Sunday, May 06, 2007

NYT: Nothing to read

For any who missed it, Sunday Salon: Larry Bensky Retrospective is now archived. Turning to the New York Times . . .

3 Iraq related articles. What's the deal with Michael Luo? He wanted a link from WalkOn? He's ignorant of the peace movement? He's a sexist? At one point he writes "Many of the major players in Americans Against Escalation . . ." CODEPINK hasn't signed on with that group. Medea Benjamin is quoted in the article (right before the sentence noted above):

There's a dividing line between those groups who feel the most important thing is to be clear on bringing the troops home as soon as possible, and the groups that feel the unity within the Democratic Party is most important and the most important thing is for the Democrats to win the White House. So the groups who feel the most important thing is to win the White House would naturally be more inclined to listening to Speaker Nancy Pelosi when she says the only way we can get a vote through is if we water it down.

Medea Benjamin co-founded CODEPINK which, for the paper of record's record, is all caps as opposed to the way it appears in the paper today. Well, at least one woman got quoted. Is Luo only comfortable talking to men? Where's Military Families Speak Out, which unlike WalkOn, didn't wait until Bully Boy started talking escalation to visit Congress (and visit the home districts of Congressional represenatives) about the issue of Iraq?

But Medea's really the token activist. The others are largely lobbyists and, big surprise, that's what the Times is more interested in. Reading the article you may feel that that Luo honestly knows nothing that has gone on this year or last year, that he has on idea about the fast for peace or anything. Then again, he might have just been hoping for mass online links. He'll have to look elsewhere because we don't link to trash and, outside of Medea's quote (that is her appareance in full in the paper and CODEPINK gets one mention (as opposed to repeated shout outs to WalkOn). By the way, he not only fails to put it all caps, he spells it "Code Pink" -- there has never been a space between the two words although today's article indicates there's a large space, if not an empty cavity, between Luo's ears.

Our "Free Man In Paris" continues to feel unfettered and alive by a lack of dateline. Paul von Zielbauer grabs whitewash duties. He offers "Propaganda Fear Cited in Account of Iraqi Killings." Call it "Propaganda For My Sources." Mischaracterized is also known as . . . Lying.
Not only can the word not be used to describe the cover up of Haidtha massacre, he fails to tell you the code of conduct for officers -- something the paper's well versed in even if they choose to play to dumb. Finally, while Tim McGirk (Time) deserves credit for exposing the story to a larger audience he was not the one who "broke" the story and, in fact, it was given to Time by someone already reporting on it. Ground control to Major Paul.

Correction, there are four Iraq-related articles. It's spread out on the floor (the paper). Let's move now to Benedict Carey's "Stress on Troops Adds to U.S. Hurdles in Iraq" (billed as a "NEWS ANALYSIS"). We noted the study on Friday (and, unlike Carey, we credited the one who was first ouf othe gate with the study). We'll zoom in on two sentences. First this data: "According to the survey, suicide rates for soldiers in Iraq from 2003 to 2006 were 16.1 per 100,000 compared with the average Army rate of 11.1." Second this claim: "The Iraq war, experts say, is a new kind fo war -- a 360-degree battle space, with no front or rear, no safe zone outside the large fortified bases, and the coumpounded physical uncertainty of roadside bombs and mortar attacks." That sort of sentence has been written about every war in the last century when it was ongoing. Reading it, you get the feeling Carey so desperately wanted to use old slang (a la Thomas Friedman) and proclaim, "This isn't your ___'s war!"

Damien Cave offers "Iraqi Courts Seek to End Sunni's Immunity" which I was just about to offer kind words for but see that the hate group (SITE Institute) is quoted (again). It really must be nice to lie to reporters and get away with it. Again, in a real press, that 60 Minutes interview would have killed SITE's chances of ever being taken seriously -- and should have.

No link. I'm not in the mood for SITE or their attempts to channel McCarthy. The New Yorker has noted their 'difficulties' with translations. Why the New York Times continues to utilize them as a 'respected' source defies not only logic but basic journalism.


New content at The Third Estate Sunday Review?

Posting was delayed due to illustrations and one other thing. If they go up (on Flickr -- two hours now for one illustration to post there) they will be added to the features later. (Much, much later. None of us have been to sleep yet.) (Since we woke up Saturday morning.)

Here's the other thing:

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While doing something as 'suspicious' as hitting "publish" to the posts, Google gives us that crap.


Ruth's Report went up this morning and "Kat's Korner: Patti from the Mount" went up last night. If we can get Isaiah's comic to upload, it will go up today.

The e-mail address for this site is common_ills@yahoo.com.






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