Houston Chronicle: Images of dying soldier renew...debate

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jimservo
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01 Feb 2007, 11:55 pm

Sometimes I think it's lost in the debate just how free America's press is. I'm not sure if perhaps many of the people that comment that the government is preventing the press from operating, or that the media is just a puppet are from out of country or perhaps somewhat niaive. But as the this story demonstrates, the American press operates on it's own set of rules:

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WASHINGTON — A photograph and videotape of a Texas soldier dying in Iraq published by the New York Times have triggered anger from his relatives and Army colleagues and revived a long-standing debate about which images of war are proper to show.

The journalists involved, Times reporter Damien Cave and Getty Images photographer Robert Nickelsberg, working for the Times, had their status as so-called embedded journalists suspended Tuesday by the Army corps in Baghdad, military officials said, because they violated a signed agreement not to publish photos or video of any wounded soldiers without official consent.

New York Times foreign editor Susan Chira said Tuesday night that the newspaper initially did not contact the family of Army Staff Sgt. Hector Leija about the images because of a specific request from the Army to avoid such a direct contact.

"The Times is extremely sensitive to the loss suffered by families when loved ones are killed in Iraq," Chira said. "We have tried to write about the inevitable loss with extreme compassion."...

Chief Warrant Officer 4 Robert Lobeck, serving as the Army's casualty assistance officer with Leija's family in Texas, said seeing the images of Leija on the Internet was very upsetting to the relatives.

"Oh God, they shouldn't have published a picture like that," Leija's cousin Tina Guerrero, who had not seen the images but was aghast about them anyway, told the Houston Chronicle on Tuesday in Raymondville. She said the images would be especially hurtful to the soldier's parents, Domingo and Manuela Leija, who have remained in the family's home on the edge of town. ''It's going to devastate them," Guerrero said. ''They're having enough pain dealing with the death of their son."


(source link)

To be fair, the coverage of NYT Iraq correspondent John Burns (who exposed the media's deal that traded covering up negative stories in Saddam's Iraq for access to the country; a similar deal that occurs and still exists in Castro's Cuba) is excellent.

The New York Times had editorialized heavily against both President Bush (they have not endorsed a Republican presidential candidate since 1956) and both his domestic and foreign policy. Of, course that is, and should be their right, and I am be proud to defend that. However, they have generally shown a strong bias and irresponsibility in their coverage of the war.



amerikasend
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02 Feb 2007, 2:40 am

Jimkservo, may I ask if you have a opinion for any of anything for yourself? What's the deal with Quoting these right-winged blogs? Other than to show that you're Mr. Right Winged.



Flagg
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02 Feb 2007, 2:56 am

I am forced to argee. You look like another programmed mook nowadays. What happened to you? You used to be an intelligent guy who I respected. Now you just spout neo-con crap.

Oh how the mighty have fallen.


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Corvus
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02 Feb 2007, 10:43 am

How will Jim respond? Only time can tell



jimservo
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02 Feb 2007, 5:01 pm

The Houston Chronicle is a newspaper not a "right wing blog" that spouts "neo-con crap."



jimservo
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02 Feb 2007, 5:04 pm

Flagg wrote:
You look like another programmed mook nowadays.


Can you explain this remark please?



Awesomelyglorious
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02 Feb 2007, 5:07 pm

jimservo wrote:
The Houston Chronicle is a newspaper not a "right wing blog" that spouts "neo-con crap."


Actually, you are right, the Houston Chronicle does not seem to be a right wing thing.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Houston_Chronicle

"The paper is currently the subject of multiple boycott efforts including efforts by a Houston radio station and the Houston Republican Party over allegations of a liberal political bias." Unless jimservo put it there hoping that one of us would do research, I'd say that this backs his claim of it not being of a conservative bias.

Of course, that jimservo is conservative is something that I think we all knew in the first place. It just must be remembered that conservative news sources are about as untrustworthy as those that are incredibly left-leaning as well.



jimservo
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02 Feb 2007, 5:22 pm

I do not take a stand on whether the Houston Chronicle is a right-leaning or left-leaning newspaper. I was able to find two websites(! !) dedicated two criticizing the Chronicles supposed liberal bias, although one hadn't been updated in months, and the other I found not worthy of linking to. I hadn't found any liberal websites so dedicated, just a few of links complaining about conservative complaints of liberal bias.

Again, I don't have enough to make a stand either way. One of the authors of the piece is listed as "James Pinkerton." There is a "Jim Pinkerton" that is sometimes listed that way, and writes for many newspapers. He is (at least) right-leaning, and can be seen on the rather entertaining Fox News Watch on the weekends.



Awesomelyglorious
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02 Feb 2007, 5:28 pm

jimservo wrote:
I do not take a stand on whether the Houston Chronicle is a right-leaning or left-leaning newspaper. I was able to find two websites(! !) dedicated two criticizing the Chronicles supposed liberal bias, although one hadn't been updated in months, and the other I found not worthy of linking to. I hadn't found any liberal websites so dedicated, just a few of links complaining about conservative complaints of liberal bias.

Again, I don't have enough to make a stand either way. One of the authors of the piece is listed as "James Pinkerton." There is a "Jim Pinkerton" that is sometimes listed that way, and writes for many newspapers. He is (at least) right-leaning, and can be seen on the rather entertaining Fox News Watch on the weekends.

You know, you aren't going to win friends by mentioning your love of conservative news. Just giving you hints of course.



jimservo
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02 Feb 2007, 5:36 pm

I was just being honest. By the way, if this helps I think Neil Gabler is great on the show and he is essentially an exact opposite of me politically. They should stick him on the Fox News BriteHume evening show "panel" . The liberal person they have on is good but she's a reporter so she tries to be "fair." I will be honest with you: Fox news is biased on the right. An example is that the conservative and the centrist are commentators who don't mind expressing their views clearly but the liberal (with the exception of reporter Juan Williams, who I like as well) is not In fact it is more so then ever. It used to be just a few shows that were clearly so. Now they are making it mind boggling obvious and it is annoying.

EDIT: I actually rarely watch Fox News today. I used to, maybe two or three years ago. I never catch programs anymore because they have set times.

I really am not "programmed." I developed my views on my own over time. I change my mind on things based on events and new information I learn. I just did the other day in regards to Mahmoud Abbas and his FATAH party.



charlesbronstein
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03 Feb 2007, 1:48 am

There's nothing particularly controversial about "Is it appropriate to show pictures of dead soldiers". I'm convinced there's only two acceptable streams of thought in the U.S:

the Liberal/Democratic stance: "bomb Iraq with UN approval"
or the fat cat/Republican stance:"bomb Iraq unilatteraly"

....debate is kept in the framework of inane arguments like this. I don't think it's government that controls the press, I think it's the big businesses that own the press that also control government.The generic "liberal" stance and the generic "conservative" stance are the ideological counterparts to "pepsi" or "coke".



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03 Feb 2007, 6:56 pm

Wow, I don't recall writing that above. I was pretty drunk that night lol.



Awesomelyglorious
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03 Feb 2007, 8:49 pm

charlesbronstein wrote:
There's nothing particularly controversial about "Is it appropriate to show pictures of dead soldiers". I'm convinced there's only two acceptable streams of thought in the U.S:

the Liberal/Democratic stance: "bomb Iraq with UN approval"
or the fat cat/Republican stance:"bomb Iraq unilatteraly"

....debate is kept in the framework of inane arguments like this. I don't think it's government that controls the press, I think it's the big businesses that own the press that also control government.The generic "liberal" stance and the generic "conservative" stance are the ideological counterparts to "pepsi" or "coke".

Considering the calls for us to pull out of Iraq I am not so certain. I really do think that positions are held close together more because of the desire to appeal to moderates. The reason being that the majority of Americans are moderates so therefore the debaters will try to reach the middle in order to appeal with as many people as possible. I think this is called the median voter theorem in economics. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Median_voter_theorem This tendency is because of the nature of our system, it has its advantages and flaws, the advantage largely being to discourage change, and the flaw being the same thing essentially.