Monday, December 18, 2006

My nomination for most callous lede of the year

Bill O'Reilly was the latest Fox News personality to get a tour of Iraq. Now, as newly announced Democratic presidential contender Tom Vilsack mentioned on "The Daily Show" tonight, any visit is largely a scripted experience, but I'm sure we can count on O'Reilly's "no spin zone" to cut through the staging and get the real story. If not, at least it might give him something new to put on the placemats or whatever it is he's selling nowadays.

In the meantime, I was quite taken aback by the press release from the Multi-National Force -- Iraq on the visit. It begins:

In a war that has perhaps been even hotter in debates than it is on the streets of Baghdad, the one constant in the media has been “spin.”

Even with the "perhaps" to mitigate it...just wow. But I guess they're right. Every member of the armed forces I interviewed upon their return from Iraq said something like: "Yeah, sure, it was rough, but I'd rather be there than stuck between Brent Bozell and Donna Brazile on that Tucker Carlson show."

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

IEDs...Tucker's bowtie...IED's...Tucker's scary combover job...IED's...oh hell. I'll take the imminence of death by exploding truck over that scary man tool any day.