DebateGate
General Category => 3DHS => Topic started by: Lanya on April 25, 2007, 08:25:40 PM
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The Pat Tillman and Jessica Lynch frauds
It is difficult to watch these clips from yesterday's House hearings investigating the absolute, deliberate lies regarding Pat Tillman and Jessica Lynch fed to the American public by the U.S. military -- with an eager and accommodating assist from our excellent and intrepid media -- and feel anything other than disgust (and this is just beyond comment). But as anger-inducing as it all is, there is really nothing remarkable about any of it.
What these episodes actually do is illustrate how virtually every rotted and broken branch of our political and media culture operate:
First, it has been well-known for several years that the U.S. military outright invented lies regarding literally every aspect of the Jessica Lynch story. And the Tillman family for years has been vocally complaining about the lies they were told by the Pentagon regarding the circumstances surrounding Pat Tillman's death, the pressure on other soldiers to conceal the truth, and the crass and disgusting exploitation of those lies to serve the administration's political interests. None of this is new. So why is Congress holding hearings to investigate these matters only now?
The answer, of course, is because the Republicans who controlled Congress for the last four years absolutely suppressed any attempt whatsoever to exert oversight on the administration. They not only investigated nothing, they aggressively blocked every real investigation into allegations of wrongdoing and corruption on the part of the administration. Our government literally ceased to function the way it is designed to, because Congressional Republicans deliberately abdicated their duty of checks on the executive and actively helped to conceal every improper and deceitful act.
The only reason any of this is being aired now is because the American people removed the President's party from control of Congress and they are no longer able to keep concealed the Bush administration's misconduct.
Second, I defy anyone to go back and read the April and May, 2003 tongue-wagging, mindless American press accounts of Jessica Lynch's epic firefight against the Enemy; the severe gun shot and stabbing wounds she suffered; the torture to which she was subjected while in the Iraqi hospital; and the daring, gun-blazing rescue of her by our Special Forces, and then try to claim that we have a functioning, healthy political press in this country that serves as a check on government deceit and corruption. It is impossible for any minimally honest person to make that claim in light of those stories.
The seminal article "reporting" the Lynch Fraud was published on April 3, 2003, from The Washington Post's Sue Schmidt and Vernon Loeb, which mindlessly and uncritically passed on one false claim after the next, beginning with this paragraph: "Pfc. Jessica Lynch, rescued Tuesday from an Iraqi hospital, fought fiercely and shot several enemy soldiers after Iraqi forces ambushed the Army's 507th Ordnance Maintenance Company, firing her weapon until she ran out of ammunition, U.S. officials said yesterday." If one's metric is accuracy, it goes downhill from there.
That is the article that spawned virtually every other newspaper and network news program to repeat those lies. As but one of literally countless examples, ABC News' Robin Roberts said this to Diane Sawyer on the April 3 broadcast of Good Morning America:
And we keep finding out, Diane, how remarkable it was. Military officials are calling Lynch's rescue from Iraqi captivity, the first successful rescue of an American POW in almost 60 years. . . .
This morning, we are learning dramatic new details of her rescue and her capture a week ago by Iraqi forces. According to "The Washington Post," Lynch fought fiercely after her unit was ambushed near Nasiriyah, shooting several Iraqis during the attack. Emptying her weapon before being stabbed and finally taken prisoner. The young soldier was shot at least once in the leg.
Lynch was kept in this run-down hospital that had been converted into an Iraqi military headquarters. Her whereabouts unknown until a local doctor handed a note to US Marines in the area saying there was a wounded soldier inside. The daring nighttime rescue was right out of a Hollywood thriller as seen in this footage released by the Pentagon just this morning.
The excuse from Schmidt and Loeb, of course, is the same one which such journalists always give when they uncritically print total lies fed to them by their friends in the government and military: hey, what do you want from us, this is what our sources told us? The Post's then-Ombudsman, Michael Getler, responded to reader concerns about the accuracy of the original report, by saying this:
Schmidt and Loeb are experienced reporters, and there is no reason to doubt they were told what they reported, and by a source in whom they had confidence. They say it is certain that the descriptions they used are included in sensitive internal intelligence reporting about the rescue. The official silence about Lynch, they suggest, may be due to intelligence classification, possible war crime investigations or other issues.
So, "experienced reporters" Schmidt and Loeb were lied to by their sources, causing them to publish a humiliatingly (though flamboyantly promoted) false "news" story that had a huge impact on how the American press discussed this war. Yet they continue to defend not only their own actions, but those of their lying sources.
This is what turned out to be the real story here -- that "experienced reporters" Schmidt and Loeb were completely manipulated by lying, scheming high-level officials in the military and government, and they fell for it by turning the front page of The Washington Post into a venue for false, highly manipulative government propaganda.
So what have Schmidt and Loeb done about that story -- the real story here? Absolutely nothing. In fact, here is what the completely unrepentant Vernon Loeb and his editor said months later, even once it was clear that they were totally duped:
Vernon Loeb, who wrote the story with another reporter, Susan Schmidt, calls their sourcing solid. He concedes, however, that the tale could have benefited from stronger and more prominent caveats about the sketchiness of intelligence reports. "My lesson learned is I should have been more cautious in the way I wrote this story," he says. "But, having said that, I would have written the story anyway." . . . .
But he and Post Managing Editor Steve Coll say they have no reason to doubt that their April 3 story accurately reflected the information contained in those reports--even if the reports had inaccuracies. "We had multiple sources because multiple people were reading the same intelligence report," Coll says.
So The Washington Post thinks it did nothing seriously wrong here and, astonishingly, defends the behavior of "its sources" as admirable and honorable (just a little inaccurate due to that notorious "fog of war" that put imaginary bullet and stab wounds in Jessica Lynch as a result of a heroic and inspiring firefight that never happened).
And most of all, Schmidt and Loeb continue to protect the identity of their sources, and will until the day they die. The fact that their sources fed them lies in order to manipulate American public opinion about the war is irrelevant to them. Over and over and over, our most influential American media outlets publish false stories based on government "sources" who purposely lie to them, and they never report on the real story -- who are the government sources lying to the American public while hiding behind shields of anonymity granted to them, and maintained by, our nation's "journalists"?
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http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/
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I am not surprised by this nor outraged in any sense. Of course, the American public should be told the truth about a public affair as crucial as the conduct of a war. Yet, intelligence (and other) officers charged with psychological warfare management should be expected to have a tendency to "tell the story" most compatibly with perceived strategic needs. I rely on reporters to ferret out the truth, and Congressional hearings.
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It is too bad that these two young courageous people had to suffer for a weak & cowardly CNC.
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Or, Knute, at all.
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Or, Knute, at all.
You have a minor point there, Dome. Except I didnt send them into that horror & indeed fought against it.
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Point taken, though I didn't actually send them but went along with the madness of the time, a distinction that leaves me my dignity.
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Point taken, though I didn't actually send them but went along with the madness of the time, a distinction that leaves me my dignity.
Understood- You have come a long way from that madness since I first came across you.We cant all be perfect. ;)
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Brass did it better:
Newsflash! The Military LiesWednesday 25 April 2007 - 08:48:40
The thing I wanted to bring to your attention was the way the military is now reacting to the Tillman Family's outrage and daring to call the US Military "liars". (Jessica Lynch did, as well.) The military is trying to deflect criticism back on to the Tillman Family.
Basically, the military's stance is that it doesn't matter what happened to the Pat Tillman or his family because they're atheists. I am crapping you negative.
Here's a quote:
Kauzlarich, now a battalion commanding officer at Fort Riley in Kansas, further suggested the Tillman family's unhappiness with the findings of past investigations might be because of the absence of a Christian faith in their lives.
In an interview with ESPN.com, Kauzlarich said: "When you die, I mean, there is supposedly a better life, right? Well, if you are an atheist and you don't believe in anything, if you die, what is there to go to? Nothing. You are worm dirt. So for their son to die for nothing, and now he is no more ˜ that is pretty hard to get your head around that. So I don't know how an atheist thinks. I can only imagine that that would be pretty tough."
Asked by ESPN.com whether the Tillmans' religious beliefs are a factor in the ongoing investigation, Kauzlarich said, "I think so. There is not a whole lot of trust in the system or faith in the system [by the Tillmans]. So that is my personal opinion, knowing what I know."
See, it's their own fault! They just won't get over it. They don't have enough faith. They're just like those little kids who can't be healed by Benny Hinn. They just don't have enough faith. And they don't think that there's a heaven, so F those atheist bastards.
They think Pat, their son, their brother is "worm food", so they don't really count. We can shit all over them if we want to because everybody hates atheists, right?
http://www.brassmask.com/news.php?day.20070425
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Hugs to Brass. I really like that post. Trying to put the Tillman family in the wrong in this way is unethical, immoral and unamerican in my view. The military lied to a fallen soldier's family even while they (the military) were burning his uniform and his diary, and then, then puts the blame on the family..."if only they had Christian faith."
Obscene.
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Unfortunately Brass got it wrong.
It wasn't the military it was a member of the military. a subtle but important distinction.
And I hate to be callous, but i don't understand why an atheist would have a problem with corpse eventually becoming worm food. If there is no heaven, if there is no hell, if there is no soul what else is left but for the body to decompose and become one with the earth.
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And I hate to be callous, but i don't understand why an atheist would have a problem with corpse eventually becoming worm food. If there is no heaven, if there is no hell, if there is no soul what else is left but for the body to decompose and become one with the earth.
I think I mentioned that earlier today in the 'Faith and Science' thread:
...See, I don't have the same problem theists do; I'm not worried that I have to convert you to believe the same way I do, because if I don't, you're going to burn in hell for eternity. To me, it doesn't matter what you believe, because we're all destined for the same fate when we die anyway: worm food.
Damn, I'm so far ahead of my time...
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Damn, I'm so far ahead of my time...
So true.
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Unfortunately Brass got it wrong.
It wasn't the military it was a member of the military. a subtle but important distinction.
And I hate to be callous, but i don't understand why an atheist would have a problem with corpse eventually becoming worm food. If there is no heaven, if there is no hell, if there is no soul what else is left but for the body to decompose and become one with the earth.
They have a problem with being deliberately lied to by the people that their son gave his life serving. Worm food is clean compared to these bloody monsters.
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They have a problem with being deliberately lied to by the people that their son gave his life serving.
I can understand their frustration. It must be tough to learn you had just lost your brother in combat. It must be even tougher to learn later that his death was accidental. And the desire by the officer incharge to cushion the hurt by not informing immediately that Pat was kllled by friendly fire is understandable though misguided. And we all know lies take on lives of their own.
That was why Clinton lied about Monica wasn't it? To protect Hillary and Chelsea? Does that make him a monster?
or is it OK if they are on your side of the aisle.
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And the desire by the officer incharge to cushion the hurt by not informing immediately that Pat was kllled by friendly fire is understandable though misguided.
Is that what it was?
Or was the command trying to cover their collective asses?
Seems this one went way beyond just trying to cushion the hurt - keeping the facts from the family for weeks, even going so far as to award Tillman a medal under false pretenses. That goes quite a bit further than just trying to cushion the blow, donchathink?
Hence, the hearings, to determine the truth.
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Is that what it was?
Probably initially
Kevin Tillman was in a convoy behind his older brother, a former NFL star, on April 22, 2004, when Pat Tillman was mistakenly shot by other Army Rangers who had just emerged from a canyon where they'd been fired upon. Kevin Tillman didn't see what happened. O'Neal said he was ordered not to tell him by then-Lt. Col. Jeff Bailey, the battalion commander who oversaw Tillman's platoon.
"He basically just said, sir, that uh, 'Do not let Kevin know, he's probably in a bad place knowing that his brother's dead,'" O'Neal testified. "He made it known that I would get in trouble, sir, if I spoke with Kevin."
Or was the command trying to cover their collective asses?
As i stated lies have a tendency to take on lives of their own. The lifespan of the lie was less than thirty days. So yeah some folks tried to cover their ass, but that doesn't change what was perhaps the original motivation for the omission of facts.