Jim (Con't): An e-mail from a Jose Villedo asked why we "continue to cover Iraq? The war is over and there are a lot more important issues." Ann?
Ann: Well the Iraq War isn't over but let's pretend that it is for the sake of argument. Did the children born with birth defects due to the exposure to the various illegal weapons used in and on Iraq, did they vanish? Are they not worthy of attention? Are they not worthy of focus? If the war really were over -- and it's not -- don't you think the story of a people trying to rebuild their country would be a story worth telling?
Jim: You're upset.
Ann: I'm angry. And I'm angry with the guy writing such nonsense and e-mailing it. Look, I get it. You're tired of Iraq. In our gaming age, we're used to clear starts and clear ends and it's just too much for you and your X-Box to comprehend, Jose, I grasp that. But the war continues.
Jim: Trina?
Trina: If the war's over, why was Kim Rivera arrested when she left Canada this month? If the war's over, the "dumb war" as Barack called it, why is Kim Rivera going to be court-martialed for resisting the illegal war? And Kim Rivera is a story that was barely told by the US media. I really would love to believe that Iraq was preventing poor Jose from getting other important news. He seems to feel that way. But the reality is Iraq is barely covered by the US media.
Jess: And we're not going to walk away from the Iraq War here. If we're publishing, Iraq will be in the edition. Iraq impacted us more than anything else. Jim, Ava, Dona, Ty and I were all in college together. Our generation grew up with the Iraq War. It had a huge impact including the lesson that we could not trust the media. The five of us were journalism majors and our story's the same for many across the country. We looked at the profession we wanted to go into with shock and then with disgust as they lied the country into war and then, after they accomplished that deception, lied about what was going on in Iraq to keep the US military there. I'm of the generation that does a media critique as they watch the news, as they read the news, as they hear the news because we've learned that you can't trust them.
Jim: And five of us were journalism majors as undergrads. Ty now works in the film industry, Jess, you're a lawyer, Ava's got no interest in professional journalism at present. I do wonder how much the whoring the press did to start and continue the Iraq War impacted our generation and impacted the five of us?
Ava: Well the whoring never ends. Last week, Tim Arango of The New York Times reported, "Iraq and the United States are negotiating an agreement that could result in the return of small units of American soldiers to Iraq on training missions." Now if that were the lede, we'd all be saying, "Scoop! Way to go!" We'd be giving props to the paper of misrecord. But that sentence appears in paragraph 15 and is never touched on again. This is news. How is this not news? And, no, Jose, the Iraq War is not over.
C.I.: How could it be over? AP's reported 26 dead in Iraq from violent attacks today. How does that qualify as war is over? What am I missing here?
Jess: Exactly. And we called out Tom Hayden for that xenophobic nonsense when Hayden was claiming this year that the Iraq War was over. We noted how it reeked of xenophobia to declare a war over just because a Western country pulled most of its troops out.
Trina: And Tom Hayden was back last week blogging about Tim Arango's article, noting that Barack had sent Special-Ops into Iraq. That should be "more Special-Ops" but Tom Hayden is apparently unaware that Special-Ops remained in Iraq even after what Barack called a "withdrawal." Six paragraphs and he never got around to noting the negotiations.
Ann: It shocks me how little attention there is to that story of the negotiations. Isn't Barack running on "I brought all the troops home"? Shouldn't negotiating with Iraq to send more troops into Iraq be seen as news and something to cover and fact check?
Ava: Yes, you're right, Ann. You're 100% correct. But this is what we saw over and over, when we journalism undergrads, the media lied for the Oval Office occupant, the media lied to start and continue the Iraq War, the media repeatedly ensured that the American people were uninformed and misinformed. Nothing has changed after all this time.
Trina: It really is as though the pathetic left media got the head of Judith Miller and then decided to call that victory, you know? They have abandoned their press critique and are too busy tongue bathing Barack to cover Iraq. Every day for The Nation magazine is about trying to get people to vote for Barack, the same with The Progressive, the same with Democracy Now, the same with the whole f**king Panhandle Media.
Jess: I think Trina's got a point. The scalp of Judith Miller is waived around by the likes of Amy Goodman and Miller was just a bad reporter. There were people who knowingly lied. There were columnists and reporters. And instead of holding them accountable, it's all about, "Well we've got Judith Miller's scalp. Press critique complete."
Jim: I really do think the lesson for our generation was that the media lies and then tries to pretend like it didn't. They don't take accountability. They don't own their mistakes. Hell, they really don't even correct them. The media fail was a turning point and I don't think it's forgotten, I think it goes to why the public repeatedly gives the press low marks when it comes to the trust issue.
Ann: If I were picking the top ten stories of the '00s, at the top of the list would be the way the media sold the Iraq War. And today there are so many stories from the ongoing war that are not being told. I thought C.I. did a wonderful job in Thursday's "Iraq snapshot" addressing the issues of death row, the lack of an amnesty law and how that creates sympathy for the prisoners who escaped when the Tikrit prison was assaulted Thursday.
Jess: Absolutely. And her point later about how today people hear about the struggle between the PKK and the Turkish government and they wonder how did this happen? If the press did a better job talking about potential causes maybe that confusion wouldn't exist. And right now the press could be explaining what's taking place in Iraq re: death row and they're not.
C.I.: Well the Iraqi press wasn't afraid to draw the connection and Ali A. Nabhan and Sam Dagher, writing for The Wall Street Journal, also made the connection.
Ava: Yeah, but your snapshot was Thursday, the Wall St. Journal article was Friday afternoon. And I don't say that to slam Dagher and Nabban, I'm grateful that they covered the very important issue. But the point is, there are people who lead on the issue of Iraq and, in the US, it's pretty much down to you online.
Jess: I'm jumping in because C.I.'s getting ready to respond and I'm cutting her off. Ava's exactly right. Yes, there are others who write about Iraq. They write garbage. We know who they are. They're the ones who, for example, write valentines to Nouri al-Maliki. C.I., you're the only one with real independence and the only one with the knowledge base and analytical skill to write about Iraq in a way that matters. Every day of the week.
Jim: And if you're listening to the audio of this on the Hilda's Mix newsletter, you hear the beep-beep. That's my cell phone. I set the alarm to make sure we stuck to the time limit already agreed upon. So this is a rush transcript and we thank Dallas for hunting down any links in this piece.