posted February 11, 2005 11:57 AM            

The idea had widespread implications. Simply excise the notion of accountability from the public imagination and anything was possible! Women who chose to destroy their in-utero infants could deny their acts by calling it "choice." Serial murderers could deny culpability for their crimes by citing multiple personality disorder and blaming their "alters."
And the wife of a sitting president could deny her husband's paramour as a fiction of "the right-wing conspiracy" while that very husband could deny that sex was sex!

Conservatives, overwhelmingly, dismiss "denial" as the lame excuse it is. But liberals – and particularly those in the so-called mainstream media (MSM) – continue to cling to it. Case in point: their transparent and rather pathetic bravado in behaving as if they are the "voice of the people" when, in fact, their ratings and credibility have plummeted while conservative newspapers, Internet sites and radio shows have skyrocketed in popularity.
It's All ‘on the Record'

The Iraqi elections that took place on January 30 – the first after decades of brutal and tyrannical rule – were by any measure a testimony not only to the yearnings of millions of Iraq's citizens to embrace freedom and democracy but also to a resounding, history-making and, yes, legacy-emblazoning tribute to the first visionary American president in the last 50 years – a president who looked at the dark sky of his predecessors' many failures in the Middle East and called it … a dark sky!

And then proceeded to light the way to a new and hopeful path for that beleaguered region of the world, with unprecedented democratic elections in Afghanistan, Iraq, in the Palestinian Authority and, yesterday (February 10), the first-ever local elections in Saudi Arabia, as well as upcoming elections in Lebanon this spring.

And how did the mainstream media (MSM) in our country react? A day before the election in Iraq, ABC-TV's anchor Peter Jennings stated with what appeared to be perverse glee (disguised as fake concern): "All over Baghdad today there is no question that it looked like an occupation … it looks as if the election process has been rejected."

Of course Jennings – in the terminal stages of objectivity denial (as is his network of other leftists like Ted Koppel) – was echoing the doomsday words of Sen. Ted Kennedy, who had intoned days earlier, "The U.S. military presence has become part of the problem, not part of the solution."

And then there was that dour deliverer of doomsday drivel, John Kerry, to whom NBC's "Meet the Press" afforded a full hour on the day of the Iraqi election and who pronounced that we shouldn't "over-hype" the astounding turnout and contagious elation of the Iraqi electorate.

Kennedy, of course, comes by his anti-American sentiments (probably genetically) from his father, Joseph Kennedy, an ardent isolationist and admirer of Hitler. And Kerry, too, has a long and ignominious record in lobbying for American defeat, as he did when he voted against funds for our military in Iraq and lied to the Congress in the late 1960s about the "war crimes" of his fellow vets in Vietnam.

And when triumphant Iraqis who had risked their lives to vote, some walking up to 15 miles to embrace the democratic dream, succeeded in turning out by the millions, all MSNBC's cynical Chris Matthews asked was "Will this weekend's vote create a country or demolish it?"

As for CNN's entire staff, all they could do was spout the mantra of their real bosses, the liberal political establishment, by echoing their brand new we-won't credit-Bush-with-anything mantra: What is the exit strategy?

This is strange, given that they applauded Bill Clinton's foray into Bosnia, a country that posed no threat to our country, where he sent troops without any consultation with or approval from the United Nations. Our troops are still there after seven years, with no call from the left/media to bring them home. But, then again, the heroic American soldiers who liberated Europe during World War II are still there 60 years later!

According to Jon Podhoretz of the New York Post: "The dark talk emanating from the media … isn't really based in concern about Iraq's elections. It's really based in concern about the success of American policy in Iraq. Anti-Bush partisans – both Democrats and leftist ideologues – understand that if the elections are seen as a triumph, they will be seen as Bush's triumph, and they cannot stomach it."

What the Mainstream Media Never Report

Ray Reynolds (SFC Iowa Army National Guard, 234th Signal Battalion) wrote a letter home as he headed to Baghdad for the final weeks of his stay in Iraq. He wanted the recipients to know that he was thankful "to all of you who did not believe the media." Here are the "noteworthy" events he listed:

Over 400,000 kids have had up-to-date immunizations.

School attendance is up 80 percent from levels before the war.

Over 1,500 schools have been renovated and rid of the weapons stored there so education can occur.

The port of Uhm Qasar was renovated so grain can be off-loaded from ships faster.

The country had its first $2 billion-barrel export of oil in August.

Over 4.5 million people have clean drinking water for the first time ever in Iraq.

The country now receives two times the electrical power it did before the war.

100 percent of the hospitals are open and fully staffed, compared to 35 percent before the war.

Elections are taking place in every major city, and city councils are in place.

Sewer and water lines are installed in every major city.

Over 60,000 police are patrolling the streets.

Over 100,000 Iraqi civil defense police are securing the country.

Over 80,000 Iraqi soldiers are patrolling the streets side by side with U.S. soldiers.

Over 400,000 people have telephones for the first time ever.

Students are taught field sanitation and hand-washing techniques to prevent the spread of germs.

An interim constitution has been signed.

Girls are allowed to attend school.

Textbooks that don't mention Saddam are in the schools for the first time in 30 years.
Has any reader of this article ever – even once – heard this good news on CNN, ABC, CBS, NBC, MSNBC or NPR, or read it in the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times – to mention just a few left-wing media outlets that never tire of saturating their audiences with bad – and anti-Bush – news? I haven't.

No better proof exists of the failure of the MSM to climb out of their biases and present the American public with "fair and balanced" news than that provided by a soldier in Iraq to federalistpatriot.com after the recent Iraqi election.

"The media have it bass-ackwards," he said. "CBS, NBC, PBS and CNN just don't get it – their reports completely failed to show the incredible energy and joy these voters exhibited. People everywhere wanted to talk to us and thank us. This is what it must have been like when the Allies liberated Paris."

"The Iraqis' statements to us were all the same: ‘Thank you for your sacrifices for the Iraqi people.' ‘Thank you for making this day possible.' ‘The United States is the true democracy in the world and is the country that makes freedom possible.'

"A homicide bomber drove up to a polling site, which was not too far from us, but he did not kill anybody but himself. After the bomb went off, the Iraqi voters calmly walked out of the polling site and spit on the remains of the suicide bomber. The polling site stayed open and the voting continued. That incident ran all day long on Iraqi TV – but not on U.S. TV."

Read this anywhere in the MSM? I haven't.

The Picture Worth a Thousand Words

A 27-year-old Iraqi artist who goes by the name of Kalat was commissioned by the 4th Infantry Division of the U.S. Army to create a memorial statue to their fallen comrades. Kalat had worked on a pair of 50-foot bronze statues of Saddam Hussein on horseback that flanked the gateway on the main road into the presidential palace compound in Tikrit. Army engineers melted down the statues and division commander Maj. Gen. Ray Odierno suggested adding a small child to symbolize Iraq's new future. This month, the statue was flown to the 4th Infantry Division Museum in Fort Hood, Texas.

And Charles Bissell, an American contractor working in Iraq, said that "the area I work in (northeast Iraq) is more calm, secure and peaceful than the city I came here from (Phoenix). In fact I'd say it's so calm and peaceful that it can be very boring – and I thank the Almighty (not Allah) for it."

Heard or read this anywhere in the MSM? I haven't.

Neither, apparently, has writer Thomas Sowell of TownHall.com, who said, "With all the turmoil and bloodshed in Iraq, both military and civilian people returning from that country are increasingly expressing amazement at the difference between what they have seen with their own eyes and the far worse, one-sided picture that the media present to the public here."

Our media, he goes on, "cannot even call terrorists terrorists, but instead give these cutthroats the bland name ‘insurgents.'"

Death Throes Are Not Pretty

Far be it for the MSM to admit they're a dying species. After all, this is what denial is all about! While Jennings clings on at ABC, Koppel has, mercifully, resigned. While Dan Rather's name is now officially mud, his CBS news programs have horrific ratings and even "60 Minutes II" may go by the wayside. While Brokaw has resigned, Couric and company are no longer considered credible as "news" reporters.

And while the New York Times continues to maintain the conceit that it reigns supreme, journalist Seth Lipsky (in last month's BusinessWeek.com) reported that the conglomerate has "weaker earnings" after its "plagiarism scandal aftermath" and is trading "at about 40, down 25 percent from its high of 53.80 in mid-2002."

"The once-Olympian authority of the Times," Lipsky said, "is being eroded not only by its own journalistic screw-ups … but also by profound changes in communications technology and in the U.S. political climate."

In 2004, he says, the Times "had an infinitesimal 0.2 percent increase in the circulation of both the daily edition, which now stands at about 1.1 million, and the Sunday paper, which is just under 1.7 million. Since the national expansion began in 1998, the Times has added 150,000 daily subscribers outside New York but is thought to have lost about 96,000 subscribers in its home market" and the paper "has many fewer readers outside … New York City than do the two largest national newspapers – USA Today and The Wall Street Journal – both of which have circulations far in excess of 2 million."

Nationally syndicated radio talk show host Hugh Hewitt has observed that "the Times' coverage of the war on terrorism … is woefully inadequate." He cites an article in which the Times "relied too heavily on experts who seem most concerned that the invasion of Iraq has triggered an expansion in the ranks of Jihadists."

"Imagine," he says, "a newspaper during World War II giving so much space to people fretting that the Army's victory over the Japanese at Guadalcanal would only make the combined enemy forces more eager to fight on Iwo Jima and Normandy. …"

Liberal magazines, too, are being exposed for the anti-American bias they spew week after week, month after month. In a recent issue in The American Spectator, political sociologist Rael Jean Isaac cited Seymour Hersh's article in the liberal magazine The New Yorker – in which he said that the U.S. was "conducting super-secret reconnaissance missions in Iran as groundwork for destroying Iran's nuclear facilities and/or invading the country."

Isaac noted – quite accurately, I think – that Hersh's rant "endangers the lives of the American commandos on these missions, especially since he pinpoints the areas in which they are operating."

Isaac then documents that Hersh's sources for the article rely on "a series of anonymous sources: ‘a former high intelligence official,' a ‘government consultant with close ties to the Pentagon,' a ‘retired senior CIA official,' etc." But "the reader," she says, "has no way of knowing [if these sources are legitimate] and neither do the vaunted fact-checkers upon whom The New Yorker wastes its money."

The Desperate MSM Go Racist

Imagine that when far-left California Rep. Maxine Walters was running for office, a number of Republicans didn't like her platform and so they called her "Aunt Jemima" or depicted her as a slave girl who took her marching orders from her "massa," Terry McAuliffe. This is exactly what happened – in articles and political cartoons – during the confirmation hearings of Condoleezza Rice as secretary of state.

And how did the MSM cover this rank racism? Not by calling it by its name and not by condemning Sen. Robert Byrd, the former Grand Kleagle of the Ku Klux Klan, who led the Democratic pack in delaying Rice's ascendance to this august position. Instead, they were uniformly mute about the racist assaults and slavishly echoed Rice's critics.

As columnist Mark Steyn remarked: "The sight of an old Klansman blocking a little colored girl from Birmingham from getting into her office contributed to the general retro vibe that hangs around the Democratic Party these days."

And, I must add, contributes to the general retro vibe that hangs around the MSM as well.

The MSM's Intellectual Superiority Defense

When all else fails in the MSM – and, yes, their collective IQs, Ivy League educations, inside sources, high-priced jobs and sophisticated propaganda all failed in electing their left-wing presidential candidate of choice – they resort to the only thing they have left: pure snobbery.

On Chris Matthews' "Hardball," NBC's Andrea Mitchell bleated that Bush's Cabinet officials were not "exactly the best and the brightest." This from a commentator with a bachelor's degree, commenting on Dr. Rice, who has a Ph.D., a fellowship in the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, was national security adviser to the president of the United States (in a time of war) and is now secretary of state!

Yet, in spite of their inflated opinions of themselves, those who populate the MSM haven't fooled the American public. That is why "Hardball" has the lowliest of low ratings. Counterpunch.com called Matthews "a self-serving blowhard" – especially for the ways in which he savaged conservative columnist Michelle Malkin, conservative Democrat Senator Zell Miller and also John O'Neill, spokesman for the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, the group that effectively exposed John Kerry for his treason during the Vietnam conflict.

And that is why Cliff Kincaid of Accuracy in Media says: "The Iraqi people were the big winners on their election day and the U.S. media were among the big losers. … To their credit, the millions of Iraqis who turned out to vote must not have been watching American TV. … This remarkably successful election day occurred with no thanks to the U.S. media."

Kincaid suggests that the media answer the following questions: "Why did you tell us that Iraq was going so badly when it is now clear beyond doubt that the people there wanted a democratic government? Why did you focus on the death and destruction and not on the Iraqi thirst for democratic government? Why did you highlight the strength of the terrorist ‘insurgents' and not the value of the U.S. mission to bring freedom to the people of Iraq?"

Don't expect any answers from the media," he warns, explaining, "Some journalists don't believe that the U.S. is a force for good in the world. They want the U.S. to fail in Iraq. …" Others "would prefer, like the French and Germans, that the U.N. guide or even conduct U.S. foreign policy. Other journalists are card-carrying liberal Democrats who personally despise President Bush and his political party and want his administration to fail."

Old Dogs Never Learn New Tricks

In light of their documented biases and partisan leanings, is there any hope that the MSM will step out of denial and into the reality of their precipitously plunging ratings, reform themselves and start, as Ann Landers used to say, to "wake up and smell the coffee"? Unlikely, says writer (and undefeated heavyweight boxer) J. Matt "Bam Bam" Barber in a recent article in theconservativevoice.com entitled "Big Media Dinosaurs Face Extinction."

The "obstinate, lumbering dinosaurs … of Paleolithic journalism … have succumbed to stubbornly self-inflicted wounds of poorly camouflaged liberal bias. …" Among "the future-fossils," he predicts, "are nearly all major print publications and broadcast news networks."

To that I say amen and good riddance!

posted February 12, 2005 11:18 AM            

CNN Slimes Our Troops
Michelle Malkin
Wednesday, Feb. 9, 2005

One of the most common complaints I hear from our troops is that the media rarely report on the military's good deeds.

A simple column I wrote last month lauding the humanitarian efforts of our men and women in the U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln Carrier Strike Group, for example, resulted in an avalanche of mail from military members and their families expressing astonishment and relief over a bit of positive press.

"I cannot tell you how much that it meant to myself as well as several of my shipmates to be praised," wrote Mariano Gonzales, a member of Strike Fighter Squadron 151 aboard the Lincoln. "Sometimes it seems that in today's world, it is just not fashionable for someone in a position to influence public opinion to admit that the U.S. military's role in the world involves more than just war and bloodshed."

Well, with folks like powerful CNN executive Eason Jordan in charge - a man who clearly has issues with the U.S. military - it's no wonder our troops so often feel smeared and slimed.

For the past week, Internet weblogs ("blogs") around the world have been buzzing about outrageous comments regarding American soldiers reportedly made by Jordan, the head of CNN's news division, at a World Economic Forum gathering in Davos, Switzerland. (My reporting on the controversy, with extensive links to other bloggers, is at www.michellemalkin.com.) According to several eyewitnesses, Jordan asserted on Jan. 27 that American military personnel had deliberately targeted and killed journalists in Iraq. (Jordan has since disputed the characterization of his remarks.)

Why wasn't this headline news?

Forum organizers have stonewalled citizen attempts to gain access to a videotape or transcript of the Davos meeting. But American businessman Rony Abovitz, who attended the panel Jordan participated in, reported immediately after the forum that "Jordan asserted that he knew of 12 journalists who had not only been killed by U.S. troops in Iraq, but they had in fact been targeted. He repeated the assertion a few times, which seemed to win favor in parts of the audience (the anti-U.S. crowd) and cause great strain on others."

Another panel attendee, historian Justin Vaisse, wrote on his blog that Jordan "didn't mince words in declaring that the intentions of journalists in Iraq were never perceived as neutral and were made deliberate targets by 'both sides.'"

On Monday, journalist and presidential adviser David Gergen, who moderated the panel, told me that Jordan indeed asserted that journalists in Iraq had been targeted by military "on both sides." Gergen said Jordan tried to backtrack, but then went on to speculate about a few incidents involving journalists killed in the Middle East - a discussion Gergen cut off because "the military and the government weren't there to defend themselves."

Panel member Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., also told me that Jordan asserted that there was deliberate targeting of journalists by the U.S. military and that Jordan "left open the question" of whether there were individual cases in which American troops targeted journalists.

Finally, panel attendee Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., issued a statement in response to my inquiry that he "was outraged by the comments. Senator Dodd is tremendously proud of the sacrifice and service of our American military personnel."

Jordan's defenders say he was "misunderstood" and deserves the "benefit of the doubt." But the man's record is one of incurable anti-American pandering.

Jordan's the man who admitted last spring that CNN withheld news out of Baghdad to maintain access to Saddam Hussein's regime. He was quoted last fall telling a Portuguese forum that he believed journalists had been arrested and tortured by American forces (a charge he maintains today). In the fall of 2002, he reportedly accused the Israeli military of deliberately targeting CNN personnel "on numerous occasions." He was in the middle of the infamous Tailwind scandal, in which CNN was forced to retract a Peter Arnett report that the American military used sarin gas against its own troops in Laos. And in 1999, Jordan declared: "We are a global network, and we take global interest[s] first, not U.S. interests first."

Now, who is more deserving of the benefit of the doubt? Eason Jordan or our men and women on the battlefield?

posted February 12, 2005 11:25 AM            

Friday, Feb. 11, 2005 9:56 p.m. EST
CNN News Executive Eason Jordan Quits

CNN chief news executive Eason Jordan quit Friday amidst the furor over remarks he made in Switzerland last month about journalists killed by the U.S. military in Iraq.

Jordan said he was quitting to avoid CNN being "unfairly tarnished" by the controversy.
During a panel discussion at the World Economic Forum last month, Jordan said he believed that several journalists who were killed by American forces in Iraq had been targeted.

He quickly backed off the remarks, explaining that he meant to distinguish between journalists killed because they were in the wrong place and were killed by a bomb, for example, and those killed because they were shot at by American forces who mistook them for the enemy.

"I never meant to imply U.S. forces acted with ill intent when U.S. forces accidentally killed journalists, and I apologize to anyone who thought I said or believed otherwise," Jordan said in a memo to fellow staff members at CNN.

posted February 12, 2005 11:35 AM              

YOU KNOW ONCE I READ IT BUT THEY SAID CNN WAS GONNA REPORT SOMETHING. THEY OBVIOUSLY KNEW TO MUCH. THE NEXT DAT THE CIA WAS THERE THREATENNG THEM AND THERE FAMILIES. THEY DESTROYED THE EVIDENCE THEY HAD.

http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/02/06/cia.nazis/

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/1301306.stm

posted February 13, 2005 02:34 PM              

Iraqi oil reached 2 billion barrels exported in August of 2003-Fiction!
Iraq sits on the second largest proven crude oil reserves in the world and the flow of oil resumed in August, 2003 amid equipment that needed repair and suffered from looting and attacks from saboteurs.
The initial flow in August, 2003, was 500,000 barrels per day, according to the BBC.
Iraqi oil is subject to the ups and downs of the crude oil market but in April, 2003, more than 2 million barrels a day were being produced, but that has not accumulated to 2 billion.

Clean drinking water for the first time for than 4.5 million Iraqis-Fiction!
According to the U.S. Agency for International Development, safe drinking water was not widespread in Iraq before the U.S. led coalition invaded Iraq but that was partly because of water treatment systems that were in disrepair or had been looted.
In other words, clean water is not new to Iraq.
We couldn't find any figures that indicated how many would be receiving clean water for the first time.
In December, 2003, USAID was on track to provide clean water to more than 14 million Iraqis.

Iraq has twice the electrical power than before the war-Fiction!
USAID says power was restored in October, 2003 to slightly more than pre-war levels, or more than 4500 MW as opposed to about 4400 MW prior to the war.
The goal was to reach 6000 MW by the summer of 2004.

Elections taking place in all major cities-Fiction!
This has been a source of contention in Iraq.
In June of 2003 U.S. authorities called halts to local elections across Iraq and chose to put hand-chosen mayors or administrators into office.
There have been various local elections since that time and debate over whether Iraq is ready for national elections.
According to the Army New Service, there were three truly democratic elections by the end of 2003 in the cities of Tallafar, Zumar and Al-Eyaldia in northern Iraq.

Sewer and water lines installed in every major city-Unproven!
We're not sure about all the major cities, but according to USAID, the water and sewage in Iraq has been suffering from years of neglect, electricity shortages, and post-war looting.
Work is underway to restore healthy water and sewage treatment to more than 14-million Iraqis.

More than 60,000 police in the streets, more than 100,000 Iraqi civil defense police securing the country, and 80,000 Iraqi soldiers patrolling the streets with the U.S. soldiers-Mostly Fiction!
All accounts regarding the Iraqi police say that the goal is to have 35,000 to 50,000 trained and in place by 2005 or 2006, according to the U.S. State Department.
The first class of more than 400 police offers graduated in January, 2004.
The Civil Defense Corps (ICDC) is composed of Iraqis who remain citizens, as opposed to serving full time in the military, and are integrated into the coalition military units.
The internal defense of the country is in their hands and they are led by the coalition.
According to
There were about 25,000 hired and trained by February, 2004.
The first Iraqi Army battalion of 700 soldiers graduated in October of 2003.
By February of 2004, 3,500 had been recruited, about 2000 of those being operational.

Over 400,000 people have telephones for the first time ever-Unproven!
We've not found any statistics regarding how many new customers there will be for telephones.
Most of the work in Iraq has been to restore telephone communications that were lost because of damage from the war.

Girls are allowed to attend school-Truth! But Misleading!
A quick read of Sgt. Reynolds' report would leave the impression that Iraqi girls are able to attend school for the first time because of the invasion.
According to Human Rights Watch, Iraqi girls and women have enjoyed comparatively more rights than in some of the other countries of the Middle East.
The Iraqi Constitution of 1970 included women's rights for voting, attending school, owning property, and running for office.
Still, the status of women in Iraq has not always been the best because of other cultural and economic factors such as the aftermath of the 1991 war and economic sanctions.
School attendance for girls has not been prohibited although more boys than girls have been enrolled, especially in rural areas.
*********
TV reporter killed by US fire during live Baghdad broadcast
By Adrian Blomfield in Baghdad
(Filed: 13/09/2004)

A Bradley fighting vehicle was damaged by an apparent car bomb. A total of five American soldiers were wounded in the explosion and during the operation to evacuate the crew.
Later, a crowd of Iraqis gathered round the burning vehicle and some began dancing in celebration.
Tumeizi was describing the incident on camera when two helicopter gunships were seen flying down the street and opening fire. Tumeizi was hit by a bullet and doubled over, shouting: I'm dying, I'm dying." About 50 people were wounded, the health ministry said, among them a Reuters cameraman and an Iraqi reporter for the Guardian.
Through the day, United States officers offered contradictory accounts of the incident and ordered an investigation.
"As the helicopters flew over the burning Bradley they received small arms fire from the insurgents in the vicinity of the vehicle," said Major Philip Smith of the 1st Cavalry Division. "Clearly within the rules of engagement, the helicopters returned fire destroying some anti-Iraqi forces in the vicinity of the Bradley."
However, witnesses said there were no Iraqi fighters in the area at the time.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004 /09/13/wirq13.xml&sSheet=/portal/2004/09/13/ixportaltop.html

U.S. Bombing Raid Kills Three Journalists in Baghdad
Tuesday, April 08, 2003

BAGHDAD, Iraq — U.S.-led military strikes in the Iraqi capital Tuesday hit the hotel housing hundreds of journalists and an Arab television network, killing three journalists and injuring three others.
Less than a mile away, a reporter for Al-Jazeera television was killed when U.S.-led forces bombed his office. Nearby, coalition artillery battered the Baghdad office of Abu Dhabi television, trapping more than 25 reporters who phoned for help from the basement.
"I'm astonished and shocked," said Art Bourbon, news director of Abu Dhabi, speaking from the network's headquarters in the United Arab Emirates. "We've been in this office for more than 2 years. Anyone going into military operations would have known our location."
Early Wednesday, the network announced that it had been unable to broadcast live video from Baghdad overnight, saying American tanks were posted outside its offices. Its live shots are often used by television networks, including those in the United States. Al-Jazeera, whose offices are alongside Abu Dhabi television, also did not broadcast live scenes of Baghdad overnight.
On Tuesday, Al-Jazeera chief editor Ibrahim Hilal said the U.S. military has long known the map coordinates and street number of his network's office. Witnesses "saw the plane fly over twice before dropping the bombs. Our office is in a residential area, and even the Pentagon knows its location," Hilal said in Qatar.

Military officials offered different explanations for the attacks.
Brooks initially said the hotel was targeted after soldiers were fired on from the lobby. Later, he told reporters, "I may have misspoken."
U.S. Army Col. David Perkins, commander of the 3rd Infantry Division's 2nd Brigade, which deployed the tank, said Iraqis in front of the hotel fired rocket-propelled grenades across the Tigris River. Soldiers fired back with a tank round aimed at the Palestine Hotel after seeing enemy "binoculars," Perkins said.
More than 50 news cameras were set up on hotel balconies when the tank fired, according to Associated Press photographer Jerome Delay. "How can they spot someone with binoculars and not [see] cameras?" he asked.
Journalists said they heard no gunfire coming from the hotel or its immediate environs. They had been watching two U.S. tanks shooting across the al-Jumhuriya bridge, more than a half-mile away, when one of the tanks rotated its turret toward the hotel and fired.
The round pierced the 14th and 15th floors of the 17-story hotel, spraying glass and shrapnel across a corner suite serving as Reuters' Baghdad bureau.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,83503,00.html

Details of the Army report, focusing on the actions of the 3rd Infantry Division's 4th Battalion 64th Armor Regiment, are mostly consistent with CPJ's own investigation into the shelling, which concluded that after a morning of heavy fighting near the Tigris River the tank opened fire on what it believed was an Iraqi "spotter" directing enemy fire at U.S. troops from the hotel's upper floors or roof. It appears from soldier testimony that troops likely mistook cameramen working on the hotel's balconies for the "spotters." http://www.newssafety.com/stories/cpj/iraq8.htm

posted February 13, 2005 03:15 PM            

Petron, what do rumors have to do with truth? Or are rumors truth to you?

How do reports of journalists being killed by accident..the accident of being mistaken for combatants because they happened to be holding a piece of equipment bearing a striking resemblance to a rocket launcher or being in a crowd of people milling around at a scene of a fresh attack on US military forces, have to do with deliberately targeting journalists....as the CNN twit alleged?

posted February 13, 2005 03:57 PM            

Let me clear something up for you. George W. Bush won the election by about 3,000,000 votes; he won 2500 out of 3000 counties in America and he won 53% of the electoral vote.

posted February 13, 2005 04:46 PM              

*slaps jwhop in the face jesus christ these people could see this man kill someone right in front of there face and still say well the president is a great man.

Green day definitely knew what they were talking about when they made the song American Idiot.

posted February 13, 2005 06:31 PM              

http://www.rense.com/general42/bshnazi.htm

http://www.btinternet.com/~nlpwessex/Documents/bushnaziheraldtribunenewscoast.cfm.htm[/UR L]

[URL=http://www.unknownnews.net/bush1941.html]http://www.unknownnews.net/bush1941.html

There's definitely proof

Don't let the stuttering and dumb looks on his face fool you.

Open your brain. You cannot seem to accept the fact that your sweet little airhead bush is an evil person.

posted February 13, 2005 07:46 PM            

So, how about putting whatever intellect you possess to work and tell me exactly what Nazi associations President George W Bush has.

By the way, Joseph Kennedy...you know, the father of John F Kennedy, Robert Kennedy AND Edward M Kennedy had lots shares of Nazi company stock himself and was a Nazi sympathizer. You want to go on record as questioning their qualifications to serve as President and US Senator...respectively? Joe Kennedy made his money running illegal whiskey..during Prohibition and had reputed connections to the Mob. Is that a disqualifier from any Kennedy ever serving in public office?

Here's the bright side. Tomorrow, you're going to wake up confused and bitter as usual and guess what...George W Bush is still going to be President.

New Nazi Connections
It looks like the Guardian is trying to help John Kerry's flagging campaign:
George Bush's grandfather, the late US senator Prescott Bush, was a director and shareholder of companies that profited from their involvement with the financial backers of Nazi Germany.

The Guardian has obtained confirmation from newly discovered files in the US National Archives that a firm of which Prescott Bush was a director was involved with the financial architects of Nazism.

Sounds like pretty damning stuff…until you read a bit further:

While there is no suggestion that Prescott Bush was sympathetic to the Nazi cause, the documents reveal that the firm he worked for, Brown Brothers Harriman (BBH), acted as a US base for the German industrialist, Fritz Thyssen, who helped finance Hitler in the 1930s before falling out with him at the end of the decade. The Guardian has seen evidence that shows Bush was the director of the New York-based Union Banking Corporation (UBC) that represented Thyssen's US interests and he continued to work for the bank after America entered the war.
So in the absence of any tangible evidence, Prescott Bush is connected to Hitler via the fact that he worked for one bank and later directed another; both of which were used by Fritz Thyssen in his efforts to fund the Nazi Party in the 20s and early 30s.
This is a concern. It also makes me feel somewhat suspicious about the teller at my bank…there is just no telling who she might be collaborating with - drug dealers, the mob, foreign leaders. I may have to check and see what kind of car she drives. I pray it is not a Volkswagen!

It is not as if this story is new, or has not already been debunked prior to today:

President Bush owes his family inheritance to Adolf Hitler, and his grandfather, Prescott Bush, helped finance the Nazi rise to power in Germany.
These stories had circulated for years but resurfaced on May 13, 2003, in the Cuban Communist Party newspaper Granma, headlined, "Bush Family Funded Adolf Hitler." As the Associated Press reports, Prescott had been on the board of Union Banking Corp., whose majority owner, the Thyssen family of Germany, indeed had funded the Nazis against a feared communist takeover of Germany in the 1920s and 1930s. Family leader Fritz Thyssen broke with Hitler over the 1938 Kristallnacht pogrom against the Jews, was stripped of his citizenship and fortune, and was in a Nazi prison at the time the elder Bush sat on that board. There is no evidence that Prescott Bush, who owned just one share of Union Banking, had anything to do with the Thyssen political work in Germany.
Some critics go even further to accuse the president of having inherited ill-gotten profits from a Nazi slave-labor operation near the Auschwitz death camp in Poland. But the Polish company in which Prescott Bush had an interest, Silesian-American Corp., was stolen by the Nazis in 1939, the year before Auschwitz was built. Discussing this controversy, columnist Joe Conason of the New York Observer writes, "Henry Ford was a Nazi collaborator. Joseph P. Kennedy Sr. was a Nazi sympathizer. Unless additional information emerges to indict him, Prescott Bush Sr. was neither. To misuse such terms for political advantage against his grandson is to trivialize very grave offenses."

posted February 14, 2005 12:11 AM              

People need to wake up. The media here is controlled by the govt not because they choose to be but because they are told they will be.

posted February 14, 2005 12:16 AM              

Prescott Bush's business interests seized under the act in October and November 1942 included:

Union Banking Corporation (UBC) (for Thyssen and Brown Brothers Harriman)
Holland-American Trading Corporation (with Harriman)
the Seamless Steel Equipment Corporation (with Harriman)
Silesian-American Corporation (with Walker)

Bush's interest in UBC consisted of one share. For it, he was reimbursed $1,500,000. These assets were later used to launch Bush family investments in the Texas energy industry. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prescott_Bush
*******

How Bush's grandfather helped Hitler's rise to power
Ben Aris in Berlin and Duncan Campbell in Washington
Saturday September 25, 2004
The Guardian

The debate over Prescott Bush's behaviour has been bubbling under the surface for some time. There has been a steady internet chatter about the "Bush/Nazi" connection, much of it inaccurate and unfair. But the new documents, many of which were only declassified last year, show that even after America had entered the war and when there was already significant information about the Nazis' plans and policies, he worked for and profited from companies closely involved with the very German businesses that financed Hitler's rise to power. http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,1312540,00.html

posted February 14, 2005 12:58 AM            

Thyssen broke with Hitler over the 1938 Kristallnacht pogrom against the Jews, was stripped of his citizenship and fortune, and was in a Nazi prison at the time the elder Bush sat on that board.

Further, this all happened before the United States entered the war. Thysesen was imprisoned by the Nazis, his businesses were seized by the Nazis and all his financial accounts in Germany along with them....before the US entered the war.

There can be no charge against Prescott Bush that he was dealing with the enemy..Nazi Germany. Further, Prescott Bush was not dealing with Germany, Hitler or the Nazis. He was dealing with a German businessman who rejected the ideological and racial hatred of the Jewish people shown by Hitler and the rest of the Nazis and that businessman paid a high price for standing up to Hitler and the Nazis.

Now, George W Bush was born in 1946. What does the current Bush President or the former, who flew combat missions in the Pacific in WWII have to do with Thyssen, Hitler, the Nazis or the German war machine.

posted February 14, 2005 02:11 AM              

Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS). Bush was introduced to William Paley, founder of CBS, by Averell Harriman, who in 1929 had represented CBS in a merger with Paramount Studios. In 1932, he took an active role in arranging the financing for Paley to purchase the company. Bush joined the board of directors and retained the position for several years. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prescott_Bush

heh he

but lets see....hitler became fuhror in germany in 1934 the same year prescott got on the board of directors at ubc....(after working for W. A. Harriman and Company since 1926)

Union Banking Corporation. Established in August 1924 with George Herbert Walker as president, Prescott Bush served on the board of directors from 1934 to 1943 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prescott_Bush

with the help of thyssen building up hitlers war machine til.....1938 when hitler started occupying Sudetenland seems like a crucial four year overlap there.....at the very least

Harriman Bank was the main Wall Street connection for German companies and the varied U.S. financial interests of Fritz Thyssen, who had been an early financial backer of the Nazi party until 1938 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prescott_Bush

so if ubc's ties to the nazis ended in 1938(the year hitler began occupying countries) like you seem to be implying...why was ubc and all those properties of prescott bush seized in 1942???

posted February 14, 2005 12:40 PM            

If that is, you want to play the associate game.

However, for someone to attempt to connect an individual who was not even born at the time events occurred to those events and cast a negative shadow on them is very far over the line of reason.

"Henry Ford was a Nazi collaborator. Joseph P. Kennedy Sr. was a Nazi sympathizer. http://king-of-fools.com/blog/weblog/new_nazi_connections/

posted February 14, 2005 09:26 PM              

*****
Former Federal Prosecutor John Loftus confirms the Bush-Nazi scandal
Copyright October 31. 2003

Every great family has its scandal. The Bush family's scandal is that they funded Hitler and profited from the Holocaust.

It is quite possible that "W" (and his boyhood friend William Stamps Farrish, now US Ambassador to Britain) have tilted towards Israel perhaps because they wished to atone for the sins of their fathers. (Farrish's father committed suicide over his father's connections to the Bush-Nazi scandal.) Whatever the reason for the rebellion of the grandchildren, this Bush is quite a different man than his forbears. I like him and wish him well. But liking this Bush does not excuse my duty as a historian to tell the truth and let the chips fall where they may.

There was a great deal of skepticism ten years ago when I first wrote about the Bush-Nazi scandal in my book, "The Secret War Against the Jews." Its historical validity has now been confirmed by the ground breaking work of reporter John Buchanan. In October 2003, Buchanan unearthed the recently released Bush-Thyssen files in the US National Archives.