Posted on 11/14/2007 11:42:43 AM PST by Aristotelian
In an era of thinly veiled media bias, it's probably fitting that as positive reports pour out of Iraq on an almost daily basis, the situation there has virtually disappeared from the radar screens of mainstream news outlets.
For the first time in months -- in fact, since the U.S. troop surge was put in place in June -- coverage of U.S. policy in Iraq does not rank among the top 10 news stories as tracked by the Project for Excellence in Journalism.
The percentage of news stories devoted to events in Iraq, moreover, has shrunk to 3%, the lowest since September and barely half the 2007 average. In only three other weeks this year has Iraq coverage been so scanty.
All this in a period when word managed to get out through other sources that:
U.S. troop casualties have plunged to their lowest level since February 2004, as rocket, mortar and suicide bomb attacks have all hit two-year lows.
Iraqi civilian casualties are down two-thirds from their peak in December 2006.
Iraq's government and the U.S. military say al-Qaida has been vanquished in Baghdad, as thousands of Iraqi families return to the capital to rebuild their lives.
Iraq's government has signed up 20,000 Iraqi Sunnis and Shiites to fight foreign terrorists.
The U.S. has announced it will remove 3,000 troops, with more to follow in coming months, as the wind-down of the surge begins.
But so it goes with anti-war news organizations that aggressively report setbacks in Iraq but give short, if any, shrift to the positive developments.
It's to the point where some news observers use the absence of news about Iraq as a bellwether of U.S. progress -- the old "no news is good news" indicator.
As sufficient as that may be for more savvy news consumers, the question remains of how Iraq coverage -- or noncoverage, in the current context -- affects attitudes in the population as a whole.
In other words, how can Americans led to believe the war in Iraq is a "mess" or "mistake" or "quagmire" (to use terms repeated often in media accounts) ever see it differently if they hear or read nothing to the contrary?
The latest IBD/TIPP Poll suggests they can't. Of the 924 adults interviewed last week, 58% were hopeful that the U.S. will succeed in Iraq. But that was the same as in August, before results of the surge were known, and little changed from attitudes registered when we asked the same question in May, February and December.
Not only that, but more people think the war has actually been lost. Some 49% believe this to be the case now vs. 46% three and six months ago.
These findings jibe with those of the Pew Research Center, which polled Americans right after Gen. David Petraeus gave his upbeat assessment of the surge in mid-September. Only 16% in that poll said Petraeus' testimony made them more optimistic about the war, while 67% said their views were unchanged.
The rigidity of opinion about prospects in Iraq may reflect a deep split and highly partisan populace that made up its mind about Iraq long ago and is unwilling to change positions.
Republicans, for example, are still 79% hopeful that Iraq will turn out all right -- about where they've been all year -- and Democrats are 44% hopeful -- also little changed over the last 12 months.
If there's any flexibility on the issue, it would probably be found in the middle, from independents. But while their hopeful percentage of 55% in November was up from 51% in August and 49% in May, it's still lower than the 56% registered last December.
It's possible, then, that the lack of improvement in people's views of the Iraq situation reflects a dearth of information on what's happened there since the surge began in February and especially in recent weeks.
The dry-up of coverage evident last week is showing few signs of revival....
(Snip)
What matters in the end, more importantly, is whether the voting public comes to a different, more informed view of Iraq by next November.
Do a Keyword Search for FRWN to find all the War News the MSM won’t report.
Unfortunately, it is up to the White House press office to insert good news about Iraq into the media, the bully pulpit must be used to get any coverage at all.
Make no mistake, the OSM (old stream media) is in line with both the Democrats and Defeat.
If nothing else, the ‘Bush Era’ will be remembered as the time when the mainstream media’s leftleaning bias became evident to anyone with working brain cells, working ears, and working eyes.
I know, I know, that criteria eliminates everybody at the midgets website dailykos, Democratic Underground, and the lesser known but still virulent websites.
I haven't thought that about the media since I was maybe 20.
The amount of surprise I feel at this development could fit into a thimble and there would still be room for my thumb.
I expect that Nancy Pelosi will soon be scoffing on TV: “Good news from Iraq? Ha! If the news from Iraq is so good, why aren’t I reading about it in the New York Times???”
NYT....”Only if it bleeds...it leads”.
Thanks for all your good postings
IBD editorial gets it ping.
Yes, it is outrageous in my opinion that the left-wing news media, which would trumpet the smallest piece of bad news now remains remarkably silent. Shame on them.
With the tremendous success The Surge has provided in Iraq, the bad news is harder and harder to find. So the MSM is really starting to stretch in finding the news and what constitutes bad news.
My favorite thus far, the MSM portrayed as terrible news and a sign that things are bad in Iraq, the fact that morgues and funeral homes have seen a steep decline in business and those who made a living as taxi drivers to and from funeral homes are struggling because the amount of available passengers is way down.
Can you believe it! Killings are down so much that funeral homes and their taxi drivers are suffering from a drop in business is bad news to the MSM.
Unreal!
The wife and I were on a little trip a couple of weeks ago, and had to stay in a motel that only served CNN as the ‘cable news” channel. We both watched through a couple of “news-loops” (you start hearing repeats) when we both notice there was not ONE Iraq/Afgan “news” story! No talking heads or retired Generals bashing Bush... NADA. That was when I realized we had won...
I recall a story bemoaning the fact that fewer deaths in Iraq meant less work for gravediggers. I’m not kidding.
I’m not surprised. If it doesn’t fit into the accepted storyline, it’s not covered.
I would think the Iraqis would be very concerned about our voting public, because the U.S. 2008 elections will affect them very strongly. A democratic victory, and they can enjoy being Viet Nam 1975 redux. And the Middle Eastern neighborhood can reenact fanaticism as bad as Pol Pot's Cambodia.
The dems want power for it's own sake, and to hell with everything else.
And it was presented as a heartbreaking story of how bad things are in Iraq.
The Surge is working so good it is putting gravediggers out of business!
Our leftist media has come up with empty, shrivelled souls once again, and for that I am not surprised.
I have to say, the administration could stop losing the war of information if it cared to engage, and in many ways it is their fault they do not care to shape the debate at all. It surprises me how little they care to reclaim a semblance of honor for this war.
Bush lost the war of public opinion because he would not engage the insanity of his political opponents, and now he appears to want to continue that policy.
So, just out of curiosity, a look back over four years.
Did the issues of the Baghdad power grid get resolved?
Was Saddam captured? How about most of his henchmen?
Is the Iraqi police, courts and Army coming on line?
Where is Iraqi oil production today?
Did the transition of authority to the Iraqis occur on time after all?
Did the elections go off fairly well after all?
How fast did the Army field armored HMMWVs?
What about recruiting numbers, are they really that bad?
How fast did the Army field newer body armor?
Please feel free to add......
The advantage the liberal media has is that they simply drift from one theme to the next, and they seldom revisit an issue, “unless” it’s negative or the rare occasion that they made a prediction that actually ended up happening. They need not make excuses, they seldom correct themselves, and they almost never revisit a story after the issues are resolved. No, they just find some other topic to pounce on.
No, they don't want to trumpet this - no more "Mission Accomplished" disasters. Bush knows what is going on. They are patient to let the results speak for themselves.
No, they don't want to trumpet this - no more "Mission Accomplished" disasters. Bush knows what is going on. They are patient to let the results speak for themselves.
Sorry, I love the resolutelness of W on the war, but find it disgraceful he cannot engage his opponents effectively when they are such easy targets. So far there is little to show he knows what he is doing in the field of public relations.
Investors Business Daily has to be excerpted
The presstitues are seeing their gory gravy-train running out in Iraq and are starting to look elsewhere.
W has been resolute, and he knws the rats are trying to make as much political hay out of the situation as they can, but he is not going to stick his nose out just for self-serving egotistical reasons.
Time to dust off the Katrina sob stories.
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