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How Many Dead? (Don't Ask Our Media)
I hadn't written anything yet for this week because I'd been at a regional blogger conference and was still mentally processing and mulling over alot of things in my head. I saw these symbolic grave markers and stopped, but soon realized that it would be impossible to photograph them. When I took a photo encompassing all that would fit in, and then moved to where that photo ended and took another one (with the hope of connecting them for a panorama), it took me twenty photos. When walking back, I decided to film them. It took me a few seconds short of five minutes just to walk by and capture the graves of Arlington West, which are here in Seattle for the fifth year. For shame!
Meanwhile, as Matthew Carnicelli alerted us to, the networks are avoiding war coverage. They may be tired of it, but those of us who haven't forgotten should remember when we vote next.
Reporters Say Networks Put Wars on Back Burner
Getting a story on the evening news isn’t easy for any correspondent. And for reporters in Iraq and Afghanistan, it is especially hard, according to Lara Logan, the chief foreign correspondent for CBS News. So she has devised a solution when she is talking to the network.
“Generally what I say is, ‘I’m holding the armor-piercing R.P.G.,’ ” she said last week in an appearance on “The Daily Show,” referring to the initials for rocket-propelled grenade. “ ‘It’s aimed at the bureau chief, and if you don’t put my story on the air, I’m going to pull the trigger.’ ”
Ms. Logan let a sly just-kidding smile sneak through as she spoke, but her point was serious. Five years into the war in Iraq and nearly seven years into the war in Afghanistan, getting news of the conflicts onto television is harder than ever.
“If I were to watch the news that you hear here in the United States, I would just blow my brains out because it would drive me nuts,” Ms. Logan said.
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From the above article:
Almost halfway into 2008, the three newscasts have shown 181 weekday minutes of Iraq coverage, compared with 1,157 minutes for all of 2007. The "CBS Evening News" has devoted the fewest minutes to Iraq, 51, versus 55 minutes on ABC's "World News" and 74 minutes on "NBC Nightly News." (The average evening newscast is 22 minutes long.)
Meanwhile, US taxpayers have funded with $500 million dollars a propaganda network in the middle east, designed to counteract sources there, with failed results. (see Middle East Hearts and Minds)
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DailyKos has a top recommended diary on the near-total news blackout on Iraq and Afghanistan that I referred to above.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/6/24/16424/3631/706/541349
I am starting to get the feeling no one cares or wants to hear about it anyway.
Please prove me wrong.
As crass as this sounds, Americans have become conditioned not to respond to the Iraqi Occupation. For years, we were lied to and prevented from learning the full truth about the debacle. Just like an abused individual who has been conditioned to accept abuse, Americans have become conditioned to the horrors of the Fiasco we created. There is nothing newsworthy to many people who have heard the stories before. So why should the networks keep telling us the same type of story over and over, if we have become blase´ about it? That was a rhetorical question.
We have not been allowed to even see the caskets of the returning Americans. Yet, we are given the privilege to see the deceased's memorial pictures, and those pictures suggest some strange immortality for those individuals (Bush logic at work here: Hey, they really are not gone, here is their picture).
Our indifference to the the plight of the Iraqi citizenry is part of an even more developed defense mechanism. Americans have a hard time accepting that we are responsible for the misery of millions of people who did nothing to harm us. Hence our collective subconscious fails to recognize and accept what we have done.
It is a challenge for any candidate to remind people about something they do not want to hear. But, it can be done. Remind people that Americans are spending FIVE THOUSAND DOLLARS EVERY TWO SECONDS IN IRAQ, and then people might start caring more about ways to end this tragedy. People will start to realize there is better use for our money. Like I said it is crass.