Brokaw/NBC Devoted 32 Words To Anti-War Speech When It Counted-Yet Still Deny Complicity In Iraq War

[kpete]

Tom Brokaw's Disturbing Defense of the Media and Iraq
Brokaw's NBC devoted exactly 32 words to the key antiwar political speech

In the wake of the revelations in Scott McClellan's new book, former NBC anchor Tom Brokaw offers Exhibit A in the continuing denial by the media of their complicity in the catastrophe that is the Iraq war.

By Greg Mitchell

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/columns/pressingissues_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003810384

Consider just a few elements. Brokaw says, “But this president was determined to go to war. It was more theology than it was anything else. It was pretty hard to deal with.” So “hard” that the media didn’t even try hard to “deal” with the 'theology." NBC and others chose to focus on the “evidence” of WMD rather than the evidence that the administration was simply bent on going to war, WMD or not.

Brokaw, to make light of McClellan’s charges, also declares that “all wars are based on propaganda.” He even mentions World War II. For Brokaw, who has embraced the notion of that being the “good war,” to put the Iraq invasion in the same class is outrageous. There is a huge difference between admitting that there is a propaganda element to every war – and pointing out that certain wars are mainly based on propaganda and that a country has been misled, or lied, into war. Surely, Brokaw doesn't think FDR hyped the Japanese and German threat -- or was hellbent on war.

...............

He also blames the Democrats for not raising more of an antiwar cry. What kind of journalist explains a failure to probe the real reasons for a war on others who may not be doing their own due diligence? And as Media Matters pointed out this week, Brokaw's NBC devoted exactly 32 words to the key antiwar political speech in September 2002 by Sen. Ted Kennedy. The other networks did much the same.

Here is the Brokaw/Williams transcript. As an antidote, please consult the link at the end -- the column this week by Jonathan Landay and Warren Strobel of McClatchy (formerly Knight Ridder), whose rare, and courageous, work during the runup to the war gives lie to virtually everything Brokaw says about the impossibility of penetrating the “fog” of propaganda.

more (plus transcript)at:
http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/columns/pressingissues_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003810384

[blm]

1. Brokaw also wouldn't cover Kerry's Jan2003 speech Do Not Rush to War as weapon inspections

were proving force was not needed. As he promised he would should Bush make his decision without heeding the facts as they existed on the ground and in the reports back from weapon inspectors.

But, OTOH, maybe media WOULD have gotten the message if MORE Dems who voted for the resolution stood by the weapon inspections they claimed as their primary reason for that vote. Instead, most sided with Bush's decision to invade and even continue to do so.

[hvn_nbr_2]

2. Since Scottie's book, they've been in full cover-their-ass mode.

All sorts of stupid, self-excusing bullshit. They're trying to regain a few shreds of credibility before they go into full-on bash-Obama praise-McBush mode.

They gave at least 100 times more coverage to 10 protestors at Terri Schiavo's hospice than they gave to a million anti-war demonstrators in the streets.

Oh, and K&R.

[Tangerine LaBamba]

3. Greg Mitchell's book

Don't miss it. "So Wrong For So Long." It's a collection, annotated, of all the misleading and misinformed articles and reports that appeared on our way to this invasion so incorrectly called a "war."

It's a brilliant work. Mitchell should be proud.

[Gabi Hayes]

4. Greg Mitchell, Glenn Greenwald. wonder why we NEVER see them on TV?

two of he best. what a surprise they never ever are seen by anyone that matters

[barbtries]

5. it probably shouldn't surprise me

but it does, to find that so many in the complicit MSM are as incapable of admitting they're wrong as dickhead and gw themselves.