UPDATED - ColdType

EMBEDDED: WEAPONS OF MASS DECEPTION
wanted to do a different kind of show. But the
management changed, and the new management
said, ‘We don’t want that kind of show.’ She was
not given a chance to do something different for
them.” I am sure Ted Turner, who made clear his
distaste for the show, is a bit happier tonight.
What’s another million dollars after all the
money AOL Time Warner has pissed away?
(My favorite play on the shock and awful scenario
was on comedian John Stewart’s brilliant
nooze show on Comedy Channel where he
coined the phrase “stock and awe” to report on
the decline in the market in the wake of all the
setbacks in Iraq.)
The media war through Arab eyes
HERE’S how Gulf News, one Arab media outlet is
reporting on this media war: “The images shown
on Arab TV have an explosive impact on Arab
public opinion, much to the dismay of U.S. and
British officials.
“Western channels, notably CNN, have come
under fire for not only following, but also promoting
American policy, serving as ‘apologists‚
for a unilateral war on Iraq waged without a UN
mandate, and censoring graphic images of the
civilian carnage. ’
“And then there is the matter of journalists
stealing the show.
“No sooner did the U.S. wage their offensive on
Baghdad on March 19, ‘daredevil’ journalists,
mainly from the West, had copped a greedy
share of the limelight.
“First person accounts of journalists’ own
experiences in war zones have long been the
bane of sober political analysts, who regret that
sensationalized tales of adventure should eclipse
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the reality on the ground.
“As such, critics would argue foreign correspondents
reporting on the war in Iraq have broken
a cardinal rule of journalism by becoming a
part of the story they are sent to cover.
“Their confrontations with the big bad Iraqis,
and their subsequent expulsion from the country,
have generated more news coverage than the
suffering of innocent civilians, including women
and very young children.”
Back to the drawing board
HOW many times have we heard about the
PLAN? The plan is working. We are on plan.
Today The New York Times makes it official: The
plan is being changed. Why? It didn’t work. The
unexpected fierce resistance has put a wrinkle in
the plan to spend Arabian nights in the Iraqi capital.
Washington Post’s Howard Kurtz, a mainstream
media writer, is now blaming media
accounts for misleading viewers and the administration:
Kurtz writes: “Why did so many people think
this would be a cakewalk? You’d have to say the
media played a key role. The pre-war buildup
was so overwhelming that it seemed like the war
should be called off as a horrible mismatch.
There were hundreds of stories about America’s
superior weaponry, the Bradleys and Apaches
and Mother of All Bombs, the superbly trained
forces. There were so many ‘shock and awe’ stories
that Americans could be forgiven for thinking
they were in for another video-game conflict.
There were stories about how Iraqi units would
quickly surrender, how Iraqi citizens would hail
the advancing Americans and British as liberators.
Some of this was driven by the more than