Big News Orgs Who Gushed Over O'Hanlon Ignore Skeptical Op-Ed By U.S. Troops

[babylonsister]

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/horsesmouth/2007/08/big_news_orgs_i.php


Big News Orgs Who Gushed Over O'Hanlon Ignore Skeptical Op-Ed By U.S. Troops
August 20, 2007 -- 1:13 PM EST // //

Just stunning.

By now you've all almost certainly read yesterday's riveting New York Times Op-ed piece by U.S. troops in Iraq arguing that the belief that the American occupation can win this counterinsurgency is "far fetched."

By any reasonable standard, this should have been big news. A group of soldiers with a first-hand view of the situation stepped forward and publicly proclaimed not just that the prospects for success are "far fetched," but also that the press has been basically misinforming the American people about the situation there. As the soldiers wrote, they are "skeptical of recent press coverage portraying the conflict as increasingly manageable."

You'd think that the people at the big news orgs who decide whether things are news or not -- the same people who lavished tons of coverage on Michael O'Hanlon and Kenneth Pollack's Op ed -- would read this and say, "Hey, here is an alternative point of view being voiced by some of the troops themselves, and they say we're giving people the wrong impression about what's really happening here. Our readers and viewers deserve to know about this. Therefore, it is news, and we will cover it."

Right?

Nope -- of course not.

Rather, this Op-ed has been met with near-total silence. TPM intern Benjy Sarlin and I did an exhaustive hunt for coverage of this by the big news orgs. We only found one mention: CBS' Bob Scheiffer brought it up in passing in an interview with John McCain yesterday. The only other news-org mentions came in Editor and Publisher, on MSNBC's First Read blog, and on Time's Swampland blog.

more...

http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/horsesmouth/2007/08/big_news_orgs_i.php

[youngdem]

1. Well really, what do the troops really know (sarcasm)

:grr:

[babylonsister]

2. Credit where due; Barnicle talking about article on Hardball now. nt

[babylonsister]

3. I guess no one is surprised; I was, sort of. So much for listening to the military. nt