Actually you are quite wrong and stlnative linked many times to a common machine that can knock it out in 15 minutes. It's a matter of photoshoping an image, adding text and pressing the print button.
Jonah's article stated this was hung in Qana, which it wasn't. It was hung off a bridge in Beriut.
No, one of the blog links said that, the photo itself says Beirut.
Excuse me, I don't think I am "quite wrong".
I read stlnative's posts. That is why I said it is very possible for this to have been done that way.
However, you didn't think my post through, apparently.
Did you know EXACTLY where the company was that could produce this type of banner in less than 1 hour? I didn't even know it could be done, much less know where one is located.
Do you have a picture of Condolezza rice on your computer right now?
Do you have the money, right now, to go and pay for a banner like that? I feel pretty confident that it would cost up into the 4 figure range.
It "COULD" have been done that way.
I find it unlikely that it did happen that way.
This looks and smells like a hard propoganda exercise, not a spur of the moment action by some "protesters" in Beirut.
Before the bombing, you locate the printer, locate the pictures, plan you headings for the banner, get your financing in order.
After the bombing, you show up at the print company with your banner idea all laid out and ready to go.
There are a host of other possibilites:
- The print company is tied in to Hezbollah
- The print company employs the "protestors"
- The "protestors" were actually Hezbollah operatives.
We could go on and on.
All I'm opining is that, to me, it seems likely that Hezbollah saw a window of opportunity with Condi Rice in the region and planned an operation.
I don't know. 2 Arab geek-goobers from Beirut may have more money than brains and did this in an hour.
Who knows?
It doesn't really work that way.
Also, the print speeds given are going to be under ideal conditions.
These are very large high-res images that are ripped to the printer. Ripping a large file takes time above and beyond the print time.
That said, the banner is displayed near where it was printed so that saves time. The graphics layout can be done quickly but still takes time. But from what I understand there was a laspe of hours between the actual bombing and when the rescuers (and media attention) arrived on the scene. In fact on Fox there was some discussion of the big delay in the rescue efforts.