Cliff LyonI Wake Up Sick Each Morning. Do you?
The conversation on the post “A Question for Sue” has brought home a very stark reality about the incredible organized media restriction of war reporting in this country. If you are not sickened each morning when you wake up and are reminded that we are at war, you do not know war. Ask the soldiers.
For those of you interested in a really penetrating perspective on the American media I recommend watching this documentary. It only runs in RealPlayer broadband.
I especially hope Sue and her friends will secretly watch this. I hope they will put away their media-fed media-bias and just watch.
December 29th, 2006 at 2:29 pm
Waking up every morning in Illinois sick… and tired!
December 29th, 2006 at 2:55 pm
Yikes … Illinois, you poor thing.
December 29th, 2006 at 4:27 pm
Who speaks for the small voice of each child? Isn’t being there for those who can’t speak for themselves a part of democracy? ASP, do you have any anwers? Look at your children when they crawl into bed with you each morning, sleepy eyed and looking to you to take them through another day. Do you think parents in Iraq wish for anything different for their children? How about changing places with them? How can we stop this injustice? How can we stop the madness?
December 29th, 2006 at 4:36 pm
Cliff,
You should talk to Marshall Thompson about this. He has a long, long list of truly AMAZING stories about how the military blatantly and knowingly manipulates the media and uses soldiers to promote the Bush war policy.
My favorite was the story he told about when the military decided that they would have a soldier propose marriage at the Rose Bowl. They didn’t know who, but a soldier WOULD do it. So they sent out notice to the various units in Iraq that if a soldier was willing to propose marriage (and the proposee was going to accept) the military would fly both to Southern California, cover their trip costs, etc.
What manipulation.
December 29th, 2006 at 6:21 pm
I notice that Sue and LL and others are over at ASP now patting each other on the back for what amounts to sticking their heads in the sand - they see, speak and hear no evil, and thereby convince themselves that there is no evil vis-a-vis their former and continuing support for Bush and his war criminal policies and behavior.
My guess is that Sue, at least, had the courage to look at the documentary, but then immediately felt ill by what she saw and heard, and became compelled to run for cover over at ASP and continue the process of right-wing war-mongering self-validation. Pathetic!
Seal Pat’s got a lot to learn about the company he keeps - his goals are a critical part of the ASP grown-ups’ need for further self-validation that the Iraq war is a just war and that their participation in and support for the war is noble and just. What a whoppin hangover these folks are going to have when they finally wake up!
December 29th, 2006 at 6:29 pm
Looks like Sue ran off with her tail between her legs.
Its pretty pitiful these guys are sooo tough when they think they have the full force and effect of the US Military behind them…OUR US Military.
But when it comes to a battle of the mind they retreat back to their little Indian tents and sit around patting each other on the back.
Piteeeee ful
December 29th, 2006 at 8:40 pm
@ ASP we are trolls.
Self validation and denial are painful facts of life. They hang together in that bubble. Sorta like we do here.
I work with an Iraq vet and am myself a Viet Nam war veteran. When I returned from that war I wasn’t really spit on, it just felt like it sometimes. Maybe I was spitting on myself. This new crew, may just feel like rationalizations of ‘promoting Democracy’, etc, don’t really get them off the hook for the shit they did, thier behavior in ‘defence of thier country’. They are correct in the assumption that we (others) will likely misunderstand them and thier experiences (often nightmarish). I can be sympathetic to thier naivete, and still curse the ‘leaders’ that set this mess in action. I have to be. Cause I have myself to forgive, as well as them. This is just another aspect of having served in the military. So they did these awful things, are they forever cursed? Folks, this is a forgiveness test all around and not everybody will pass. Sadly, some will not be able to forgive themselves. There are some none of us will be able to forgive, and on and on…There certainly IS another reality that warriors will have to grapple with for the rest of thier haunted lives. Once again, more reasons to end this fubar before it creates even more casualties.
December 30th, 2006 at 6:32 am
Forgive them? That is up to their God, and those they have damaged. We are way down on the list.
December 30th, 2006 at 12:06 pm
I watched the documentary, and it gave me a different perspective. The media is all about glitz and glamor and celebrity romance, but I didn’t think about it in terms of how the networks sanitized the initial invasion nor how they romanticized the invasion with their embedded reporters and their retired generals.
That being said, the documentary presents the perspective that war is never justified. The Iraqi-Americans think it is. The Kurds obviously do. The Shi’a in Iraq do, because now that Saddam is gone, they can go to their holy cities–Najaf and Kufa–and worship Allah as they haven’t been able to for about 20 years.
Yes, I think the media does a terrible job of reporting the truth when it is not glamorous or when it will not improve their ratings. Now they seem to think (from my perspective) that they can maintain their ratings by reporting only on the negative in Iraq, refusing generally to report the improvements there.
All media should be more like those forums, of which OneUtah is a good example, where both sides of the whole story can be told without filtration. Then, good people on every side of any issue can decide how they feel about each issue without being told how they should feel.
December 30th, 2006 at 12:20 pm
Maybe forgive isn’t the right idea. What I was hoping to get to was that none of us are without shortcomings. I have to at least listen to, hear, and accept the stories that are coming from the vets. It’s part of the deal. No one knows beforehand, what kind of mayhem they’ll be caught up in when they take that leap and sign on the dotted line. AND since there is such status and onus to be “all that you can be” it is certain that there will be too many of us that do just that. There you have it. No getting around the fact that healing will involve understanding and acceptance, and, if we can’t at least listen to the stories, it will become just another divide. I don’t really see a lot changing, it’s just my take.
As for the soulless perps, pols, and capitalists, who conjure up these wonderful adventures, May they rot in hell with the femur of Saddam lodged deeply up thier posterior. As you can see, I’m still working on the forgiveness thing.
December 30th, 2006 at 12:29 pm
Frank,
You said, “I watched the documentary, and it gave me a different perspective. The media is all about glitz and glamor and celebrity romance”
The point of the documentary was not THAT the media is bad, but WHY. (the MSM media is controlled by corporate interest.) nd that the government and corps work together much like state-run media to squish free speech and protest.
We need to protect the independent media.
I listen to democracynow.org almost everyday. You will really appreciate it. You can also go back and listen to archives. FACINATING.
Do your own experiment at home. Watch the MSM then DemocracyNow THEN You Decide.
December 30th, 2006 at 2:33 pm
I don’t watch the MSM much, including the puffery of Fox News. I did recognize the woman from DemocracyNow, and remember having watched a few stories a couple months back. I will make it a bookmark in my News Sources so that I reminded to check there often.
Good point, by the way, about the WHY in her story. She really is interesting and has at a MINIMUM a very good goal at heart–to “protect the independent media.”