Posted on 11/01/2001 4:07:25 AM PST by DM1
NUTLEY, N.J. Every day, they gather at the Pentagon and clamor to ask questions about the war on terror.
They demand details about military strategy, civilian casualties and locations of troops and targets. Their inquiries are laced with skepticism over how the government is handling the war.
But that cynicism has made some average Americans angry. "I guess they've forgotten the events of Sept. 11, when thousands of civilians here died for no apparent reason," Sam Marino, 25, a bartender at the Franklin Steak House and Tavern in Nutley, N.J., says of the Pentagon press corps.
With America's war on terror approaching its third month, the tone in media reports is increasingly bleak. Why haven't we won the war already, they ask. Why are civilians dying, they want to know. Where is Usama Bin Laden, they demand to know.
he questions aren't going over well with out-of-the-beltway Americans, nearly 80 percent of whom tell pollsters they approve of the war's progress. "The pundits sitting on their fat backsides in Washington I really have a problem with them," fumed World War II Navy veteran Jim Goran of Bloomfield, N.J. "I would jail them, that's how angry I am." Goran takes issue with most of the questions posed by the press corps, calling them "insensitive, unpatriotic and devoid of any intelligence."
At Wednesday's Pentagon briefing, reporters asked Defense Department spokesman Rear Adm. John Stufflebeem to provide more details about the recent, heavier bombing in Afghanistan and targets that were struck a day earlier. "Admiral, what's the rationale for not saying where the B-52s hit Tuesday?" one journalist asked. "We're getting reports from eyewitnesses they hit; the bad guys know where you hit. What's the big secret?" Stufflebeem responded as he did several times during the news conference that he wouldn't go into specifics. "It's one thing to have seen one fly overhead if you're on the ground," he said. "It's another thing to broadcast an intention of a type of target or tactic and a specific weapons system that is optimized against that."
Many Franklin Steak House patrons said the press and the public don't need the scoop on each move the military makes in the war. "We don't need to know everything. They can't tell us everything," said Jamie Deberto, 34, a Web designer from Bloomfield. "It's frustrating they know they shouldn't be asking some of these questions." She and others think revealing all troop strategies and movements spells defeat. "That reporting is doing the intelligence gathering for our enemy," said communications systems engineer John Gadoury, 54, of Bradford, N.H. "Our news system shouldn't be in that business."
The Washington press corps has pummeled Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and other Bush administration officials with questions about Afghan civilian casualty numbers and mused at the ethics of bombing during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. But many here don't share the media's concern with those issues. "The press has been almost obsessed with whether the campaign is going to end before Ramadan and how many civilian casualties the Taliban are suffering," said lawyer and state legislator Kevin O'Toole, 37, of Cedar Grove, N.J. "But the people of the United States believe those things are not relevant during times of war. Is bin Laden going to take a break on Christmas?" He expressed frustration at the media's apparent impatience with how long the war is taking, and said that's not in line with what the average American feels. "They're doing a disservice to the American people, the presidency and national security by trying to make this a 24-hour war," O'Toole said. "The American people are very patient with this military action."
Not all Franklin patrons believe the press has been off-base, however. "We should definitely know all the moves," said Greg Lampariello, 31, head chef at Terrazza, another steak house in Nutley. "They should keep pressuring [the government] to tell us what's going on. They're our lifeline to the other side."
But that opinion wasn't shared by the majority of patrons. Most said they wished the D.C. press corps would report the news without cynicism and join with other Americans in rallying around the cause. "I think they've lost the morale," said Jennifer Hartos, 23, a medical assistant from Bloomfield. "They've lost a sense of American pride."
Contrary to what Rush says, it's a question of which party benefits from the triumph or benefits from the failure.
Sounds like the press already knows everything about Tuesdays bombing runs. Why are they asking?
OH! By bad guys he probably meant the Taliban, not the press. My mistake!
jennings and the rest of the main stream medias 'legends in their own minds' are not only sick, they have become disgusting lackies for bin laden and every other enemy of these United States, jennings should be deported! Or better yet tried for and then shot for intentional acts treason.
Nukem
The questions, however, in this case, reveal much more about the mindset of the reporters than they do about the war.
Insesitive, unpatriotic, and devoid of any intellingence, MY sentiments exactly ! In fact I find I can no longer watch the briefings from getting so upset with the press. Rumsfeld and Ari Fleisher have the patience of a Saint.
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Thanks and may the Lord God Yeshua bless and protect, while reviving, our country.
Alas
The People's Right To Know Versus Our Soldier's Right To Live
Source: toogoodreports.com; Published: October 30, 2001
Author: Col. David H. HackworthPress Vs. Military - Justice or the First Amendment
Source: National Review online; Published: October 29, 2001
Author: James S. Robbin
I think Rumsfeld is the one doing the pummeling.
The common sense of the great mass of our people has always been under rated by the left. The sentiments of americans are conservative in many things. The failures of the world socialist intelligensia in this regard will help change their political sensibilities toward hearty american conservatism in politics.
Good Job, Jennings. Way to go, Rather. Katie, you just keep it up. For the children.
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