March 19, 2011
If you'll be very quiet for just a minute, you can hear it. "Whores Keep Swinging." Yes, it's as though David Bowie updated his song just for our modern day press corp.
Whores keep swinging.
Eight years ago today, the Iraq War started and, in the process, proved that even though William Randolph Hearst was, like much of the mainstream media, dead, if they all worked together, in the best "Yes, we can!" fashion, they could still sell an illegal war.
Judith Miller has become the poster girl and that's unfair. Where are the poster boys? And Miller was an idiot not a whore. You don't commandeer US soldiers in Iraq to search for WMD over and over if you know they're non-existent. She was a stupid woman and a bad reporter, but there were many more who were far worse than the deluded Judy Miller.
And if you ever doubt that, look around. The Iraq War hasn't ended. But other than AP, find a domestic news outlet that issued a statement on how to handle the administration's spin that it had. You won't find one.
Look around this morning for coverage of Iraq.
The media didn't just sell the illegal war on March 19, 2003. They spent months and months selling it. And now they can't even be bothered with the topic.
Some will insist, for example, that they found a 'report' on Iraq, like this bad one from Reuters.
Many observers of the war -- US observers -- have noted that it appears Iran triumphed over the US in the Iraq War because the (US installed) government is so close to the government of Iran. A few observers on the left have floated another narrative in which the US and Iran worked together to destroy Iraq.
I don't have an opinion on either. They're both worthy of further exploration. But it's that latter hypothesis that the press seems eager to prove today. The Reuters article tells you "thousands" of Iraqis protested in Basra yesterday in solidarity with the people in Bahrain. It goes on and on but 'forgets' to note either that Basra is a Moqtada al-Sadr strong-hold or that Moqtada ordered his followers to protest.
It is a lot, a lot, like the articles coming from the Iranian press -- for example, Press TV.
Reuters has gotten into a real bad habit lately. Why is that?
Oh, look, it's the whore: Serena Chaudhry. I've three-times pulled something from an entry about that little ___ (use any word you want there). But we've addressed her before. She is "Girlie In The Green Zone." (Check the archives.) Serena landed in Iraq with a mission. She's whored pretty damn good. Reported? No, not really. Whored? Absolutely.
While Reuters reports less and less on Iraq -- Serena's chief whore job is to ensure that story ideas are shot down -- when you see Serena as writer, it's a whore's horror story. When you see her name as an editor on an article, it's even worse. What's really sad is that Reuters management is no longer excusing the little whore. They've given up offering excuses for her. They know they made a mistake. I'll assume they'll use Serena for a little while longer and then she'll be looking for a job somewhere else. (Serena, there are street corners all over the world for you to ply your trade.)
By contrast, Bushra Juhi (AP) is a real reporter and managed to note in the first sentences (and AP noted in the headline) that "Iraqis" were not the ones protesting, "Shi'ite Iraqis" were.
What does it matter, some may say?
It matters a great damn deal.
The "thousands" in Basra? Not really thousands by most counts, but okay. Reuters wants to tell you that people protested in Falluja and Baghdad for Bahrain as well. Really?
In Falluja?
In the Sunni-strong hold of Falluja? In the heart of the resistance to the US-occupation of Iraq? Seriously?
That's the lie you want to tell, you little whore?
In Baghdad, the protests Friday took place in "Liberation Square," named that by the protesters who have been protesting every Friday. And they did add a new demand (for Baghdad), it had to do with prison conditions and releasing detainees. You can find all of that out in yesterday's snapshot.
Reuters lied to you because Serena's a cheap, trashy whore. Toss a Hersey bar to her, she'll drop to all fours (as Joan Rivers' joke used to go). They flat out lied because Serena's a dirty liar. Say that to Reuters friends, and they'll shoot back, "Now you'll feel bad if she dies in Iraq." No, I won't. I won't write an entry celebrating it but the idea that someone like that dies, I won't break a sweat. And I really think it's interesting that she's allowed to be a channel for so many other things -- I'm wording that as nicely as I can but there's a reason reporters from other outlets in Baghdad are increasingly wary of her. In other words, Reuters may be her employer, but she showed up on the job already having a pimp.
Yesterday in Baghdad's Liberation Square, hundreds of Iraqis managed to turn out despite security forces closing bridges and roads and using barbed wire to rope off areas. And, yesterday, these protesters were attacked by Iraqi security forces and beaten with batons and falsely arrested.
Serena disappears that. She's a good little bag whore for the company, isn't she?
And isn't it cute how the protesters being beaten by Nouri's forces doesn't make Iraq come off well. But ignoring that very real news story for the non-news of "Moqtada followers marched" pleases the US government. Again, she arrived in Baghdad with her pimp firmly in place. When something much more minor happened at CNN there was (rightly) an outcry. It happens at Reuters and the management excuses it and plans to just string her along for a little bit longer and then get rid of her. (Or they may indeed intend to keep her. They might think they'll get favors from the US government as a result of keeping her.)
What was a news story? That Moqtada's cult did his bidding by marching in circles and chanting his slogans? Or that protesters were beaten down? The latter is the news story as any real journalist would know.
But search in vain for the report from a US outlet that tells you what happened in Liberation Square yesterday. In Falluja, where the protest was not about another country, Iraqi forces have "vowed" to hunt down the organizers of the protests. The city is under crackdown. If Sereana Whore's lies were true, the Basra would be under crackdown. But the Iraqi government and the US government benefit from whoring.
Alsumaria TV broadcast the reality. In the Sadr City section of Baghdad, there was a (small) protest by Moqtada cultists. Serena Whore is really lucky that so few in the US can follow Arabic outlets. She's real damn lucky. But luck doesn't always hold, look at what happened to the US 'diplomat' in Pakistan.
Broadcast the reality. It's cute isn't it, how a non-Iraqi network (Alsumaria TV is Iraqi) finally got back into Iraq and they've got so little to say. One might wonder if the (non US) cable network had to make an agreement to get back in?
Baghdad, the Black Market capital. Everyone's cutting deals with everyone and the people suffering are still the Iraqis and the US service members.
You can do your part to end it by hitting the streets today and protesting.
A.N.S.W.E.R. and March Forward! and others will be taking part in these actions today:
March 19 is the 8th anniversary of the invasion and occupation of Iraq. Iraq today remains occupied by 50,000 U.S. soldiers and tens of thousands of foreign mercenaries. The war in Afghanistan is raging. The U.S. is invading and bombing Pakistan. The U.S. is financing endless atrocities against the people of Palestine, relentlessly threatening Iran and bringing Korea to the brink of a new war. While the United States will spend $1 trillion for war, occupation and weapons in 2011, 30 million people in the United States remain unemployed or severely underemployed, and cuts in education, housing and healthcare are imposing a huge toll on the people. Actions of civil resistance are spreading. On Dec. 16, 2010, a veterans-led civil resistance at the White House played an important role in bringing the anti-war movement from protest to resistance. Enduring hours of heavy snow, 131 veterans and other anti-war activists lined the White House fence and were arrested. Some of those arrested will be going to trial, which will be scheduled soon in Washington, D.C. Saturday, March 19, 2011, the anniversary of the invasion of Iraq, will be an international day of action against the war machine. Protest and resistance actions will take place in cities and towns across the United States. Scores of organizations are coming together. Demonstrations are scheduled for San Francisco, Los Angeles, Chicago, Washington, D.C., and more. Click this link to endorse the March 19, 2011, Call to Action.
Isaiah's one of the reasons I'm doing this entry. Another is an e-mail to the public account. On that, from the headline, it appeared there was something we needed to link to; however, then I read the e-mail and, no, we won't be linking to that crap. (We also didn't link to an article on Ireland and many other things this week. It's the anniversary of the Iraq War and it is amazing how many non-Iraq things I was repeatedly asked -- by strangers I've never met -- to link to.) On Isaiah, I didn't know he was going to do four comics. Three apply to reason to protest. So they have to go up before the protests. They don't do a lot of motivating after the fact, now do they?
The plan was for the snapshot to be the top entry until tonight. And it had the protest information in it. The comics changed that and the e-mail (whose heading made it appear that ____ _____ had a feature on Iraq) appeared to also be time sensitive. So I've done a morning entry. I may not do another one until Sunday. I may do one as usual tonight. I don't know. I'm very tired. But after this goes up, Isaiah's third comic will follow and he'll have another one tomorrow (it's already done and at Flickr but we've got it restricted right now so you can't see it). His two already up are:
|
