I agree with much you said, However the State Dept has no buisness making comments on a Dutch Newspaper. When is the last time they commented on an American Editorial. We have to give the Saudis some leeway but as I posted earlier this was a made up issue by the Saudi Govt to get their mismanagement of the lastest pilgrimage where hundeds died off the front page. Again once they let the Jeannie out of the bottle there was no way to contain it. State should have defused it then.
By the way this site is hilarious. This blog is from an moslem from Saudi Arabi. Keep it on your fav of blogs. He is pretty honest on Saudi Arabi and the posting his has done on these cartoons and the pics are hilarious http://muttawa.blogspot.com/
I think State is trying to distance itself from these press depictions. They're making it clear that they in no way support such images, while making it clear that freedom of the press is still the law of the land.
From the article. I think it's clear that freedom of press is supported, but this particular use of it is not supported by our government:
""These cartoons are indeed offensive to the belief of Muslims," State Department spokesman Kurtis Cooper said in answer to a question.
"We all fully recognize and respect freedom of the press and expression but it must be coupled with press responsibility. Inciting religious or ethnic hatreds in this manner is not acceptable."