-------------------- "The best defense is not a good offense. The best defense is a terrifyingly accurate and devastatingly powerful offense, with multiply-overlapping kill zones and time-on-target artillery strikes." -- Laurence, Archangel of the Sword
Registered: Mar 1999
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posted
Um... That article is about Kosovo. The "Nightline" thing was about Iraq. Our troops aren't dying by the hundreds and being downplayed by most media outlets in Kosovo.
Registered: Mar 1999
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-------------------- Great is the guilt of an unnecessary war. ~ohn Adams
Once again the Bush Administration is worse than I had imagined, even though I thought I had already taken account of the fact that the Bush administration is invariably worse than I can imagine. ~Brad DeLong
You're just babbling incoherently. ~C. Montgomery Burns
Registered: Mar 1999
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quote:Originally posted by TSN: Um... That article is about Kosovo. The "Nightline" thing was about Iraq. Our troops aren't dying by the hundreds and being downplayed by most media outlets in Kosovo.
Why isn't there a "Nightline" thing about Kosovo? We've been there longer...
So, then, the fact that we're still in Kosovo after 5 years (no exit strategy), and three Americans have been murdered by a UN "policeman," (who just happens to be a Jordanian Palestinian),
And the fact that this shooting has gone essentially unreported-on for two weeks ( mean, really, this hasn't even made FOX), while we get continual updates on deaths in Iraq,
Doesn't matter?
Does the fact that these three people weren't killed in Iraq make them less newsworthy? Or is it the fact that they were killed while on a UN mission rather than a US mission, by another UN officer, "friendly fire," in this case not being newsworthy?
Registered: Mar 1999
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posted
I remember seeing the Kosovo shooting on the news. It wasn't the lead story, because the same day Israel killed Abdel Aziz Rantisi, but it was on the newscast. Also, it was on most of the news web sites.
Since there have been no updates in the story (the Jordanian's motive is not quite clear), of course the press wouldn't report on it.
posted
What about all soldiers, anywhere, on active duty?
That's the length to which your movable line gets drawn.
-------------------- Great is the guilt of an unnecessary war. ~ohn Adams
Once again the Bush Administration is worse than I had imagined, even though I thought I had already taken account of the fact that the Bush administration is invariably worse than I can imagine. ~Brad DeLong
You're just babbling incoherently. ~C. Montgomery Burns
Registered: Mar 1999
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Cartman
just made by the Presbyterian Church
Member # 256
posted
No Rob, they're not less newsworthy because they weren't killed in Iraq or because they were on a UN mission instead of a US one, they're less newsworthy (although the story got plenty of coverage in Europe) because over FIVE-HUNDRED soldiers have died in less than a YEAR while taking part in one of the most botched military operations in HISTORY and because more ARE dying there every WEEK while the situation spins further and further out of control and nobody in the Bush administration seems to have a CLUE what to do about it. THAT is why there isn't a Nightline thing about Kosovo.
I think I liked things better in your absence.
Registered: Nov 1999
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quote:Originally posted by Veers: Since there have been no updates in the story (the Jordanian's motive is not quite clear), of course the press wouldn't report on it.
Since when has a lack of updated information been cause for a lack of press coverage?
-------------------- "The best defense is not a good offense. The best defense is a terrifyingly accurate and devastatingly powerful offense, with multiply-overlapping kill zones and time-on-target artillery strikes." -- Laurence, Archangel of the Sword
Registered: Mar 1999
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quote:Originally posted by Cartman: because over FIVE-HUNDRED soldiers have died in less than a YEAR
When will people stop acting as though this is some enormous casualty rate?
quote: I think I liked things better in your absence.
I was going to make the obvious analogy about life forms which prefer the dark places, but a smile will do.
-------------------- "The best defense is not a good offense. The best defense is a terrifyingly accurate and devastatingly powerful offense, with multiply-overlapping kill zones and time-on-target artillery strikes." -- Laurence, Archangel of the Sword
Registered: Mar 1999
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quote:Originally posted by Veers: Since there have been no updates in the story (the Jordanian's motive is not quite clear), of course the press wouldn't report on it.
Since when has a lack of updated information been cause for a lack of press coverage?
The thing is, it WAS reported on in the US media, albeit in a small manner due to the more important (in the media's eyes) story of Rantisi's assassination. I do not know why they would do a story on something days after it occurred, if nothing new was discovered.
quote: quote: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Originally posted by Cartman: because over FIVE-HUNDRED soldiers have died in less than a YEAR --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
When will people stop acting as though this is some enormous casualty rate?
Let's put it this way: for a modern conflict involving the US military, in a time where "major combat operations" are supposed to be over, 750+ deaths and 3,000+ wounded are A LOT of casualties. You may not think so, but I'm fairly sure most of the country does.
posted
He rest of the country is comparing our losses to the nigh-impossibly bloodless victory over Iraq in GWI.
-------------------- Justice inclines her scales so that wisdom comes at the price of suffering. -Aeschylus, Agamemnon
Registered: Aug 2002
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posted
Anyone who didn't expect a blood bath when invading and occupying a country like Iraq was deluding themselves. This is urban combat with a deeply entrenched enemy, across a vast area of land where everyone and their auntie has a machine gun close at hand. I don't mean to offend any Americans reading this but yank soldiers are quite possibly the worst equipped and least experienced to deal with this situation. By most accounts they have serious trouble building up trust with the locals, they are gung-ho, reckless and in the words of John Simpson they have a habit of "shooting first and asking who they shot later". Indeed a British army Staff Sergeant once told me that American soldiers are great blokes but when the shooting starts, he'd be much more worried about being shot with a round from an M-16 than an AK-47. So combined with the current administration's apparent lack of any clue as to what they're actually doing or why they're doing it, it's no wonder that there's a steady stream of folded American flags heading back to the states.
"When will people stop acting as though this is some enormous casualty rate?"
I don't even know how to respond to that. Over a hundred American soldiers and who knows how many Iraqis were killed in the past month, when the war was supposed to have ended a year ago, and you just shrug and say "Eh. No biggie."?
Registered: Mar 1999
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Cartman
just made by the Presbyterian Church
Member # 256
posted
Dismissing casualties is easy when you're nothing but a pathetic armchair quarterback with a grip on reality that doesn't reach beyond your living room and there's no possibility you'll ever have to answer for the mistakes of your team, isn't it?
"I was going to make the obvious analogy about life forms which prefer the dark places..."
The analogy in which Flare's the rock and you're the cockroach, you mean?
Registered: Nov 1999
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