Yes, We Can Handle the Truth - Jonathan Alter

[TacticalPeek]

Yes, We Can Handle the Truth

The bottom line: this government doesn't trust the people. The last thing it wants to do now is fight an image war at home.

By Jonathan Alter
Newsweek


May 3 issue - Somewhere at Scott Air Force Base in Illinois, a public-affairs officer is awaiting his fate. This still-unnamed but totally clueless representative of the Air Force Air Mobility Command apparently never got the memo saying that the Pentagon and White House wanted No Pictures (Got that? No Pictures!) of flag-draped caskets arriving at Dover Air Force Base from Iraq. He didn't quite understand that the American people cannot be trusted with absorbing the consequences of war. Had he just bucked that pesky Freedom of Information Act request one or two more levels up the chain of command, he would not now be contemplating his transfer to... well, the 732d is in Alaska and the 729th no doubt has a place for him in the Azores.

The poor soul has plenty of company in newsrooms across the country, where red-faced editors are kicking themselves over one Russ Kick, a self-styled "information archeologist" from Tucson, Ariz. Through pluck and luck, Kick pried loose 361 moving Air Force photos that have already become iconic images of the Iraq war. Once again, the Internet, in this case a tiny site called thememoryhole.org, scooped major news organizations.

That's because this particular form of censorship, which began in 1991 under Defense Secretary Dick Cheney but was only sporadically enforced until Cheney returned to Washington, is now a priority. Body counts, especially when displayed so powerfully, are seen as a more potent threat than any militia in Fallujah. "The military is so concerned they will have to fight without the support of the American people that they will do anything they can to limit the release of information or images they fear would erode that support," says Robert Hodierne, senior managing editor of Army Times Publishing.

Anything. A woman working for a contractor in Iraq was fired in a separate incident for sending similar photos of caskets to the press. She got off easy. Should anyone in the military try that, Hodierne says, he would likely be court-martialed and sent to the brig.


more
http://msnbc.msn.com/id/4825259/



Hmmmmm, the Azores . . . . perhaps Far Tortuga? :)

[NMDemDist2]

1. i hear Costa Rica has no military

there fore great medical care and education for it's citizens