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October 19, 2003
Burying the Bad News
How to stem bad news of continuing deaths in Iraq?
How about barring reporters from hospitals and morgues?
In Baghdad, official control over the news is getting tighter. Journalists used to walk freely into the city's hospitals and the morgue to keep count of the day's dead and wounded. Now the hospitals have been declared off-limits and morgue officials turn away reporters who aren't accompanied by a Coalition escort. Iraqi police refer reporters' questions to American forces; the Americans refer them back to the Iraqis.There is no doubt good news to report from Iraq, but emulating dictatorial control of the news is hardly likely to convince Americans that democracy is going well.
But what do you expect from a President who thinks only news clippings produced by his staff are "objective news."
From the Patriot Act to Bush's views on media control to the scary views of top aides that God put him in office, there is an authoritarian creed in this administration that is truly dangerous.
Posted by Nathan at October 19, 2003 12:20 PM