Introduction To The Tinfoil Apocalype: Eason And The MSM Gloom Of Ignorance

You may have already caught this piece by a Task Force Commander in Iraq. It gets very high marks for being a relatively short piece -- if you haven't you need to read it now! Here are some samples -- first on bad new sells:

What if domestic news outlets continually fed American readers headlines like: "Bloody Week on U.S. Highways: Some 700 Killed," or "More Than 900 Americans Die Weekly from Obesity-Related Diseases"? Both of these headlines might be true statistically, but do they really represent accurate pictures of the situations? What if you combined all of the negatives to be found in the state of Texas and used them as an indicator of the quality of life for all Texans? Imagine the headlines: "Anti-law Enforcement Elements Spread Robbery, Rape and Murder through Texas Cities." For all intents and purposes, this statement is true for any day of any year in any state. True -- yes, accurate -- yes, but in context with the greater good taking place -- no! After a year or two of headlines like these, more than a few folks back in Texas and the rest of the U.S. probably would be ready to jump off of a building and end it all. So, imagine being an American in Iraq right now.

I just read yet another distorted and grossly exaggerated story from a major news organization about the "failures" in the war in Iraq. Print and video journalists are covering only a small fraction of the events in Iraq and more often than not, the events they cover are only the bad ones. Many of the journalists making public assessments about the progress of the war in Iraq are unqualified to do so, given their training and experience. The inaccurate picture they paint has distorted the world view of the daily realities in Iraq. The result is a further erosion of international public support for the United States' efforts there, and a strengthening of the insurgents' resolve and recruiting efforts while weakening our own. Through their incomplete, uninformed and unbalanced reporting, many members of the media covering the war in Iraq are aiding and abetting the enemy.

The fact is the Coalition is making steady progress in Iraq, but not without ups and downs. War is a terrible thing and terrible things happen during wars, even when you are winning. In war, as in any contest of wills with capable opponents, things do not always go as planned; the guys with the white hats don't always come out on top in each engagement. That doesn't mean you are losing. Sure, there are some high profile and very spectacular enemy attacks taking place in Iraq these days, but the great majority of what is happening in Iraq is positive. So why is it that no matter what events unfold, good or bad, the media highlight mostly the negative aspects of the event? The journalistic adage, "If it bleeds, it leads," still applies in Iraq, but why only when it's American blood?

There's an insight here the more you think about it. The media DOES follow the principle of "bad news sells" in pretty much everything it does. But since they're true propagandists, the only bad news that appears is that which reflects badly on their enemies -- the military and conservatives and their sympathizers. Remember CNN's Eason Jordan refusing to report the bad news from Iraq for fear their local staff would be killed?

Next he takes on what he calls perspective:

As a recent example, the operation in Fallujah delivered an absolutely devastating blow to the insurgency. Though much smaller in scope, clearing Fallujah of insurgents arguably could equate to the Allies' breakout from the hedgerows in France during World War II. In both cases, our troops overcame a well-prepared and solidly entrenched enemy and began what could be the latter's last stand. In Fallujah, the enemy death toll has already exceeded 1,500 and still is climbing. Put one in the win column for the good guys, right? Wrong. As soon as there was nothing negative to report about Fallujah, the media shifted its focus to other parts of the country. Just yesterday, a major news agency's website lead read: "Suicide Bomber Kills Six in Baghdad" and "Seven Marines Die in Iraq Clashes." True, yes. Comprehensive, no. Did the author of this article bother to mention that Coalition troops killed 50 or so terrorists while incurring those seven losses? Of course not. Nor was there any mention about the substantial progress these offensive operations continue to achieve in defeating the insurgents. Unfortunately, this sort of incomplete reporting has become the norm for the media, whose poor job of presenting a complete picture of what is going on in Iraq borders on being criminal.

Here he's wrong. It IS criminal -- no "bordering" about it! Want evidence of what the Iraqi's new government thinks is criminal? Check this out:

What about the media's portrayal of the enemy? Why do these ruthless murderers, kidnappers and thieves get a pass when it comes to their actions? What did the media not show or tell us about Margaret Hassoon, the director of C.A.R.E. in Iraq and an Iraqi citizen, who was kidnapped, brutally tortured and left disemboweled in streets of Fallujah? Did anyone in the press show these images over and over to emphasize the moral failings of the enemy as they did with the soldiers at Abu Ghuraib? Did anyone show the world how this enemy had huge stockpiles of weapons in schools and mosques, or how he used these protected places as sanctuaries for planning and fighting in Fallujah and the rest of Iraq? Are people of the world getting the complete story? The answer again is no! What the world got instead were repeated images of a battle-weary Marine who made a quick decision to use lethal force and who now is being tried in the world press. Is this one act really illustrative of the overall action in Fallujah? No, but the Marine video clip was shown an average of four times each hour on just about every major TV news channel for a week. This is how the world views our efforts over here and stories like this without a counter continually serve as propaganda victories for the enemy. Al Jazeera isn't showing the film of the CARE worker, but is showing the clip of the Marine. Earlier this year, the Iraqi government banned Al Jazeera from the country for its inaccurate reporting. Wonder where they get their information now? Well, if you go to the Internet, you'll find a web link from the Al Jazeera home page to CNN's home page. Very interesting.

Yes -- VERY interesting. There's that Eason Jordan sneaking in there again. And then this:

Those on the outside saw the Coalition portrayed as invaders or oppressors, killing hapless Iraqis who, one was given to believe, simply were trying to defend their homes and their Muslim way of life.

Reality couldn't have been farther from the truth. What noticeably was missing were accounts of the atrocities committed by the Mehdi Militia -- Muqtada Al Sadr's band of henchmen. While the media was busy bashing the Coalition, Muqtada's boys were kidnapping policemen, city council members and anyone else accused of supporting the Coalition or the new government, trying them in a kangaroo court based on Islamic Shari'a law, then brutally torturing and executing them for their "crimes." What the media didn't show or write about were the two hundred-plus headless bodies found in the main mosque there, or the body that was put into a bread oven and baked. Nor did they show the world the hundreds of thousands of mortar, artillery and small arms rounds found within the "sacred" walls of the mosque. Also missing from the coverage was the huge cache of weapons found in Muqtada's "political" headquarters nearby. No, none of this made it to the screen or to print. All anyone showed were the few chipped tiles on the dome of the mosque and discussion centered on how we, the Coalition, had somehow done wrong. Score another one for the enemy's propaganda machine.

What's just amazing to me is the complete lack of outcry -- nay, a coverup of the bad news -- at the whole beheading thing. There is no clearer indication of a psychopathic killer than an act like beheading. In fact, if you think about it there is nothing that makes us more distinctly human than our heads and our VERY ABILITY TO THINK! These killers are in some sense trying to remove reason itself from the earth. And of course that's what Sharia law is all about: no need to think, just follow Allah's wishes. Which in practice means of course that the mullahs get to be dictators -- how convenient. And then:

CNN and others say they were duped by the military in this and other cases. Yet, they never seem to be upset by the undeniable fact that the enemy manipulates them with a cunning that is almost worthy of envy. You can bet that terrorist leader Abu Musab Al Zarqarwi has his own version of a public affairs officer and it is evident that he uses him to great effect. Each time Zarquari's group executes a terrorist act such as a beheading or a car bomb, they have a prepared statement ready to post on their website and feed to the press. Over-eager reporters take the bait, hook, line and sinker, and report it just as they got it.

Did it ever occur to the media that this type of notoriety is just what the terrorists want and need? Every headline they grab is a victory for them. Those who have read the ancient Chinese military theorist and army general Sun Tsu will recall the philosophy of "Kill one, scare ten thousand" as the basic theory behind the strategy of terrorism. Through fear, the terrorist can then manipulate the behavior of the masses. The media allows the terrorist to use relatively small but spectacular events that directly affect very few, and spread them around the world to scare millions. What about the thousands of things that go right every day and are never reported? Complete a multi-million-dollar sewer project and no one wants to cover it, but let one car bomb go off and it makes headlines. With each headline, the enemy scores another point and the good-guys lose one. This method of scoring slowly is eroding domestic and international support while fueling the enemy's cause.

Here is one area where I give the MSM some stupidity credits -- they're not smart enough to ever have heard of Sun Tzu. Too busy reading the collected volumes of Ward Churchill. (Did I forget to mention that Churchill trained the Weather Underground in bomb making? With the requisite "work accidents" that you might expect apparently. Kaplis and Silverman dropped that bombshell on Governor Owens tonight. But I digress.) And Ryan goes on to explain a different angle on it:

So what are the credentials of these self proclaimed "experts"? The fact is that most of those on whom we rely for complete and factual accounts have little or no experience or education in counter-insurgency operations or in nation-building to support their assessments. How would they really know if things are going well or not? War is an ugly thing with many unexpected twists and turns. Who among them is qualified to say if this one is worse than any other at this point? What would they have said in early 1942 about our chances of winning World War II? Was it a lost cause too? How much have these "experts" studied warfare and counter-insurgencies in particular? Have they ever read Roger Trinquier's treatise Modern Warfare: A French View on Counter-insurgency (1956)? He is one of the few French military guys who got it right. The Algerian insurgency of the 1950s and the Iraq insurgency have many similarities. What about Napoleon's campaigns in Sardinia in 1805-07? Again, there are a lot of similarities to this campaign. Have they studied that and contrasted the strategies? Or, have they even read Mao Zedung's theories on insurgencies, or Nygen Giap's, or maybe Che' Gueverra's? Have they seen any of Sun Zsu's work lately? Who are these guys? It's time to start studying, folks. If a journalist doesn't recognize the names on this list, he or she probably isn't qualified to assess the state of this or any other campaign's progress.

Game over. But he continues with some even more common-sensical information that you're never see in the MSM:

Also bothersome are references by "experts" on how "long" this war is taking. I've read that in the world of manufacturing, you can have only two of the following three qualities when developing a product -- cheap, fast or good. You can produce something cheap and fast, but it won't be good; good and fast, but it won't be cheap; good and cheap, but it won't be fast. In this case, we want the result to be good and we want it at the lowest cost in human lives. Given this set of conditions, one can expect this war is to take a while, and rightfully so. Creating a democracy in Iraq not only will require a change in the political system, but the economic system as well. Study of examples of similar socio-economic changes that took place in countries like Chile, Bulgaria, Serbia, Russia and other countries with oppressive Socialist dictatorships shows that it took seven to ten years to move those countries to where they are now. There are many lessons to be learned from these transformations, the most important of which is that change doesn't come easily, even without an insurgency going on. Maybe the experts should take a look at all of the work that has gone into stabilizing Bosnia-Herzegovina over the last 10 years. We are just at the eighteen-month mark in Iraq, a place far more oppressive than Bosnia ever was. If previous examples are any comparison, there will be no quick solutions here, but that should be no surprise to an analyst who has done his or her homework.

So W's come out and set the country a "generational challenge" on the spread of democracy -- it's not just for the highbrow any more. That's what this is ALL ABOUT. Repeating the formula from the last wars to avert the Tinfoil Apocalypse. And Ryan closes with one of the key issues we must address:

Ironically, the press freedom that we have brought to this part of the world is providing support for the enemy we fight. I obviously think it's a disgrace when many on whom the world relies for news paint such an incomplete picture of what actually has happened. Much too much is ignored or omitted. I am confident that history will prove our cause right in this war, but by the time that happens, the world might be so steeped in the gloom of ignorance we won't recognize victory when we achieve it.

So there it is. Tinfoil Apocalypse? We are in a race between technology and sanity -- and insanity is winning. The MSM is using technology as one of the ropes to hang us with. And make no mistake, printing presses and satellite television are technology in the hands of the MSM enemy. They leverage it to deploy their million liliputian ropes.

Unfortunately, weapons of mass destruction have matured before the wisdom of Star Trek's "prime directive" has been recognized. 911 was the event that finally precipitated our first however-dim understanding of this brutal truth.

And now we have Eason Jordon in his latest tinfoil hat appearance on the theme of the brutal U.S. military targeting journalists.

So what are the options here?

1. He didn't say what Frank and Dodd, etc think he did. Given the other incidents this is unlikely in the extreme given that he trots this garbage out periodically.
2. He did say it and walked it back because he realized that if he didn't then more of his staff would get killed by our nasty military. If this is true he's just an intellectual midget because as just noted he brings it up entirely too often to credibly be in hiding about it. In this case he's just playing checkers on a 3-D Vulcan chess set.
3. He did say it and knows that it's not true and does it to curry favor with the Eurabians and to cut the U.S. down to size in any way he can. Probably consciously. But he's also probably an intellectual midget in this scenario.
4. He's just plain nuttier than a cuckoo clock on this and many other subjects but he appears even to many rational people to be sane since he remembers to groom each morning. And with bosses like Ted Turner who on earth do you expect to be hired?

And of course, the answer is most likely to be 2 through 4 inclusive. And while the details differ, the tenor smells just like Ra^thergate: Cover-up ho!

But the blogosphere won't let it go.

But this is all just a distraction from the Tinfoil Apocalypse. Austin Bay has a bead on it with what he calls "technological compression". And Wretchard dances around it all the time including yesterday.

I won't be distracted -- will you?

Stay tuned -- and buckle your seatbelts. Christians and non-believers alike may be surprised to hear what I have to say next about the Tinfoil Apocalypse...