Yahoo! Continues to Lead with Bad News from Iraq
On Monday, I noted how the news headlines on Yahoo!’s homepage tend to reflect a left-wing bias. If there’s bad news coming from Iraq, it’s sure to find its way to the news headlines on that page.
And today, we find Yahoo! leading not with bad news from Iraq, but with an article speculating that things are about to get worse. In their “In the News” colum, they list an article they title, “Will spiraling Iraq violence force a ‘re-surge’ of U.S. troops?” a Time magazine piece which is so fulfilled with the conditional, it almost reads as a grammar exercise wherein a high school students shows he knows how to use that speculative tense.
There is a growing possibility that it could become a wider intra-Shi’ite war . . . .
Tuesday’s sweep of Basra could turn sour in other southern cities where the central government’s power is weak . . . .
If the U.S. decides to actively go after the Shi’ite forces in the south, it would mean reopening a southern front . . .
.
Yes, there has been some increased violence in the southern regions of Iraq. But, we don’t know whether this is just a last gasp of the militias or an attempt by forces loyal to radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr to show that they still matter.
Perhaps, things will turn out as Time’s Darrin Mortenson imagines. But, that’s not what’s happening now. His speculations belong more on the editorial page than on the news headlines.
Sometimes, it seems Yahoo!’s editors can’t distinguish the two, so eager are they to lead with stories critical of our mission in Iraq. Not just that, now that there is much good news coming out of Iraq, it seems that those in the MSM will seize any piece of bad news and define it is a trend.
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The other article in Time about the Basra situation has this interesting point.
Many Iraqis blame Basra’s descent into chaos on flawed British strategy. They contend that in their haste to draw down forces, the British did little to train and bolster the local police force. Instead, many militia fighters were recruited into the police, making the force a part of Basra’s problems rather than a solution.
Or, in other words, the Democrat Party solution of cut and run has already been tried and found to exacerbate the problem.
Comment by North Dallas Thirty — March 26, 2008 @ 6:40 pm - March 26, 2008
Oh, and the latest; seems Saddam was paying for his useful idiots to come visit.
Comment by North Dallas Thirty — March 26, 2008 @ 7:40 pm - March 26, 2008
It seems the uptick in violence is mostly due to Sadr’s dead-enders basically ending the cease fire. Â It was nice having them lie low for a while, but it seemed inevitable that at some point they would come back. Â Maybe now we can finally dismantle them for good.
Comment by cme — March 26, 2008 @ 8:11 pm - March 26, 2008
Please excuse the forward praise, but you do a great job in your due diligence and variety of posts. Thanks, Dan.
Comment by heliotrope — March 26, 2008 @ 8:51 pm - March 26, 2008
If the drive-bys didn’t blur the lines between news and opinion, there would be less "news" out there. The papers wouldn’t be as thick as they are.
Then again, I don’t see a hell of a lot of difference between the Lakeland Ledger (NYT) and those free city paper rags.
Comment by ThatGayConservative — March 26, 2008 @ 11:40 pm - March 26, 2008
It could be that Yahoo doesn’t know much about counterinsurgency operations. The Iraqi forces in the south putting the smack down on the Shia militias are also Shia. This is extremely significant and shows the level of progress. I think the Brits should have hung around longer, but this is the same military that was captured by Iranians in Iraqi waters and completely crumbled like little school girls under the pressure. I don’t expect much more from them. It is necessary, however, for the Iraqi military to engage in real engagments of this sort. There’s nothing like on the job training. Also, we’re 1/2 way through the counterinsurgency. Violent resurgents happen at this point as the host nation military steps in and takes the place of the assisting military. Maybe Yahoo should listen to some of GEN Petraeus’ briefings sometime, and read a few COIN manuals before inferring all is going to hell in a handbasket. Or maybe that’s what they want us to believe? I’m just an Army wife and I know more about counterinsurgency and military operations than those journalists. Too bad.
Comment by Amy Proctor — March 27, 2008 @ 12:58 pm - March 27, 2008