The American Media in Wartime

Speech delivered at a Hillsdale College seminar in Dearborn, MI ^ | Apr. 28, 2003 | Brit Hume

[Bigg Red]

Bump for later read.
I love Brit. I don't have cable, but the local FOX affilifat carries Fox News Sunday. I rarely miss the show, but if Brit's not on, I don't pay that much attention.

[malia]

Thanks for the posting!

Brit Hume is my media Hero!!!

[Tamzee]

This was wonderful, thank you :-)

Bump!

[Ragtime Cowgirl]

Brit's awesome. He survived the 60s, DC pols and his own press peers with his sense of humor and common sense intact - and he sees through the BS, knowing that our military is and always has been honorable.

The attitude of the media in times of war is all the more puzzling when considered in the context of what America has done in the world over the last century – and in particular, what the American military has done. It entered World War I toward the end, tipped the balance, and saved our friends and allies. In World War II, it led the free world to victory against genuinely monstrous evils. After that war, it gave aid and comfort to defeated enemies on a scale never before seen. Considering its actions in Japan alone, the U.S. should go down in history as one of the most benevolent victorious powers in history.

[1rudeboy]

bttt

[Always A Marine]

Imprimis is one of the most valuable publications in existence, in my opinion. I still enjoy the print version so I can pass along the excellent essays which are excerpted from distinguished guest speakers at Hillsdale. Imprimis addresses compelling topics, and the essays are so concise that people won't shy away from the first read. And it is so consistently excellent that most new readers will want to subscribe for themselves.

[foreverfree]

Fox bump

[Ragtime Cowgirl]

You're very welcome. I meant to thank www.townhall.com for linking Brit's speech to their website.

We shouldn't have to hunt for pro-America news. The job of the press is to inform. They aren't. They are choosing to ignore the primary news source - CENTCOM, in favor of selective reporting that deceives.

www.CENTCOM.mil, proven the most trustworthy throughout the war - scorned by a press that bought Baghdad Bob's lies. Two reports from CENTCOM daily give a very different picture of the Coalition progress. It makes for a simple and solid case against the press.

We have fewer than 12 Coalition casualties a week - mostly accidental from unexploded ordnance - in a nation of over 24 million newly freed Iraqis and over 150,000 Coalition troops. How is that "chaos" or being "unwanted"? It isn't, of course.

For every tragic Coalition casualty as a result of a regime dead-ender, or terrorist-wannabe, we fire back - and we take out far more bad guys than they ever will. CENTCOM security report - daily.

We're also fixing, building, feeding, teaching, setting up police stations, getting power back on, etc., all across Iraq - a detailed daily list of good works - Centcom, daily...daily ignored by the mainstrean press.

Thank God for Brit, FoxNews (when they're off Laci), and FR. (^;

[Ragtime Cowgirl]

My pleasure.

[Ragtime Cowgirl]

Well said. They always lift up, rather than tear down the human spirit. Rare indeed.

[Ethyl]

Brit Hume is the best, almost as good looking as Tony Snow, I have to admit the Fox News has be best looking reporters of all the news channels, but I don't look at any but FOX.

[G-Bob]

bump

[optimistically_conservative]

What is starting to happen to the "media" today is a reverse Vietnam experience.

The X, Y and Z generations are tired of a cynical media that has been a constant drumbeat of anti-Americanism. They aren't products of the Chomsky/Nixon/Vietnam experience and have developed a skepticism of a press which, in their eyes, is no more credible - and perhaps less - than the government and corporations the press reports on.

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

Ted [Koppel] was an embedded reporter in Iraq, and after he came home he . . . spoke with real generosity about the American officers and enlisted men that he dealt with, and how able they were and how good they were and how effective they were. But he went out of his way to make a point of distinguishing between them and the policy makers in Washington. About the latter he said, “I’m very cynical, and I remain very cynical, about the reasons for getting into this war.”

Cynical? We journalists pride ourselves, and properly so, on being skeptical. That’s our job. But I have always thought a cynic is a bad thing to be. A cynic, as I understand the term, means someone who interprets others’ actions as coming from the worst motives. It’s a knee-jerk way of thinking. A cynic, it is said, understands the price of everything and the value of nothing. So I don’t understand why Ted Koppel would say with such pride and ferocity – he said it more than once – that he is a cynic. But I think he speaks for many in the media, and I think it’s a very deep problem.

Yes. But cynicism is just superficial negativity. And as Hume points out elsewhere in the piece,

One of the problems we in the news business face, of course, is that sometimes there’s not much news. And there’s an old saying in newsrooms: “No news is bad news, good news is dull news, and bad news makes marvelous copy.” And that’s essentially true. Some good news, like Jessica Lynch’s rescue, is spectacular stuff. But generally speaking, news is what’s exceptional, and bad stuff tends to be exceptional in our world. Reporters have a natural instinct, therefore, to look for the negative.

A superfical focus on the negative cannot be far removed from cynicism. Hume is right, that's a problem--but the problem inheres in journalism.

Fox News is just as superficial as the rest of journalism--it's just not as negative. Consequently Fox News reports will stand the test of time much better than journalism which is overwhelmingly negative towards institutions upon which we have to depend--and which are actually quite good.

Why Brodcast Journalism Is Unnecessary and Illegitimate

[CapandBall]

"The name is Hume... Brit Hume"

(a la Bond... James Bond)

I always like his name!

[The Californian]

Bump for later read.

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

This piece by Brit Hume is really quite good. Excellent!

[Bigg Red]

...he sees through the BS...

___
Yes, and I love seeing him hillary-slap Juan Williams frequently.

[leadpenny]

Bump. Thanks for posting, RC.