This Presentation May Be Too Graphic ...

[norml]

February 6, 2006

This Presentation May Be Too Graphic ...

A BUZZFLASH READER CONTRIBUTION
by Mary Pitt

Is anyone else tired of hearing this crap whenever the "mainstream media" are talking about the consequences of the War of Choice? The announcement is made on the television "NEWS" channels every time there is a story about a bombing incident or a disaster such as the situation in New Orleans after Katrina. In fact, this warning is usually unnecessary because they will "fuzz out" any details showing severe wounds or dead bodies. This protects both those with "queasy stomachs" and those who feel that it is their "patriotic duty" to know what is going on even though they may be repulsed by actually seeing anything gruesome. While the ultra right expound about the "liberal media," the corporate owners of same are as effectively self-censored as were the German newspapers during the 1930's. They know, without a doubt, that a few episodes of showing the real results of this war and the bungled disasters at home would have this corporate-coddling administration out of office faster than the French stormed the Bastille.

They know what happened to the Vietnam War when the people found out what was really going on. In those days there was still a semblance of a free press and they did their job. We actually saw Dan Rather, standing up to his hips in a rice paddy, and around him the American soldiers, some holding an arm from which the blood still dripped, some being carried on litters with heads totally covered in bloody bandages. Networks actually carried film of villages after we had attacked them, with burned homes littered with dead bodies. Soon, Americans were marching in the streets, shouting, "ENOUGH!" and that futile war was brought to an end.

With this in mind, the first Bush administration developed the idea of "embedding" reporters in order to control not only what they would see but what they would film. The controlling thought behind this is that if Americans can't see it, it isn't happening. And many Americans are willing to play along with this pretense. Sure, they may parrot the old quotation, "War is hell," but they do it in the abstract, not out of any sense of reality. They are more than willing to listen to the lies of the administration and to stand and cheer when the Liar-in-Chief announces that we are winning and that "This war is necessary." Others know the truth.

Those of us who, for whatever reason, care enough about the truth to dig it out have seen the reality of this war. We saw the film of American soldiers pumping lead into the Iraqi man who had been bandaged and left in the house with the dead from the previous day's conflict in Falluja. We have seen the clothing lying on the floor with the bodies burned away from inside them after a white phosphorus attack, and we have seen the un-cut film of the beheading of the American by Iraqi insurgents. We have seen the photos of the newborn babies in Iraqi hospitals who were born without limbs, with two heads, or with organs on the outside of their little bodies as the result of our use of depleted uranium ammunition while CNN and MSNBS rave about our compassion in bringing "Baby Noor" to the U.S. for surgery. And we have seen the bodies floating in the water that inundated New Orleans, left there to be consumed by the alligators and the starving dogs that were left behind. We have actually read the Project for a New American Century and know how the American people are being used and abused by the perpetrators, and we know about the secret detention camps that have been built on our shores to contain dissenters in the event they become a threat to "The Project."


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http://www.buzzflash.com/contributors/06/02/con06054.html

[UL_Approved]

1. It is all true, in spite of its ugliness

Nothing ever changes unless we see problems. Some of us look, while others hide them. The MSM (as it is referred to so often) is what can show us the problems that are faced in this nation. They hammered us with Katrina images for a couple of weeks.

Don't forget: all military coverage is under a HEAVY gag order now. If Bush wanted to, he could revoke broadcasting licenses for entire networks if he thought they were to critical of his endeavors, or rather transgressions. It remains to be seen whether the domestic spying program gets hammered under scrutiny or left to quietly slip away.