Original Article: http://dartreview.com/archives/2003/04/03/the_media_v_the_useless_idiots.php
Thursday, April 3, 2003
Leaving for a camping trip two days before the now-long-forgotten March 17 Deadline, I let the following slip out: 'Mom, do you think you could tape the war for me?'
Her jaw dropped. How could I be so callous?
I'm really not. I'm just hopelessly addicted to news. And my little problem has only worsened since the first night of the Shock and Awe campaign. Now I even sleep with CNN on, hoping that I'll wake up one fine morning to find Saddam's obituary ticking along the bottom of the screen.
It seems there are those who don't share my enthusiasm for 24/7, up-to-the-minute news coverage. In one of her recent posts to FreeDartmouth.com, a weblog maintained by the Dartmouth Free Press, Laura Dellatorre '03 relates an epiphany: 'Passing though the Collis TV room today, it struck me as somehow morally repugnant to be viewing the bombing of Baghdad...over your Collis omelette, essentially as entertainment.' Well, I agree with her on that point—I would feel a bit like Caligula watching this stuff over dinner. But she goes on to say that 'the infotainment that currently masquerades as news coverage adds a whole new layer of distancing that wasn't there before.' Infotainment? Come again?
Ms. Dellatorre herself probably wasn't all that entertained by the televised bombing of Baghdad, so it isn't fair for her to assume that the rest of us news junkies are whooping and high-fiving every time a JDAM hits its target. Of course, considering those targets are mostly Saddam's palaces, Republican Guard barracks, or weapons depots, I really don't see the harm.
This kind of condescension is nothing new—nor is it the real problem. What is so disturbing about this distaste for media coverage is that it's disingenuous. Only an aspiring spin doctor could argue with a straight face that constant access to video footage of the war 'adds a whole new layer of distancing.' Clearly, it does just the opposite. It brings the war right into our living rooms, dorm rooms, and dining halls. Admittedly, it leaves the fear and danger behind in Baghdad. Yet no one can deny that this is the first time in the history of warfare that the public has had so great an awareness of the ugly reality of war.
Perhaps the beef some have with media imbedding is that it has resulted in a great deal of good press for the war effort. A March 14 piece by Mark Levine tellingly refers to a swift and relatively painless U.S. victory as 'the Left's nightmare scenario.' But if the war is long and bloody? He writes, 'However unpalatable in terms of destroyed lives and infrastructure, this latter scenario would at least quash the Administration's imperial dreams.'
Michael Zmolek, of the Washington-based National Network to End the War Against Iraq, told Time, 'We could hope for a quick conflict with few casualties, but that would play into the Administration's strategy.'
Leave aside for a moment the cruelty of such statements. The interesting thing about the Left's nightmare is that it is rapidly coming true. The U.S. military has managed to subdue most of a country the size of California, and to besiege its capital city, in under two weeks—with fewer than 600 civilian casualties. The success thus far of Operation Iraqi Freedom has no precedent in military history.
For a term and a half, Dartmouth has been a hotbed of anti-war sentiment. We are home to 'Why War?', the Dartmouth Free Press, the weblog FreeDartmouth.com, and Peace Beard, that old guy who stands on the corner of Wheelock and Main wearing a sandwich board. Once in a while, somebody in this anti-war camp has something reasonable to say. Most often, however, these protesters are—to borrow a phrase from Lenin and Stalin—just useful idiots. They elect to believe a Potemkin fantasy over the brutal reality that has pushed us to war. But it is safe to say that recent media coverage of the Iraq conflict has rendered Dartmouth's idiots entirely useless.
Consider some statements made by Jared Alessandroni '03. In February, in an e-mail conversation with a number of Review staffers, Mr. Alessandroni posed the question: 'Does it not seem funny to you that most Iraqis hate the US, love their government, and are willing to die to protect their way of life? Maybe the propaganda you've been fed is true, maybe they should be miserable, but they're not.'
Never has that claim seemed funnier than it does now—with Iraqis rising up in Basra and greeting U.S. Marines with tears of joy. The New York Times reported on March 22 that some Iraqis are reluctant to celebrate, fearing reprisals from the Feyadeen Saddam or Republican Guard. Haider, a Safwan man, told the Times: 'If Mr. Hussein's government came back, believe me, many of my friends here standing around me would turn me in...I don't trust even my own brother.' Essam Al-Ghalib of the Arab News was told by a 19-year-old Iraqi, 'In public, we always pledge our allegiance to Saddam, but in our hearts we feel something else.'
So much for U.S. media bias. If you're a little skeptical of the Iraqis' love for their government, you're not alone.The anti-war movement has a pretty good idea where the average Iraqi stands. Amir Taheri, writing in The National Review, describes his attempt to get Iraqi exiles on the mic at an anti-war demonstration in London:
'Could I have the microphone for one minute to tell the people about my life?' 78-year-old Iraqi exile Salima demanded.
The reverend [Jesse Jackson] was not pleased.
'Today is not about Saddam Hussein,' he snapped. 'Today is about Bush and Blair and the massacre they plan in Iraq.'
Of course, few people require further proof that Iraq has been darkened by a decades-long nightmare. And I guess there's no need to harp on Mr. Alessandroni's views; after all, they are among the more outrageous squeals coming from the anti-war camp (it is not insignificant that Jared responded to the onset of war not with a reasoned argument against it, but with this statement: 'I kind of wish France would launch a little bomg [sic] at Penn. Ave.').
But the disturbing truth is that the horror story of life in Iraq is regarded by the peace movement as little more than a nuisance. On March 27, speaking in 105 Dartmouth Hall at a public discussion of the war, history professor Bruce Nelson blandly referred to Saddam's reign of terror and torture as the 'Achilles' heel' of the peace movement. The unspoken message is: never mind that it's a solid reason to depose Saddam—the real problem is that it makes us look bad. Alternatively, the peace movement shouldn't bother condemning Saddam's violence; it should focus on finding ways to discredit the people who point that violence out.
To date, Mr. Alessandroni is the only person who has tried to convince me of the Butcher of Baghdad's benevolence. But some of the folks at this open-mic discussion came pretty close to doing the same. When I remarked on some of the more unpleasant aspects of life in Iraq, Lee Witters, a biology professor, mockingly asked me whether I'd ever even been to Iraq. My appeals to the sincerity of Iraqi dissidents and exiles only drew laughter from the crowd. Forgive me, Professor Witters, but my budget for fact-finding missions is somewhat tighter than Sean Penn's. Unfortunately, I still have to rely on the unsubstantiated claims of Iraqi civilians.
There were other interesting arguments made at the war and peace discussion on March 27—for instance, that we shouldn't be so quick to accuse Saddam of possessing WMDs. Physics prof David Montgomery claimed in his remarks that WMDs had not even been mentioned since we began the war (presumably because the Bush Administration has moved on to the more important business of bathing in Iraqi oil). Anybody who's watched even a few minutes of news coverage knows that our troops are investigating WMDs: chemical weapons plants (Najaf), chemical suits and atropine injectors (Nasiriya), and rockets thought to contain chemical weapons (Najaf). It is irresponsible for a professor to make exaggerated—no, just plain deceptive—statements to a crowd of students, even if he is saying what 99% of them want to hear.
The best among us make plain their support for and pride in America's troops. But it's time we expressed our thanks to those brave reporters who serve alongside our soldiers, so we can see what's really happening in Iraq. There are those who feel a visceral thrill at the sight of bursting bombs—but that's no reason to hide the truth from everyone else. It's clear that the American news networks only want to deliver the reality of the war to the general public.
Sadly, the same cannot be said of the animals who grinned over the corpses of our executed American POWs. They violated international law, and the unwritten laws of human decency. But there was no major outcry against their misdeeds on FreeDartmouth.com. Why not? The United States media do not shy from the reality of Iraqi civilian casualties, because the numbers (between 569 and 725, according to IraqBodyCount.net) are a testament to the U.S.'s concern for innocent human life. Our enemies, who have armed young children, and forced family men to fight at gunpoint, have not demonstrated such a concern. Yet they are always the last to be criticized.
This reluctance to speak out against Saddam's regime is not, as some have claimed, an expression of true patriotism. It is a silent complicity with the desperate actions of a monster—and all that anyone need do to recognize this fact is reach for his remote control.