<te: I am not mad at Obama. This was just the coolest Rolling Stone cover that the editors would let me print.
As I opened up the Huffington Post this morning (I know, it’s owned by AOL, but they haven’t ruined it quite yet), the featured headline took me by surprise. It was a link to, of all things, Rolling Stone. According to an article written by Michael Hastings, US Gen. William Caldwell has been ordering a psychological operations unit in Afghanistan to manipulate visiting senators, diplomats, and potentially the president, into providing more funding and support for the war. Needless to say, highly illegal – tssk tssk, Caldwell. But let’s take a second and think about this – Rolling Stone exposes a “rogue” US general in Afghanistan – didn’t that already happen back in the summer with General McChrystal? Huffington Post, are you meaning to tell me that Rolling Stone, a magazine whose recent cover featured shirtless Lil Wayne with the tagline “ I dropped my nuts and took it!,” has somehow managed to twice trick the US military into telling them their deep, dark secrets in less than a year?
Let’s review. In addition to the unseemly information discussed in the article, last summer, McChrystal got so much flack for letting Rolling Stone’s Michael Hastings in on the super-duper secret stuff the military does that he had no other choice but to resign. At this point, you’d think Michael Hastings, and any Rolling Stone reporter, really, would go on the no-no list for any high ups in the military. And while the military did not, as they did before, invite Hastings to hang out in a weird, bromancey way, they still find themselves in the same situation. Rolling Stone strikes again. It’s unclear how Hastings got the story this time around, but one thing is becoming clear: Rolling Stone, inexplicably, is the only news operation that is capable of investigative journalism. It’s 8th week, and we’re feeling bleak, so we might even go as far as to say that Michael Hastings seems to be the only person capable of investigative journalism.
So this is an open letter to you, Michael Hastings. We like what you did there, buddy, and we’d like to say that your pieces are welcome in The Carletonian anytime. If you’re feeling the need to expose the tyranny of Bon Appétit (2 ½ versus 1 whole sandwich, anyone?) or whatever, just drop us a line.