So goes the opening paragraph of a piece written by LTC Tim Ryan, Commander, Task Force 2-12 Cavalry, First Cavalry Division in Iraq.
For those of you that don't know, CNN's motto is 'the most trusted name in news'...HOWEVER..
How many remember the CNN scandal that broke almost two years ago? The one where Chief News Executive of the network, Eason Jordan, wrote an op/ed piece in the New York Times, entitled "The News We Kept to Ourselves". This scandalous revelation about a major 'news' networks operations was amazingly glossed over with scant attention paid to what Jordan had to say.
In a 'bless me Father, I have sinned' fashion, Jordan bared his soul...but he also revealed something about CNN that is alarming...they are dangerously selective about what they show as "news".
This author wrote at the time: By operating the way that they did, CNN ceased to do what journalists are supposed to do--report the facts so that the audience can make informed judgments about the world around them. By ignoring the truth, and sucking up to Iraqi leaders and officials, CNN became just another cog in the Iraqi propaganda machine.
And so we are back to Lt. Ryan's message.
Writes Ryan: From where I sit in Iraq, things are not all bad right now. In fact, they are going quite well...Final eradication of the pockets of insurgents will take some time, as it always does, but the fact remains that the central geographic stronghold of the insurgents is now under friendly control. That sounds a lot like success to me. Given all of this, why don't the papers lead with "Coalition Crushes Remaining Pockets of Insurgents" or "Enemy Forces Resort to Suicide Bombings of Civilians"? This would paint a far more accurate picture of the enemy's predicament over here. Instead, headlines focus almost exclusively on our hardships.
What about the media's portrayal of the enemy? Why do these ruthless murderers, kidnappers and thieves get a pass when it comes to their actions? What did the the media show or tell us about Margaret Hassoon, the director of C.A.R.E. in Iraq and an Iraqi citizen, who was kidnapped, brutally tortured and left disemboweled on a street in Fallujah? Did anyone in the press show these images over and over to emphasize the moral failings of the enemy as they did with the soldiers at Abu Ghuraib?
Speaking about Fallujah and Najaf: Television and newspapers spilled a continuous stream of images and stories about the destruction done to the sacred city, and of all the human suffering allegedly brought about by the hands of the big, bad Americans...While the media was busy bashing the Coalition, Muqtada's boys were kidnapping policemen, city council members and anyone else accused of supporting the Coalition or the new government, trying them in a kangaroo court based on Islamic Shari'a law, then brutally torturing and executing them for their "crimes." What the media didn't show or write about were the two hundred-plus headless bodies found in the main mosque there, or the body that was put into a bread oven and baked. Nor did they show the world the hundreds of thousands of mortar, artillery and small arms rounds found within the "sacred" walls of the mosque. Also missing from the coverage was the huge cache of weapons found in Muqtada's "political" headquarters nearby. No, none of this made it to the screen or to print. All anyone showed were the few chipped tiles on the dome of the mosque and discussion centered on how we, the Coalition, had somehow done wrong. Score another one for the enemy's propaganda machine.
The enemy's propaganda machine...none other than our own Main Stream Media...
DR
