The New York Times, so quick to flood it must wear high waters, couldn't let go of that one topic. Over and over, all last week (and it's on the front page again today), it kept teasing out gossip and whispers into full length articles. They rarely managed to rise to the level of the news but that's because what has largely followed the original reports on the Monday shootings (at Virginia Tech) wasn't news.
Recently a poll of Americans discovered most had no idea how many Iraqis had died in the illegal war. (The truth is only the US government knows and they won't release the figures.)
This prompted some finger pointing by commentators and lectures about how the public doesn't care enough. It's a variation on the lecture that "we" aren't being asked to sacrifice.
It was left to Peter Hart (CounterSpin) to point out the very obvious reality: if Americans can't guess an approximate, that's not really an indictment of them and goes to what media chooses to report. Now CounterSpin will call out big media by name and then resort to "media" which could include small media.
We'll call out small media. BE HONEST, do you really think you're covering Iraq in any manner or form? Do you really?
Because you're not. If Americans aren't asked to "sacrifice," we'd argue neither is independent media which has a long running, declared war and very little to show for it.
Last week, we noted that Amy Goodman and Aaron Glantz could take a breather if they wanted, they'd earned it. We should all be glad that Goodman didn't take a breather because US war resister Agustin Aguayo was released from the brig in Germany last week and what you had to show for that was an article by the Associated Press (The Jerusalem Post picked up hours and hours before any American outlet would touch it) and Stars and Stripes.
Friday, Goodman (Democracy Now!, as if you didn't know) interviewed Helga Aguayo, Agustin's wife. During the interview, Helga Aguayo noted:
And the other thing is that Agustin will not be discharged. I'm getting congratulations -- 'Oh, congratulations, he's coming home' -- we don't know when he's coming home, one. And, two, he actually will not be discharged from the military for twelve to twenty-four months from now, because he got a bad-conduct discharge and it's such a serious offense. He has two felonies. It goes onto an automatic appeal, and because of that, he will remain active-duty, which means he has to abide by the standards that is required of every soldier. He could potentially be charged with anything else during the time that he's on voluntary or involuntary leave or administrative leave. They'll give him of the three, if it's approved. And we won't know if it's approved.
Agustin Aguayo's story was a bit more complicated than some, due to his being denied CO status, due to his seeking relief from civilian courts and making it all the way up to the Court of Appeals, due to the fact that he was charged (and convicted of) desertion when the rule of thumb is that to be considered a deserter, you're gone over 30 days and Agustin was only gone from September 2nd through September 26th. There were other facets of his story to explore as well.
That really didn't happen -- then or now. So thanks to Goodman (who also interviewed Aguayo right before he turned himself in) but where the rest of them?
We'll join with Ruth in noting that Sarah Olson interviewed US war resister Ricky Clousing for
KPFA's Flashpoints (Wednesday's broadcast).
Independent media (especially print) has sent the message loud and clear that war resisters don't matter. They've sent the message that Iraq's only something to be covered in a really slow week. Last week, they sent another message, one that had been hinted at but became really clear: Iraqi deaths do not matter.
The most Iraqi deaths in one day and the gas bags couldn't blog, post or even note it. They were all of Virginia Tech, to the point that you expected to hear, "Quit crowding me!"
At The Nation, as our stats feature has repeatedly demonstrated, women don't matter -- you don't run 1 woman for every four men if they do. But last week, we learned that 170 Iraqi deaths matter less than a little over 30 American deaths. It wasn't hard to find that message, day after day.
At some point, another poll will be released and Americans responding will probably know little more than they did in the last poll. That's really not a reflection on the American people, it's a sad commentary on the state of our media -- big and small.