America Is Losing Iraq: Is Anybody Watching?
New York, August 29: In the world of mainstream media, there is always something "breaking." Who wants to hear about old news when there are so many new disasters to keep up with? As a new hurricane threatens, the watch is on and reporters get out their storm gear. JonBenet is still getting massive coverage, and Tom Cruise is back in the news-always good for a story or three. And this is the week of the Katrina anniversary and every news organization in America is doing specials and recycling footage.
But there is one word missing, and that word is, class?
Flashback to March 2003 and remember the 24 hour war-a-thon with round the clock coverage and all the war all the time. Remember all the "experts" who to told us how we were going to "go in and get it over with." Remember President Bush's "Mission Accomplished" speech. It felt so great to be American when we seemed to be winning.
And then look at most of our news reporting today. What do you see just three short years later?
Iraq has been reduced to a litany of bloody incidents and body counts. For many, it is both boring and hard to follow, and so they tune out. Sunnis, Shiites, Kurds, terrorists, insurgents, private militias…whatever happened to 'us' and 'them?' No wonder that when the JonBenet Ramsey story resurfaced the TV channels flocked to it like flies to a flame. When I worked for network TV, we had a term for stories we lost interest in. We would say, "Been there, done that!"
clipped from: www.zmag.org