A crisis in waiting, reported on by Iowahawk:
A Denver newspaper columnist is arrested for stalking a story subject. In Cincinnati, a television reporter is arrested on charges of child molestation. A North Carolina newspaper reporter is arrested for harassing a local woman. A drunken Chicago Sun-Times columnist and editorial board member is arrested for wife beating. A Baltimore newspaper editor is arrested for threatening neighbors with a shotgun. In Florida, one TV reporter is arrested for DUI, while another is charged with carrying a gun into a high school. A Philadelphia news anchorwoman goes on a violent drunken rampage, assaulting a police officer. In England, a newspaper columnist is arrested for killing her elderly aunt.
Unrelated incidents, or mounting evidence of that America’s newsrooms have become a breeding ground for murderous, drunk, gun-wielding child molesters? Answers are elusive, but the ever-increasing toll of violent crimes committed by journalists has led some experts to warn that without programs for intensive mental health care, the nation faces a potential bloodbath at the hands of psychopathic media vets.
“These people could snap at any minute,” says James Treacher of the Treacher Institute for Journalist Studies. “We need to get them the help and medication they need before it’s too late.”
I’m sure you’ figured out by paragraph two that this is an attempt by Iowahawk to show how inept and idiotic the MSM, specifically the New York Times, was in their reporting of our “berserk” Veterans.
Bob Owens did his own excellent reporting on it here:
Of those 121 summaries, 40 do not show direct ties between the stresses of deploying to combat zones and the homicides for which these veterans were charged, and of those, 14 were of highly dubious nature.
- The appropriately named Travis D. Beer, an Army reservist deployed to Iraq, pleaded no contest to motor vehicle homicide, and had two prior arrests for driving under the influence. The Times does not note if those prior arrests occurred before he deployed to Iraq.
- Jonathan Braham, a Marine veteran of the 2003 invasion of Iraq, shot a man whom he thought had sexually abused his stepson. According to the Times’ own reporting, he was adamant that his service in Iraq did not play a role in his decision to shoot the alleged abuser.
- Brian Epting was sentenced to six years for vehicular homicide when he lost control of his car while drag racing in 2005 and killed Robert Duffy, a World War II veteran. Is the Times seriously implying that his deployment to Iraq in 2003 is to blame for a drag racing death?
- Michael Gwinn Jr. has a history of domestic violence.
- Robert G. Jackson was diagnosed as a schizophrenic, as was Johnny Williams Jr., which cannot readily be tied to military deployments. Likewise, James Pitts has psychiatric problems predating his deployment to Iraq.
- Michael Antonio Jordan had a juvenile criminal record and was involved in gang activity.
- Christian Mariano was acquitted for acting in self-defense, and yet the Times still included him on this list.
- Jason R. Smith, a National Guard veteran and Atlanta narcotics officer, shot elderly Kathryn Johnston in an infamous no-knock raid, and is currently being treated for post-traumatic stress disorder, but his attorney cannot say what the proximate cause of his PTSD may have been.
- Aaron Stanley’s sideline occupation as an alleged methamphetamine and marijuana dealer may have had more to do with his homicides than his deployment to Iraq. Vernon Walker killed two fellow soldiers while dealing drugs.
- Larry Jaimall West was a member of the Crips street gang.
- Jared Terrasas had a conviction for misdemeanor spousal abuse prior to his deployment to Iraq
- Jessie L. Ullom had already been charged with abusing his infant son before he saw combat.
Veterans, especially wartime veterans, face significant stresses that should not be minimized and are only just being widely recognized, much less treated.
That understood, it is irresponsible of the New York Times to write an extensive post in effect indicting all veterans, while refusing to even attempt to provide context for their story, and while unfairly including every possible connection of veterans to homicides in such a cavalier manner — even those deaths that were justified, unrelated, unsupported, or had more proximate causes than being a war veteran.
The Times article was nothing more then an attempt by the paper to belittle the war. “See what war does to our young men!” which of course would be followed with cries of “no war for oil!” and other absurdity.
Whether if its leaking our classified information to the general public about programs in place to keep our country safe or whether its writing biased and intentionally misreported screeds on our returning veterans, we can always count on them doing their best to harm our country and those that serve our country.
See author page
Your last sentence is probably the truest thing anyone will read today.
According to this Source
the publisher once said
“During this era Punch Sulzberger asked his activist son an odd question, wrote Wall Street Journal ethics columnist Harry Stein in 2000: If an American soldier runs into a North Vietnamese soldier, which would you like to see get shot?
“I would want to see the American get shot,” replied the young man who today controls The New York Times. “It’s the other guy’s country.” We now know, of course, that most of those fighting against Americans in then-South Vietnam were soldiers invading from another country, Communist North Vietnam. ”
I suspect that his opinion of the US military has not changed or has gotten worse, and that subscribing to his beliefs is a requirement to work at the NYTs.
What I got out of this was:
If your group or sub-group exists on the extreme left fringe, much spinouts and needed therapy will result!
This is, I believe, an indication of a problem that I have described elswhere: The cut budgets, laziness and ineptness of our reporters.
They no longer check facts, and that includes the new York Times, and are simply stenographers who belive they have done they job if they record what someone, andyone, said, and check nothing.
The old ovjective of presenting:
Who
What
Where
When
How
Why
Are gone in favor of.. virtually nothing.
While others see conspiracies (leftwing, of course), I jsut see reporters to incompetent and lazy to do their job.
Their poster boy being Chris Mathews of Hardball. For example he listened to speeches by Hillary Clinton and, instead of doinb a Repurter’s job of verifying that whe she said was accurate, or not accurate, he speculates on her outfit and dsoes it show clevage: Or if she cackles when she laughs.
That is about as vacuous a piece of reporting as I can imagine. I might or might not like what I hear regarding the fact checking of any candidate, right or left, but when dear old Chris can only speak of voice inflection or outfits, we have a reportage who literally cannot get past the picture he has on the screen.
True reportage is hard work, with checking and cross checking: Lots of shoelether (or internet searches) are required. And you have to miss a lot of Kennedy Center performances and coctail parties to get your job done I do not see him, or anyone else doing theri job any more.
I use Chris Mathews as my example not because he is alone in his derilictin: he has lots of company. But Mr. Mathews is so bad that you can pick out almost any broadcast, at random, and have a textbook of how NOT to report news of any kind.
Our reporters are not malevolent, just patsies.
“While others see conspiracies (leftwing, of course), I jsut see reporters to incompetent and lazy to do their job. Their poster boy being Chris Mathews of Hardball. ”
OMG! I agree with Philly Steve?! Not only is the primary problem lazy journalism, but I also agree that Chris Matthews is a perfect poster boy for it. My example would be the 2006 midterms where Matthews and other media desk jockeys swooned over DNC claims that a Dem Congress had a plan for a “New Direction In Iraq.” It was the driving force behind the change in power in Congress-something Dean, Pelosi, Reid, and the Presidential Dem candidates all agree on to this day. Yet, NO ONE in the media ever pushed the Dems to reveal their super secret plan for this “New Direction In Iraq.” Then on election night Matthews is just aghast to find out that omg…Dems have taken Congress and they had no plan. They hadn’t even formed a committee to brainstorm ideas! It was all pure sizzle with no steak. All Matthews or any other reporter had to do for the months before the campaign was ask the questions they were too lazy to ask until election night:
http://newsbusters.org/node/8944
…but they were too lazy.
Now Democrats and other Americans who voted Dems into power are scratching their heads and wondering what they got=Congressional approval ratings lower than any time in recorded history.
Lazy journalism is not an accident though. It is a sin of omission. It is a deliberate effort not to see or report on things that they don’t like or don’t want to hear, and nothing could be more out of line with the entire concept of reporting news than deliberately ignoring and steering away from things you don’t want to report. The whole point of reporting news is to report it all regardless of whether you like it or not.
Re: “My example would be the 2006 midterms where Matthews and other media desk jockeys swooned over DNC claims that a Dem Congress had a plan for a “New Direction In Iraq.” ”
Before we descend into partisian bickering of our own, remember that George W. Bush is the guy “everyone would want to have a beer with”.
My point is that such a statement is irrevelant to whether or not George W. Bush can do the job (and the fact that George W. Bush is a recovering alcoholic and such a “compliment” is in extremely poor taste.)
However your feelings are valid in that Chris Mathews did not bother to do even the slightest analysis, one way or the other, he just swooned over style.
And he was educated by the Jesuits! I always thought better of them than that.
Re: “Lazy journalism is not an accident though. It is a sin of omission. It is a deliberate effort not to see or report on things that they don’t like or don’t want to hear, and nothing could be more out of line with the entire concept of reporting news than deliberately ignoring and steering away from things you don’t want to report. The whole point of reporting news is to report it all regardless of whether you like it or not.”
I agree with your conclusion. But I do want to reiterate my point that the lazy journalism we now see is also cheap journalism, since research and fact checking costs time (money), and pontification is free.
“research and fact checking costs time (money), and pontification is free.”
ROFL! Truer words were never spoken with greater irony.
I’m still not convinced that the poor journalism is a result of just lazy reporters. As an example, I offer Walter Cronkite and his statement that America could not win the war in Vietnam, after the Tet offensive in 1968. Here are a few thoughts, from The Conservative Voice
“In reality, the Tet offensive was one in which the Communist guerilla movement was not only defeated in battle but was virtually annihilated as a major military force. From there on, the job of attacking South Vietnam was a job for the North Vietnam army.
Politically, however, the Tet offensive was an enormous victory for the Communists — not in Vietnam, but in the United States.
The American media, led by Walter Cronkite, pictured the Tet offensive as a defeat for the United States and a sign that the Vietnam war was unwinnable. ”
IMO, Walter Cronkite was not lazy. He was actively doing the same thing that Jane Fonda, Ramsey Clark and John Kerry were doing. Telling the North Vietnamese that America could not win, telling the Americans back home that America could not win.
I was back in Vietnam for my second tour in late 1968, there was no reason to believe that we could not win that war; except the enemy propaganda promoted by Anti- America Americans.
IMO, in Iraq, the enemy has used the lessons of Vietnam to feed their propaganda into the American news channels from the very first. An example would be Here
“Remember our good friend Bilal Hussein? He’s an Iraq stringer who works for the AP and who’s up-close and personal photos of terrorists in Iraq helped to gain that organization last year’s Pulitzer. Well, he’s back in the news. This time as part of an expose of how photos are staged, faked, & doctored by pro-terrorist stringers employed by the AP, AFP, Reuters, and Getty Images.
On one forum that I frequently visit, some of these doctored photos discussed in the article have been used to justify killing American soldiers in Iraq. In all cases they are used by Islamic extremists to justify their hatred of America and recruit new jihadis. Thus, the images used by the AP & other organizations–which are often staged and sometimes fake– lead directly to the deaths of American troops and will eventually help justify the next act of terrorism against American civilians.”
Imo, the leftists news agencies know exactly what they are trying to do. Defeat America!
great post Pagar.
Thanks for your service
Re: “I was back in Vietnam for my second tour in late 1968, there was no reason to believe that we could not win that war; except the enemy propaganda promoted by Anti- America Americans.”
Except, as we learned later, the South Vietnamese government was riddled with defectors and spies for the North, and was never going to be able to support itself without massive levels of American troops to do all the work for them.
We could, and did, win every major battle on the field. (As was confirmed by most of the officers I knew who had been there). And, yes, TET was not a military victory for the Viet Cong: In fact it decimated their ranks.
However there never was a South Vietnamese government that was going to be able to hold the country without a half-million American troops, fighting a war, forever.
That is one fact that the “They wouldn’t let us win” group NEVER admits.
It IS someting that Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger knew, as was documented very well in the book, “A Decent Interval”.
Those South Vietnamese who you think did so poorly held out for a good period of time after the last American Combat troops left. They held out against an enemy embolded by the support the American leftists were giving to them every day. Did they need military equipment and financial aid? Yes, but we give to many countries around the world. So why not give it to a country that was on our side?
The one thing that the American “We just can’t let our country win” group will never explain is why it is their mission in life to make sure the US military is defeated.
“However there never was a South Vietnamese government that was going to be able to hold the country without a half-million American troops, fighting a war, forever.”
Great concept based on very real facts, but a solutions-oriented person would ask, “how could the corrupt S Vietnamese govt be changed so that American forces could leave without the govt collapsing?” What you’ve outlined Steve is a problem of the State Dept, and had the politicians had the drive to actually force their own govt to do as much as the military, then the S Vietnamese govt might have been a more representative govt, a govt with more integrity and respect, and a govt which would have won the political war among the people in S Vietnam. You’ve just described a Vietnam where military goals had been reached, but the political ones were not. Why weren’t the political goals reached? Because as Pagar describes…there was no political will in the US at that time to push forward that agenda, and instead an agenda of PEACE WITH HONOR was believed. It’s like the Black Knight saying it’s just a flesh wound. Well, that works ok for an arm, and even an arm and a leg, but eventually…those flesh wounds add up, and the Black Knight is left a powerless gimp of a joke on the ground without the ability to influence anyone.