Traitors at NBC News

Hmm... This seems like NBC has made a policy change. The last time something similar happened they fired the man. Why not this time???


NBC Severs Ties With Journalist Peter Arnett

Oops slight typo on my post. 'Saw', not 'Sawed'. Sorry, long day.

So exactly what part of my post was wrong, Thermopolis? And I'm speaking as a historian here as well as a journalist.

Brilliant memory there Shots...........thanks...................

Perspective for one. Had you visited a village after "charlie" your persective would have a different angle........as far as iraq.........everyone forgets all the real saddam horrors......or the UN sanctions.........etc, etc...

I think you're going to have to explain how journalists covering current events give aid and comfort to the enemy.

If they were spying on coalition troop movements or battle plans, and providing that information to insurgents, obviously something's wrong with that picture.

But interviewing a member/leader of the Iraqi resistance? That's not treasonous, that's journalism.

The journalists put themselves in danger to bring information outside the country. They're doing a service to their country, indeed, the world. Hardly traitorous, IMO.

Heck, Barbara Walters would have had him on her set, make up, moustach and all.

This is all being brought up now that the government is saying the media is not reporting anything correctly.

The sheep will remain sheep.

I would much rather hear the absolute truth and i get pretty close to that on CNN.

[edit on 22-3-2006 by dgtempe]

(took author a while to get up off floor from laughter)

ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN twist one direction, Fox the other............

All media is corrupt and bias................try to find the raw data when possible................

Baba walters is the pinup girl for treason and media ambulance chasing.

so let me get this straight, if a reporter shows our president standing up and talking about how Iraq is not a waste of time or a failed war, it is bad reporting. If a reporter interviews someone from the opposition talking about how their cause will be won and how their cause is right and we are wrong, the reporter is a traitor.

If a NY sports anchor interviews Boston fans, does that make him a traitor too? (hint; yes)

If you can't show either side of a story, what, pray tell, should the news report on? Besides the incorrect weather reports of course.

By 'Charlie' I take it that you mean the VC? Who lived in the villages, right? (Sigh) Ok, let's get one or two things straight here.
The VC only obtained the power that it had in the South by exploiting grievances that the South Vietnamese government was very unwilling to meet, like greedy absentee landowners and the fact that the peasants wanted their own land. If this had been addressed, if the policy of winning hearts and minds on the ground had been properly applied, then this would have undermined much of the support that the VC enjoyed. The South Vietnamese government itself could be stupidly cruel - elections rigged (The '71 Presidential election had one candidate!), opponents imprisoned and tortured, and corruption rampant. I am not saying that the Communists were any better. The Hue massacre in '68 was a fairly accurate sign that they would kill without compunction and certainly without reason.
As it was Westmoreland's tactics were not well thought out. Body counts were not a meaningful expression of progress. Sweeps through villages for VC often ended in a burning village and clouds of resentment. Adams had a better plan, but by then it was too late. The VC might have been broken by Tet, but the US public was sick of the draft and didn't believe that there was a way out of the morass. Plus there was a massive drugs problem by the start of the '70s, as morale in the US armed forces sank.
As for Iraq, words fail me. Yes, Saddamm was a small-minded pyschopathic thug. He combined low cunning with appalling cruelty. He was willing to destroy anything in his path. And he had lied so much that when he finally told the truth about WMDs, no-one could believe him.
The plan for the invasion was good but the force used was far, far too small and did not take into account options like what would happen if the Turks said no to invading Northern Iraq. And worse still was that so much goodwill was squandered. Too few men meant that the looting was widespread and terrible. The main museum in Baghdad was smashed to pieces. Iraqis are very proud of their history. Inadvertantly allowing it to be looted was just one example of where we went wrong. And a vast amount of military supplies was taken away by looters when it should have been secured. Most of the IEDs are shells! How much else is out there?
And above all, the plan to occupy and rebuild was sketchy at best. Here in Britain commanders and civil servants were appalled by the lack of detail. Churchill told a committee to start looking at the best was to run postwar Germany in 1941 for heavens sake!
Iraq seems to me to be a classic example of an administration looking at all the options and proceeding on the assumption that all the best-case scenarios would apply. Real life is not like that.

Though I have no doubt that the media has its own agenda when it comes to reporting, I still find it to be a healthy sign for the nation that they are allowed to report whatever they decide to report.

My red flags would start flying when they are allowed to report only what the government allows them to report. Then we would be in real trouble.

Just mho.

Wupy

Thermo, got to agree. Anyone who thinks that anywhere on American television you get an ounce of truth is dillusional. The BBC offers far more truth about America than any other source.

and i thought you were here becouse you wanted to know the truth...

but noooo, we have an agenda to follow dont we....

ahhh.....noooo...........I'm here to teach YOU how to find the truth in a media ocean of lies............

OMG.........NO...many, many VC were forced at gunpoint fo join and fight. Many VC leaders were from the north regular army.



So just how many hour could have been saved in the original invasion? We beat the heck out of the Iraqi army way, way faster than the media 'experts' could understand. The underestimation was on OUTSIDE islamo-terrorist action. Just as the wolverines in germany up to 10 years after WWII.

Too much TV.....everything solved in a hour mentality here.

The media focus is story to story, minute to minute, sound bite to sound bite. Anything outside a few seconds is eternity to them and it shows through in the idiocy they spew.

Iraq must succeed, we must have their 90 divisions for support of the attack on Iran. Same for India, pakistan, and afganistan.

The media HYPE about WMD's or no WMD's is exactly the fantacy dribble the mullahs need to stall until they get the nukes they want.

Iran wants to purge evil (jews and America) from the earth so Islam can bring their heaven to earth.

NBC and other such morons are helping that end.........

John Walker Lindh was never charged with treason. That alone essentially lets anyone else off the hook, wouldn't you think?

Know thy enemy.
If we want to defeat them, we have to know what we're fighting.

If you don't think US intel has made good use of this interview you're a fool.



India???
Look, I need to know where you get your drugs, 'cause clearly it's good stuff.

[edit on 3/22/06 by xmotex]

Keep it civil gang.

No, just because of a stupid PC mistake from a too "feminized" whitehouse.

He should have been executed already............

I agree with thermo on this. I Don't believe it is treacherous in the fact they may be giving out state secrets, but that they are holding back on intelligence. If they tracked down Bin Laden at any time for an interview his location should have been reported to the pentagon or CIA immediately. I mean what the hell we are let him going to be free for his crimes just because a civilian news agency wants to boost ratings?

If this taliban leader was in fact responsible for insurgent attacks and american military deaths, his location should have been reported in order to either capture or incapacitate him. His location may also have been a great source of intelligence in the form of documents or computer data.

But thats only for our side. If it does not involve us, let the other peoples media report him. It seems these guys are doing a better job than the CIA.

[edit on 3/22/2006 by DYepes]

I hate to pile on here, since Thermopolis has already been thoroughly spanked by the ATS community in the posts above, but there's an aspect to this thread's assertion that hasn't been addressed.

Some people would rather not know the truth. For many, knowing what's really happening the world is not as important as having his own opinions reinforced. Since there's agreement among everyone who knows anything about Iraq that the war has been a colossal failure, was started based on a pack of lies, and is bankrupting America, but some folks want so badly to believe the President when he tells us that we're winning, it's a righteous cause, and the people of Iraq are showering American soldiers with flowers, and candy, and thanks.

If anything, the media in America is so afriad of backlash from their corporate masters that they dare not tell the real truth about Iraq and the disaster that the president has created. Remember, reporters in Iraq are limited to going to places and seeing things that the military allows. Unlike Viet Nam, where members of the media could seek out the truth themselves, the media in Iraq is shown only what the administration wants them to see. If the best they have to show is a horrible failure, can you imagine how much worse the truth must be?

Yesterday, I heard a conservative talk tool responding to the Iraqi official who said "Of course this is a civil war, there are 60 people a day being killed here". His response was: "uh, in America there are 47 people murdered every day, does that mean we're in a civil war?"

I want you to absorb the falseness of this assertion. The population of Iraq is less than 1/10th that of the United States. If America was to have a comparable rate of citizens killed every day, it would mean more than 500 a day. If there were 500 people every day killed in sectarian violence in America, you're damned well told that it would be called a civil war

But this execrable right-wing liar just threw out his prevarication and moved on. You could practically see the heads of the little lambs that listen to this pile of dung nodding along in assent. "hey, that's right!" What he said!

Things are turning a corner in America. It's going on two solid years now of steadily declining public approval for our President. More people believe today that our President is a criminal than voted for him in 2000.

But the awareness comes late. The War in Iraq has indebted our country to an extent beyond anything we've ever seen. And the people that hold the debt for the cost of the war are foreign nationals, some of whom are even our sworn enemies. To pay for a criminally failed war we've mortgaged the well-being of our children and grandchildren. For what we've spent IN ONE MONTH on the war, we could have provided health insurance to EVERY SINGLE AMERICAN. Can you imagine? We could have removed the fear that middle class Americans feel when faced with the possibility of financial ruin because of an illness, but instead we used that money to do something that has caused the world to hate us.

It is estimated that there are less than 1 thousand Al Queda in Iraq. Some American military and intelligence officers put the estimate closer to 500. We have over 150,000 American troops in Iraq. 2300+ Americans have died in Iraq, but THERE ARE MORE AL QAEDA THERE TODAY THAN THERE WERE IN 2002!

So, we have a thread here where a patriotic American blames the media. It's THE MEDIA's fault that the world hates America. It's THE MEDIA that's caused our country to become a debtor nation. It's THE MEDIA that's caused the deaths of more than 2300 Americans and the permanent disfigurement of tens of thousands more.

Anyone who can look at the state of the union, 2006, and blame the media should be ashamed of themselves. It can't be said any other way.