At the discussion panel in Davos where Eason Jordan made his unsubstantiated accusation that US troops were deliberately murdering journalists in Iraq, we’re told that members of the audience cheered and applauded Jordan’s remarks. Were you wondering what kind of people would cheer for something like this?

People like Bertrand Pecquerie, Director of the World Editors Forum, the editors’ organization within the World Association of Newspapers (WAN), who accuses the bloggers who exposed Jordan of … wait for it … McCarthyism! Eason Jordan affair: when bloggers appear as the sons of Senator McCarthy. (Hat tip: The Blog Herald.)

Sad conclusion in the Eason Jordan affair (see below the New York Times article), sad day for the freedom of expression in America and sad day again for the future of blogging: the defense of the US army honor seemed more important to some bloggers than the defense of reporters’ work (and sometimes life)! Nevertheless, there is one advantage in this story: masks are fallen! Within the honest community of bloggers, some of them claimed to be the “sons of the First Amendment”, they just were the sons of Senator McCarthy. And this is very worrying to see this new wedding between self-proclaimed citizen’s media and maintstream journalists scalps’ hunters. Fifty years ago, it was enough to be communist to be fired, today, it is enough to raise questions about the Bush administration policy in Iraq to be denounced as “anti-American”. Maybe the only difference is that you are not fired, but that you must dismiss! What’s my conclusion? Real promoters of citizen media would have to take some distance with those who have fueled and organised the Eason Jordan hatred. If not, the “new era of journalism” opened by the blogosphere will appear as the old clothes of American populism.

Mr. Pecquerie is in a high position in the world journalistic community, and he defends Eason Jordan’s remarks as nothing more than “raising questions about the Bush administration policy in Iraq.”

This could give us a clue why the World Economic Forum is continuing to stonewall on the release of the video of the discussion—they don’t want the blogosphere to see an audience full of leading world journalists cheering and applauding Jordan’s vicious slander.