What you won’t see about Iraq on American TV

western media in general is the problem — not simply American media. While it’s true that the media has focused much of its attention on the death of Anna Nicole Smith — the reality is that they do so becuase there is an audience for it.

The only way to truly speak out is to do so with our remote controls and changing the channel or simply turning the T.V. off!

The media shares some responsibility for the Iraq decable. Why weren’t the difficult questions asked of policy makers in the run-up to the war? Why did the media so blindly follow Bush and Co. throughout all of their war mongering in 2002 (and ’03) ????

@17, by Robert McLaws,

You say:

“It’s not like Bush made it up, we’ve had the same intelligence for years. How about asking REAL questions, like “Why was Saddam lying to the world?” or “Where did all those weapons go?” or “Why were the French and Germans supplying Iraq with weapons before we went in?””

Now…did I miss something here, or what exactly was Donald Rumsfeld doing shaking hands with Saddam, as we have been show again and again – oh wait, the rest of us in Europe have been shown, most US media probably conveniently ‘forgot’ about recent history between Iraq, Iran and the US.

Iran for one is the only country other than the US to operate the F-14 Tomcat long-range air-superiority fighter, recently decomissioned by the US Navy. And I bet they weren’t stolen from Miramar…

During the Iran-Iraq war, the US supplied weapons and intelligence to *both* sides, and the early chemical and biological agents that were used by Iraq had been supplied in fact by the US.

So, please, cut the we-are-oh-so-good crap, in an armed conflict the weapons industry thrives, and this means that any country with such an industry -will- supply weapons to the conflict. The fact that intelligence was wrong was corroborated with countries that wanted to go to war, but what about the rest of the countries that called the intelligence bullshit? Maybe lessons about arrogance and self-confidence should be learned from all this. I just don’t buy that since the first Gulf War the US has been flying over Iraq, they have been bombing it on a regular basis, and have had intelligence about what Saddam was doing, and then, all of a sudden, there is such an urgency to go in and bust him. A WMD program is not developed in two weeks.

Finally, I could list a dozen conflict areas where people are dying daily, opressed by armed militias or dictators, and the US don’t seem to have an urgency to take action and remove them for the good of their people. In the end, after we learned that Saddam’s WMDs didn’t even exist, this was the reason to remove him right?

@21 & 22,

Neither of you have a real clue. You guys are the kinds of people who support the govt no matter what it does.

Neither Mexico or Russia hold any interest for me. Mexico is too violent and Russia is too cold. There are some nice places in Europe I’m conmsidering should the time ever come.

As an add-on…

There is nothing wrong with being an expat. There are millions of them out there who moved for various reasons.

Just peruse the folowing site…

http://www.escapeartist.com/

“All the good that’s happening in Iraq” Give me a break. “satellite TVs” disgusting. “Internet access” are you kidding me?

Please give it up, this war is a disaster.

I completely agree that the coverage has been quite lax. A lot of people don’t realize how bad it is. 3,000 troops dead sounds bad, but estimates say that around 500,000 iraqi people have died.

Even though it’s kind of depressing, there are a lot of ways to help. I’m currently working on a project called http://www.beyondorders.com and there are a lot of other tech-savvy people doing work to help.

The Iraqi people need Jesus most of all.

Peter wrote: The Iraqi people need Jesus most of all
They have him, in a way…since Bush says he talks to Jesus.

I talk to Jesus too dude. It’s called praying. You ought to give it a try sometime.

This thread has just jumped the shark. bringing Jesus into this? Why?

Anyway, this comment caught my eye. >>Whenever I’m in Europe, I can always spot the Americans. It’s patently obvious. Complainging about European hotels, food, clothes, you name it.

Interesting. I just spent a week in Europe and didn’t see anything like that. The only thing I complain about is smoking. Which, actually, a lot of Europeans complain about too. One lady lit up in the non-smoking section of a train.

Another guy lit up in the bathroom in our flight from Germany to the US. I’ve never seen that before.

Thankfully Europe is starting to get smart and ban smoking. I can’t wait.

But, back to the point. Many Americans are ignorant. It pisses me off too. But I note that my CERN video got fewer viewings than many of my other, more commercial, videos.

This article is “tag-spammed” to the max – and won’t be any surpise to anyone has followedf the evolution of the “New Cold War” – even if they watch it on a 13″ television because they don’t want to impact their productivity by wasting too much time watching TV ..

Scoble, you should check this out: http://www.miraesoft.com/karel/2007/01/28/be-careful-with-where-you-get-your-information-from/

If you were getting “Watered down news” it would still be much better compared to what’s REALLY going on.

thanks for the link…

@35

Robert,

Why do you say so many Americans are ignorant? I think you are loosing the focus of this blog more and more.
Maybe you should become Edwards’ next blogger?

Jonathan: because I’ve traveled to most of the states and most people I’ve met would rather talk about Britney Spears’ new hairdo than what CERN is doing.

But, seriously, just look at who we elected. That’s enough of proof that we need.

Are you saying Americans overall are NOT ignorant? Oh, I do want to see your stats on that one.

Regarding Edwards. Political life does not interest me. I’d rather hang out with technologists and not need to beg them for money.

@28, “You guys are the kinds of people who support the govt no matter what it does.”

Actually, you have that wrong. I didn’t support the govt from ’63- ’69, ’72-’74, ’77- 81, ’92 – 01. And I’m no fan of Bush, either. But, I neither bitch about a country I’m proud to live in because I can work to change it. Apparently you don’t think you can.

“But, back to the point. Many Americans are ignorant. It pisses me off too. But I note that my CERN video got fewer viewings than many of my other, more commercial, videos.”

And many Europeans, Asians, Australians, and Africans are ignorant, what’s your point? Because people didn’t watch one of your poorly produced videos about some technology that is of little interest to the majority you come to the conclusion that many Americans are ignorant?

“Are you saying Americans overall are NOT ignorant? Oh, I do want to see your stats on that one.”

What actual “stats” do you have to prove your point. FYI, anecdotes and opinions are not stats.

@27 “Finally, I could list a dozen conflict areas where people are dying daily, opressed by armed militias or dictators, and the US don’t seem to have an urgency to take action and remove them for the good of their people.”

I thought the general consensus here was that people no longer want the US to be the world police. Which is it? Are you sure you want to leave these types of things in the hands of the UN? Because I’m sure the US would be happy to no longer get involved. Just tell us.

LayZ: “Because I’m sure the US would be happy to no longer get involved. ”

Actually, they wouldn’t.

Here’s a link to something you should take the time to watch, and then watch again to make sure you didn’t miss anything:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-6604775898578139565&q=peace+propaganda+promised+land

Hmm,
Americans aren’t any dumber than Europeans when it comes to things. Our media are just as biased as the American ones. Try to find a station that says anything good at all about Bush. If you believed the European media Bush is the worst leader on the planet (I don’t remember him starting a genocide on his own people), and so most Europeans believe this to be the case. Most Europeans also believe that America must be a bad country, because it chose Bush for president. What they always ignore is that in the US there about as many people that are against Bush and what he stands for, as there are that elected Bush (hence the +/- 50/50 presidential election result and the +/- 50/50 democratic/republican senate you have now).
What makes it all so funny is that while “people” believe the US to be “such a bad country” that wants to “rule the world”, they are all too happy to use US technology, eat at McDonald’s, drink Coke, wear Nike…
Also the smartest people (in a;lot of departments) we have all want to go study in the US, because that’s where the best universities in the world are.
Sorta reminds me of that interview my wife saw on tv once, where this guy in Egypt was ranting against the US and how bad everything about the US was. When the reporter asked him why his kids were drinking Coke (in the background you could see this) then, he said in a defensive way “my kids have to drink too”. Nevermind they could have been drinking water.
It never amazes me how hypocritical people can be. They say one thing, but do something else. For instance how many people that are now unhappy about Bush didn’t bother to register to vote for the last presidential elections.

PS: The Iraq war was not started about WMD (the WMD issue was brought up by Tony Blair becuase he couldn’t sell the war to his people based on the breach of resolution 1441 if I remember correctly), but actually on the breach of resolution 1441 (http://daccessdds.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N02/682/26/PDF/N0268226.pdf?OpenElement).
as adopted by the Security Council at its 4644th meeting, on 8 November 2002, and section 13 says :
13. Recalls, in that context, that the Council has repeatedly warned Iraq that it will face serious consequences as a result of its continued violations of its obligations;
Everyone knew that the “serious consequences” was other language for “war”.
They definitely breached it when Hans Blickx found the al-Samoud II missile that exceeded the limits set by Security Council.
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/2756987.stm)
This was looked upon as indeed another violation in the face of a “last chance” resolution.
On top of this their “cat and mouse” game with the inspectors continued.
If I remember correctly Bush claimed they started the war to uphold the values of the UN as an organisation (well I don’t remember the exact words, but that seemed to be pretty much what he was trying to say). If there was no action, the UN would have become another toothless dragon like the League of Nations before it.
In other words, you can’t say to a country “comply or else”, and then if they don’t comply, nothing happens at all. That would be like telling people “don’t rob the bank or else”, but then if they do they don’t go to jail and they get to keep the money.
If anyone cares to explain to ignorant little me how a system like that would ever work, then maybe I’ll look at it another way.

And please Robert, it says “Tech Geek Blogger” at the top. I don’t mind (neither you or me) giving a political opinion, but if I want to read a political blog, I visit one, if I want to read a tech blog…
I’m sure you understand.

Dirk: it also has my name at the top of the blog. Therefore things that catch my eye will be posted, even if they aren’t technology related. I’m an American, and interested in how the media differs here from other countries. And, two, I’m interested in politics. Three, I’m a taxpayer, so will post things here that show how my tax dollars are being spent from time to time.

Ok, fair enough. I can always learn how to skip em