Posted on 12/12/2005 10:06:34 PM PST by AZ_Cowboy
The media seem to have come up with a formula that would make any war in history unwinnable and unbearable: They simply emphasize the enemy's victories and our losses.
Losses suffered by the enemy are not news, no matter how large, how persistent, or how clearly they indicate the enemy's declining strength.
What are the enemy's victories in Iraq? The killing of Americans and the killing of Iraqi civilians. Both are big news in the mainstream media, day in and day out, around the clock.
Has anyone ever believed that any war could be fought without deaths on both sides? Every death is a tragedy to the individual killed and to his loved ones. But is there anything about American casualty rates in Iraq that makes them more severe than casualty rates in any other war we have fought?
On the contrary, the American deaths in Iraqi are a fraction of what they have been in other wars in our history. The media have made a big production about the cumulative fatalities in Iraq, hyping the thousandth death with multiple full-page features in the New York Times and comparable coverage on TV.
The two-thousandth death was similarly anticipated almost impatiently in the media and then made another big splash. But does media hype make 2,000 wartime fatalities in more than two years unusual?
The Marines lost more than 5,000 men taking one island in the Pacific during a three-month period in World War II. In the Civil War, the Confederates lost 5,000 men in one battle in one day.
Yet there was Jim Lehrer on the "News Hour" last week earnestly asking Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld about the ten Americans killed that day. It is hard to imagine anybody in any previous war asking any such question of anyone responsible for fighting a war.
We have lost more men than that in our most overwhelming and one-sided victories in previous wars. During an aerial battle over the Mariannas islands in World War II, Americans shot down hundreds of Japanese planes while losing about 30 of their own.
If the media of that era had been reporting the way the media report today, all we would have heard about would have been that more than two dozen Americans were killed that day.
Neither our troops nor the terrorists are in Iraq just to be killed. Both have objectives. But any objectives we achieve get short shrift in the mainstream media, if they are mentioned at all.
Our troops can kill ten times as many of the enemy as they kill and it just isn't news worth featuring, if it is mentioned at all, in much of the media. No matter how many towns are wrested from the control of the terrorists by American or Iraqi troops, it just isn't front-page news like the casualty reports or even the doom-saying of some politicians.
The fact that these doom-saying politicians have been proved wrong, again and again, does not keep their latest outcries from overshadowing the hard-won victories of American troops on the ground in Iraq.
The doom-sayers claimed that terrorist attacks would make it impossible to hold the elections last January because so many Iraqis would be afraid to go vote. The doom-sayers urged that the elections be postponed.
But a higher percentage of Iraqis voted in that election -- and in a subsequent election -- than the percentage of Americans who voted in last year's Presidential elections.
Utter ignorance of history enables any war with any casualties to be depicted in the media as an unmitigated disaster.
Even after Nazi Germany surrendered at the end of World War II, die-hard Nazi guerrilla units terrorized and assassinated both German officials and German civilians who cooperated with Allied occupation authorities.
But nobody suggested that we abandon the country. Nobody was foolish enough to think that you could say in advance when you would pull out or that you should encourage your enemies by announcing a timetable.
There has never been the slightest doubt that we would begin pulling troops out of Iraq when it was feasible. Only time and circumstances can tell when that will be. And only irresponsible politicians and the media think otherwise.
William Tecumseh Sherman
"I hate newspapermen. They come into camp and pick up their camp rumors and print them as facts. I regard them as spies, which, in truth, they are. If I killed them all there would be news from Hell before breakfast."
Thanks, I can never get too much of the clarity of Thomas Sowell.
The man has sense and understanding.
The time table demand DemonRATS keep harping about is merely the same tried and true formula John Kerry used during the Viet Nam war. It was actually a part of a plan by the Communists, and John Kerry, colaborator, the vehicle of delivery. We all know what the result of that was. It turned victory into defeat, turned a retreating NVA into an advancing one, and costs the lives of another half million people.
The Democrats and MSM were proud of themselves then, and want to repeat this shameful treasonous act yet again. The lives of Iraqi's aren't their concern, they never were. Only regaining power is -at any price.
bump
Why has it taken so long? Why isn't it written about more frequently?
The fact that such a large number of supposedly unrelated and independent media outlets all speak with this one treacherous voice makes the fact of a conspiracy undeniable, even if it's on the "prince of the powers of the air" level, rather than humanly coordinated.
The media seem to have come up with a formula that would make any war in history unwinnable and unbearable: They simply emphasize the enemy's victories and our losses.
Losses suffered by the enemy are not news, no matter how large, how persistent, or how clearly they indicate the enemy's declining strength.
...Has anyone ever believed that any war could be fought without deaths on both sides? Every death is a tragedy to the individual killed and to his loved ones. But is there anything about American casualty rates in Iraq that makes them more severe than casualty rates in any other war we have fought? On the contrary, the American deaths in Iraqi are a fraction of what they have been in other wars in our history.
...Neither our troops nor the terrorists are in Iraq just to be killed. Both have objectives. But any objectives we achieve get short shrift in the mainstream media, if they are mentioned at all.
Our troops can kill ten times as many of the enemy as they kill and it just isn't news worth featuring, if it is mentioned at all, in much of the media. No matter how many towns are wrested from the control of the terrorists by American or Iraqi troops, it just isn't front-page news like the casualty reports or even the doom-saying of some politicians.
The fact that these doom-saying politicians have been proved wrong, again and again, does not keep their latest outcries from overshadowing the hard-won victories of American troops on the ground in Iraq.
...Utter ignorance of history enables any war with any casualties to be depicted in the media as an unmitigated disaster.
Even after Nazi Germany surrendered at the end of World War II, die-hard Nazi guerrilla units terrorized and assassinated both German officials and German civilians who cooperated with Allied occupation authorities.
But nobody suggested that we abandon the country. Nobody was foolish enough to think that you could say in advance when you would pull out or that you should encourage your enemies by announcing a timetable.
There has never been the slightest doubt that we would begin pulling troops out of Iraq when it was feasible. Only time and circumstances can tell when that will be. And only irresponsible politicians and the media think otherwise.
Nailed It!
Moral Clarity BUMP !
This ping list is not author-specific for articles I'd like to share. Some for the perfect moral clarity, some for provocative thoughts; or simply interesting articles I'd hate to miss myself. (I don't have to agree with the author all 100% to feel the need to share an article.) I will try not to abuse the ping list and not to annoy you too much, but on some days there is more of the good stuff that is worthy of attention. You can see the list of articles I pinged to lately on my page.
You are welcome in or out, just freepmail me (and note which PING list you are talking about). Besides this one, I keep 2 separate PING lists for my favorite authors Victor Davis Hanson and Orson Scott Card.
For perspective, "2000" is roughly the number of Americans killed in the first half-hour on Omaha Beach.
There was a show on the History Channel about a week ago about the Nazi "Werewolves" who started killing "disloyal" Germans even as they themselves were retreating on both fronts in the face of the Allied onslaught.
The killing of cooperative bureaucrats continued up until late '48 or early '49.
This information is readily available to anyone who cares to click it up on the Internet. It is only because the MSM is both lazy and prejudiced that this information has not been long since reported in all media, since it is clearly relevant to today's events in Iraq.
Congressman Billybob
http://www.goodolddogs3.com/If-IwoJima-Happened2day.html
That is the most beautiful tribute to our fighting men I have ever seen. Thank you, Zacs Mom.
As much as I hate to ever disagree with Sowell, people have posted archived news articles showing exactly the same cut-and-run mentaility in post-war Germany as we see today in post-war Iraq. It's just that such sentiments were far rarer then, today they are the norm.
bump for later
Ditto... add me to the Thomas Sowell ping list!
I discovered Thomas Sowell back about '72, thanks to a history teacher of mine, Mr. Hewitt, who I think both liked his arguments, and was interested in this well educated, conservative Black man who noted that prejudice wasn't necessarily a barrier to economic success. He was a voice crying in the wilderness then.
At least, there are more people who listen to him now, I believe...black and white. Always a good read.
When they started it, it was obvious that they were hoping for US casualties, so they could use the garden as a public relations tool.
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