The Toppling: How the media inflated a minor moment in a long war.

[PhillySane]

By Peter Maass in The New Yorker this month.

You can read the full 10 page article at the link below. It is an account of the toppling of the Hussein statue in Baghdad's Firdos Square which was incorrectly reported by all the major news networks as an Iraqi victory celebration. In truth, it was created and fueled by both US media and military elements. Very few Iraqis participated (maybe 10?) and even the journalists covering it (some 300) were telling their editors at the time that this was no big event. However, all the networks went non-stop live on it, called it a victory parade, and soon after, TV coverage of the war plummeted by 50% or more.
As we all know, the war had only just begun. To date 4432 American Soldiers have died in Iraq. 2 on Sunday, Jan 2, 2011.

http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2011/01/10/110110fa_fact_maass

[FrenchieCat]

1. I knew it was a sham at the time, and has been reported as such for some time!

http://www.mahalo.com/answers/was-the-toppling-of-saddam-husseins-statue-a-planned-media-event-or-a-spontaneous-act-by-iraqis

Army report confirms Psy-ops staged Saddam statue toppling
by Jon Elmer
July 3, 2004 – An internal Army study of the war in Iraq has confirmed that the infamous toppling of the statue of Saddam Hussein in Firdos Square in central Baghdad on April 9, 2003 was stage-managed by American troops and not a spontaneous reaction by Iraqis. According to the study, a Marine colonel first decided to topple the statue, and an Army psychological operations unit turned the event into a propaganda moment.
http://newstandardnews.net/content/index.cfm/items/641


That's what the media does. That's how the tea party was born and promoted and made into something more than it has ever been (and this continues to date).

That's why I'm amazed how some blame government for everything, when the media has a very heavy hand on why things are as they are.

[Luminous Animal]

2. Greenwald has a good companion column to this...

http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2011/01/04/burns/index.html

[PhillySane]

3. Pretty interesting take on the media

that they are in awe of the ones they cover. Must be a journalist farm somewhere that grows spineless hacks for the corporate media to stock their shelves with.

[The_Casual_Observer]

4. That whole god damn war was a psyops event,

[HEyHEY]

5. The journalists who did the commenting on it were so contrived it was embarrassing.

[Vinnie From Indy]

6. Sadly, the vast majority of Americans either do not know that the event was staged

by the US military SPECIFICALLY to hoodwink AMERICANS or they don't care.

[PhillySane]

8. And what is now clear

is that the Psyops wasn't intended to sway Iraqis, it was intended to sway Americans. That's military action against your own people!

[EFerrari]

7. In this shot, you can see Iraqis standing on the street watching the photo op.

Those poor people.

[texshelters]

9. The whole war was a propaganda event

http://texshelters.wordpress.com/2011/01/05/hero-hypocrisy-part-two-support-our-troops/

Peace,
Tex Shelters