Posted on 06/22/2006 4:16:11 PM PDT by StJacques
I am posting this observation of the ABC Evening News, which has just concluded its evening broadcast here in the Central Time zone, without any mention of what I, and I suspect many of you, view as one of the major news stories of this day -- the revelations surrounding the discovery of Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) in Iraq. I believe that ABC News's failure to do this is news in and of itself. I watched carefully this evening to see if, either as a stand-alone story or within its reporting of the Senate Debate on Iraq policy, whether ABC News would make this known to the public today and I can now report that they did not.
I am not introducing this topic to reveal the information about the disclosure of the verified existence of WMD in Iraq, specifically chemical weapons and nerve agents, but rather to open a discussion that the omission of this story from the evening news is an important development of today's news cycle, since it offers us one more piece of evidence that the presentation of news within the mainstream media reflects a political orientation on the part of major news organizations to the detriment of President Bush and his Iraq policy. News organizations are supposed to report the news, not shape it.
And as a final point, I would also like to ask my fellow Freepers to post their own observations of newscasts on NBC and CBS, to see if they pursued a similar tact in their own reporting this evening. This is not just "harping at the news media." The release of this information today was a significant event and I believe we must put the decision of major news organizations to downplay it in proper perspective. I am frankly outraged to see that it was ignored in the ABC News broadcast tonight.
ABC, CBS, CNN and NBC are heavily invested in the 'no WMD's' storyline.
Gee, what a surprise!
I watched one network start it's broadcast the other evening by mentioning our two dead men, then saying it would return to that story in a moment as it went into a detailed report of the two troops who were charged with murder that day. It's clear what the networks priorities are.
Nor will they be.
They've spiked it. It's not a politically correct story. It's like telling people about the Gulag during the Cold War.
I'm shocked, I tell you shocked!!
WLWT here in cincy
NBC Nightly news with Brian Williams did show a snip of a snippet of Santorum saying that the weapons list was very important....
But thats all maybe 60 seconds at best but of course it showed ant least 2.30 minutes of dems trying to discount the claim ! some woman from California [D] blond bimbet...
Ms. Ashwari-Jennings and terrorist Arafat:
"Why should we at ABC give a rats a$$
about anything which might ever help any of you stupid dhimmis."
I still want to know why we haven't heard anyone from the Bush admistration comment on this... Have they been talking about it and it just hasn't been reported? Or is there another reason the White House isn't talking about this...
Officials: U.S. didnt find WMDs, despite claims
Comments are response to claims by GOP senators
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/13480264/
The Brian Williams Report ...er well it's more of a slam than a report but what did you expect ?
I think it has been "hushed" as a policy.
Reasons for it, I couldn't tell.
That's what it seems like. But if that's the case, if the administration isn't going to talk about it, you can't blame ABC for not reporting on it...
A question and short answer at todays White House Press Briefing; it was a most unsatisfactory response. Here is a link:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1653694/posts
If a couple of chemical weapons pre 1991 went off at NBC I guess the dead would not be REAL!!
Anything else? Steve.
Q This document that was unclassified yesterday, Republican lawmakers released it pointing toward 500 weapons dumps or munitions found in Iraq since 2003, of some chemical weapons. Do you consider this as a smoking gun of some sort, proving the WMD charge, or is this old material that is pre-Gulf War? What do you make of it?
MR. HADLEY: I think really it is what it is. There's a declassified, I think one-pager, that the intelligence community has cleared. I don't know whether that's been released to the press.
Q It has, yes, it has.
MR. HADLEY: That's really the story, I think. And I don't have a whole lot to add. It sort of, it is what it is. And I think -- I read that statement quickly last night and it's really all we can say about it. And I think people are going to have to draw their own conclusions.
But the bottom line is, 500 chemical munitions in Iraq, and obviously we're concerned about the potential threat they pose to Iraqis and to our forces.
Well, that was indeed most unsatisfactory...
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