No Shame, No Blame -- Media Refuse to Face Up to Role in Iraq Disaster

[marmar]

from HuffPost:




Greg Mitchell
No Shame, No Blame -- Media Refuse to Face Up to Role in Iraq Disaster
Posted April 2, 2008 | 12:07 PM (EST)



In the thousands of articles and television reports in recent days surrounding the fifth anniversary of the start of the war in Iraq -- and the grim milestone of 4,000 U.S. troops dead there -- nearly every important aspect was probed, and fingers were pointed: at Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Bremer or Dick Cheney, at stubborn Republicans or weak-willed Democrats, and at many others. But conspicuously absent as a subject in the media analysis and reassessment were... the media.

It's as if the war had been planned, launched, and continued for more than half a decade with hardly any major media slips or tragic omissions. The media, with months to plan for the five-year commemoration, were ready to take stock of everything but themselves. By and large, when they did review their role, it was to showcase some of the undeniably terrific reporting, photography, and videography that have emerged from the war zone.

A frank assessment of the overall media performance, from the "run-up" to the "surge," was nearly non-existent. That's not only shameful and revealing -- it's a real missed opportunity, since there is so much to be learned from it by current and future generations of journalists.
Yes, the fateful media mistakes and misreporting of Iraqi WMD before the war has been covered in the past, although with few apologies. But how could this not be widely revisited at the five-year mark -- beyond PBS and NPR -- with 4,000 American dead and thousands wounded for life?

What about the removal of the vast majority of U.S. reporters from Iraq in the early days of the occupation, just when they were most needed to warn of the daily Coalition blunders and emerging insurgency? The media's role in falling victim to official propaganda in the
Jessica Lynch and Pat Tillman cases? The delay in exposing the abuses at Abu Ghraib -- and attacks on civilians in Haditha and numerous other places? .......(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/greg-mitchell/no-shame-no-blame----medi_b_94645.html

[laylah]

1. And we are

surprised WHY? :shrug:

[EFerrari]

2. Greg runs Editor&Publisher and he's right.

Only about a week ago, I heard NYTs reporter John Burns on a BookTv panel spewing a bunch of rationalizations about what a good time the NYTs did and how they are better than ever.

It was unreal.

[blm]

3. It was obvious with the way they handled ToraBora by Jan 2002. Had the public understood

the level of complicity or incompetence shown by BushInc in letting Bin Laden and Al Qaeda escape en masse with no military force pursuing them, they never would have bought his image as a 'determined, stoic' commander-in-chief the media shoved down their throats.

[marmar]

9. True that....

n/t

[SammyWinstonJack]

4. Money talks.

:shrug: I do wonder how they sleep at night? Oh yeah, money! :silly: What scum they are! Their kids will only have them too blame and will they be able to handle that?

[Vincardog]

6. They will handel that the same way they handel everything else: They will say "SO?" What makes

you think they care about their own children any more than they care about anyone else? Do you think that GHWB would shed a tear if gwb choked o a pretzel and died?

[SammyWinstonJack]

7. I know they don't give a shit! It was a rhetorical question. I know they don't care about us.

Nor do they give a shit about their own! No "honor among thieves" with this bunch and we are only a cash cow to them and the countries that they take over and occupy are cash cows for the Military Industrial Complex. I have their number. Too bad the 19% do not!

[Newsjock]

10. This 'scum' asks: What money?

I do wonder how they sleep at night? Oh yeah, money! What scum they are! Their kids will only have them too blame and will they be able to handle that?

As I've mentioned a few times here in the past, I'm one of those supposed "scum" who helped edit a front page until 2004. The pressure from the right-wing watchdogs was so extreme that I left the news desk and went to the features department at another newspaper, where the challenges of the day consisted more of following Britney and Brangelina than following Rumsfeld and Cheney. I recently grew tired of waiting for the industry to correct itself, and I left journalism forever, moving back to one of my earlier careers.

Rest assured, never at any time during this whole mess was I rolling in the dough. Most engineering graduates fresh out of college made more money than I did with more than two dozen years of experience.

But to answer the original question: No, I haven't slept well at night for almost seven years now, ever since that day in 2001 (when I was on vacation, incidentally, and slept through the whole thing), because I was unable to help stop this nation's inexorable march toward war and tyranny (even though I made a point of giving Walter Pincus' pieces stronger play than they got even in his own paper). No matter what successes I may have in my new career, the failure of journalism under my watch is something I have to live with for the rest of my life.

If that makes me "scum," then so be it. Actually, I don't need anyone else to remind me of that.

[Mike Nelson]

5. The conservative media

will never own up to it.

[DemocratInSoCal]

8. I've Turned The Corporate WHORE Media Off Completely

I can't even really enjoy watching my 1 hour of Countdown anymore, now that half the show is spent blasting Hillary Clinton. I'm no Clinton fan either, but I find it to be too biased and obvious with their slanting. I had thought Keith had more integrity than that. So much for Edward R. Murrow.

[Batgirl]

11. Self honesty is such an overrated virtue after all

It was sickeningly obvious during the run-up and the first few weeks of the invasion that those reporters were overjoyed at the prospect of war. Giddier than a troop of cubscouts embarking on the Big camping trip. In which, even if they didn't actually get to shoot a real gun, they would be in close proximity to those who could and would. Geraldo for fuck's sake used the war as a backdrop for a fantasy portrayal of himself as magnificent desert warrior. And he wasn't all that much worse than the rest, just funnier. And I can totally understand why they would not want to look back. I don't want to look at pictures of myself in the 80s with shoulder pads and a Golden Girls perm either. That's why I burned those photos. I'm sure we would all feel the same way if we committed some minor indiscretion that helped cause thousands of human lives to be destroyed and billions of dollars to be wasted.

[Newsjock]

12. I don't think so

It was sickeningly obvious during the run-up and the first few weeks of the invasion that those reporters were overjoyed at the prospect of war.

I assure you, I was anything but "overjoyed." And the night we dropped the first bombs, my managing editor looked at me and said, "It's another Vietnam."

I'm sure we would all feel the same way if we committed some minor indiscretion that helped cause thousands of human lives to be destroyed and billions of dollars to be wasted.

Thank you for that warm vote of support. :P Let me rephrase it this way: Since we are indeed in the sixth year of this war, there is not a single person here who was successful at preventing it. So we should all "feel the same way," every one of us, journalist, activist, parent, soldier, or otherwise.

I've got more than enough guilt for myself already.

[Batgirl]

13. you must not have been watching the same TV news I was nt

[Newsjock]

14. TV wasn't the whole world

Yes, I saw the same crap on TV you did. And the folks at home saw the same crap, then called my bosses the next day and asked why we hated America.

The bottom line: It's unfair to portray "the media" as a one-minded beast that took this country into war. Many of us tried, doing what little we could, to prevent it. We, of course, failed, but that's not because we went home at night to light candles at our private Bush shrines.

[Batgirl]

15. I'm sure journalism is a lot like many other professions

where there is a lot of heroic, thankless work being done by powerless grunts. Who are not the ones steering the boat. Here is a page of snippets showing some of the good and the bad: http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=3062

I truly admire those good reporters who are out there. What a horrible an frustrating era this must be for them. There were a few voices during the run-up who questioned and criticized. Their stories were buried and marginalized. The great majority of the public, in who's name the invasion occurred, never heard anything except the great corporate media ginning up of the war and our Dear Leader.

[Festivito]

16. Our media is America's domestic enemy #1. ..for over 100 years./nt

[Supersedeas]

17. they have stopped covering the way; when not imbedded to read safe military script--they could

care less about reporting facts -- they have advertisers and marketeers to please

Anna Nicole, Britney, and Paris Hilton are about as close to 'reporting' as they will come these days.

[bbgrunt]

18. k and r

[mitchum]

19. I blame those scribbling and chattering hacks just as much as I blame the criminal administration...

a bunch of sniveling, ink-stained wretches