today, i want to direct you to the third estate sunday review's "Under-reported stores from last week: feat: Ron (Why Are We Back in Iraq?), Pam (Big Brass Blog) and Folding Star (A Winding Road)." that's a great story/conference on stories the mainstream media missed last week while they obsessed over only 1 story.
besides the people mentioned in the title, you'll hear 3rd estate's picks, common ills community member betty's picks, c.i.'s picks and my picks.
i want to note a pick from the 3rd estate because i think it's pretty important. it's chris anderson's 'The Media: Blind In Iraq' from nyc indymedia. kara brought this story up this morning over at the common ills and that made me think about how i think the story is important but i don't believe i've done much to help get it out.
so here's a section of 'the media: blind in iraq' and the entire thing is worth reading:
All in all, a dramatic attack that underscored the growing competence of US-trained Iraqi security forces, the increasing isolation of the insurgency, and the presence of foregin fighters in Iraq. In short, an attack that reinforced everything the United States wanted to say about the current situation in Iraq.
Which is probably why it never happened. Or at least, why it didn't happen the way we were told it happened.
Burdened by the dangers of reporting in Iraq, unofficial military censorship, and the conventions of foreign correspondence early reports about the "Battle at Lake Thanthar" were compiled almost entirely from briefings given by Iraqi and US government officials. The reports, in the NY Times, the AP, and elsewhere emphasized the high insurgent death toll, the importance of Iraqi civilian tips, the presence of foreign fighters, the large ammount of equipment at the camp, and the fact that insurgents that tried to escape in boats across the lake were killed.
[...]
So what's actually going on in Iraq? As we've noted on this page a number of times already, no one has any idea. Certainly not the journalists assigned to report there. As Juan Cole puts it:"American news organizations such as CNN refuse to report news that is only carried by AFP, because they consider it to have inadequate journalistic quality-control. But reports like this one are not being done by US wire services in Iraq, and if we don't take AFP seriously, we essentially may as well just believe whatever Interior Minister Falah al-Naqib and the Pentagon claim.
i really recommend that you read that article because we are not getting the truth about iraq. we didn't before the war and we still aren't.
this is a short entry and there may be more later tonight or not. i've going out to eat and after i have to drop jeff off at the airport.
