspective.

***

Bill Roggio of Easongate.com will be on the radio at 1:20pm EST today to discuss the latest developments.

And Jim Geraghty asks: Is this about right and left? Or right or wrong?

Maybe there are left-of-center writers and bloggers who are writing about Eason Jordan and I just haven’t encountered them. Send me links if you see them. But if Jordan smeared the troops by repeated an unsubstantiated rumor in front of the Davos crowd, this shouldn’t just outrage conservatives.

Which is why, despite our grave disagreements on many policy issues, I respect Rep. Frank for wanting to get the truth out of Eason Jordan.

Update: Jim Geraghty at TKS reports that there may be problems getting a copy of the Davos videotape. Meanwhile, the MSM, including CNN’s Judy Woodruff, according to Hugh Hewitt and Jon Lauck, remain in the dark.

And Washington Post/CNN media critic Howard Kurtz has just concluded his live online chat without breathing a word about Easongate.

Eeeen-teresting.

Roger Simon has more thoughts on MSM stonewalling.

Update II: David Gergen speaks. See above.

Update III: More from panelist and BBC director Richard Sambrook. I asked him via e-mail if he had any response to this comment from Jim Geraghty:

[BBC director Richard] Sambrook states, “[Jordan] clarified his comment a number of times to ensure people did not misunderstand him.”

But then why would Arab members of the audience come up and congratulate him for having the courage to speak the truth? Why were, according to these accounts, Franks, Dodd and Gergen so disturbed? Or are these details from other accounts inaccurate? Are Abovitz, MacKinnon, and Frank remembering things that didn’t happen? How about the secondhand sources of Jay Nordlinger?

Sambrook responded:

I can’t answer for how other people took his comments. His initial comment may have been ambiguous (although even then I didn’t think he meant that US troops had intended to kill journalists) but his clarifications as the session progressed should have left no-one in doubt about his meaning. Could it be that some people would prefer to think ill of him?

There are people in the media community who would criticise the US military on this issue. I’m not one of them and to my knowledge Eason has in the past dismissed suggestions of ill-intent on the part of the US military.

Geraghty responds here.

Update III: Sen. Chris Dodd speaks briefly. See above.

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