An e-mail received from Kuwait:

Last week the Ministry of Information in Kuwait Suddenly stopped all TV Talk shows in the government owned TV station. This included three popular programs: The weekly Diwaniya hosted by Dr. Shafeeq Ghabra; Six over Six hosted by Yousef al-Jasim; and Muftarak Torok hosted by Dr. Kafyah Ramadan. The stoppage came as a surprise to the public. The ministry’s justification for the stoppage circled around linking debate programs with state policy. The ministry’s statement made it clear that the programs must be more sensitive to state policy, to “Islamic heritage and national unity.”

It is not in the U.S. strategic interest to have U.S. partners like Talabani or Kuwait become symbols of corruption and intolerance. Not only do such abuses — and the perceived U.S. association with them — further anti-Americanism, but when we turn a blind eye toward Talabani’s and Kuwait’s efforts at censorship and abuse of journalists, all efforts to advocate for press freedom and civil society development in countries like Iran, China, Syria, and Tunisia fall flat.