Propaganda of the Elite Media

Enough talking about Germany for now. This article from The Newspaper Guild is a pure gem. Anything that presents Baghdad Bobby as an impartial source has got to have more than a few excursions from reality. And this one doesn't let us down.

But the part that just really irks me is in the very first paragraph:

It’s one thing for reporters to uncritically regurgitate Pentagon and administration lies for the mainstream press, but it’s another thing entirely to serve up the same propaganda in a publication that’s by and for media workers.

Are they talking about the same media that has been asking questions like "Is a tank the big box with the really big gun?" Is this same media that was screaming "quagmire" when we stopped for sleep? Are we talking about the same media that asks questions like "Where do you plan to attack tomorrow?" If you're going to claim elite status, at least ask halfway intelligent questions. Don't refer to me as being part of the unwashed masses when you can't figure out how to turn on the shower. And they wonder why the masses complain of the "elite media" as we turn to alternative sources of information.

Another gem:

According to Sydney H. Schanberg, one of the media’s leading authorities on hazardous duty, in Vietnam only one in a thousand reporters would ever knowingly jeopardize a military operation, and that remains true today. (See “Schanberg’s Take on the Pentagon’s Media Rules—Analyzing the Conditions for ‘Embedded’ Reporters,” by Greg Mitchell in the Feb. 24 issue of Editor and Publisher.)

No, what is of concern are the severe limits the Pentagon will put on coverage, as detailed in the above-cited article, including “vague language restrictions, and situations where copy can be held, if not sanitized.” Then there is the threat of being expelled from the Pentagon group if the news is not flattering to the U.S. military. Raise your hand, anybody who thinks that the Army will be conducting tours of the destruction in Baghdad caused by 800 cruise missiles.

So only 1 in 1000 will knowingly jeopardize a military operation? Thousands of our soldiers could die because of their reporting. To knowingly jeopardize a military operation has go to be treason. I'll agree that the military needs to be totally forthcoming about prior military operations, even if they were only a few hours ago, but until the operation is done - sanitize away. The job of the military is to prosecute a war, not to fill Freedom of Information requests.

And as for the damage caused by 800 cruise missiles? Well, the Iraqi Disinformation Ministry seemed to revel in taking reporters around to show the damage. I can only remember the IDM "exposing" maybe 5 instances of massive damage. I guess the other 790 or so cruise missiles must have missed their civilian target and inadvertently slammed into something of military importance, which would have caused the IDM to complain very vocally about the wanton damage caused by our weapons, without actually providing proof (they were still moving out the remains of the tanks, I guess).

But the last paragraph was just beautiful. The culmination of so much work and effort and quoting of Baghdad Bob closes with this:

More and more Americans are now looking to the British press for the real story about our empire’s actions abroad.

Just not to her favorite wanker, Bobby Fisk.