Media can’t capture full picture in Iraq, (Tony) Snow says

[sabra]

http://www.airforcetimes.com/story.php?f=1-292925-2458978.php


Media can’t capture full picture in Iraq, Snow says

Senior White House spokesman Tony Snow said Wednesday that media accounts of the situation in Iraq don’t give the full picture, but added he does not blame the media itself.

“It is absolutely impossible for any reporting to capture full the complexity of a situation like that,” Snow said. “It is humanly impossible.”

...

Snow said journalists are limited in what they can include in a print or broadcast news article. “The president has more time and gets far more information than one is going to be able to shove into even the best and most thoughtfully produced news story or television report,” Snow said.

“I think what happens is we may be out of touch with reality because we sit around and we look at fractional pictures on the screen,” Snow said. “This is a president who gets exhaustive briefings on a daily basis about the situation. He knows more than anybody in this room about what's going on” in Iraq.

[Paulie]

1. He better, Since HE BROKE IT, HE OWNS IT.

So that means he was fully aware of everything that happens in country... like Abu Ghraib for example? Eh Tony????

[Howardx]

2. good lord

imagine having the job of trying to convince people bush was smart and on top of things!

[marmar]

3. He's right. It's probably much worse....

I really cannot stand Tony Snow. :argh:

[stray cat]

4. Specially since they risk getting killed if they leave the green zone

[katsy]

5. why isn't his ass in Iraq then?

WTF!

Don't believe your eyes folks... believe in the fantasy being spun in the oval orifice.

Right.

:wtf:

[AlCzervik]

6. he's right, it's far worse than what has been "Captured".

[tchunter]

7. of course the media can't get the full picture...

the administration has tried to do all they can to sanitize this war for the public.

[tanyev]

8. Hey, that's what one of the correspondents on the Daily Show said.

They did a piece where he explained how you couldn't get an accurate picture of what is happening in Iraq from the ground. You needed to be up in the air, safe in an airplane, to really understand what was going on. Only difference is, he was joking.

[unhappycamper]

9. The media did catch the picture, Tony.

[struggle4progress]

10. Reporters in Iraq face danger on many fronts (2003)

By Andrew Gray
Reuters
Sept. 25, 2003.

BAGHDAD, Sept 25 (Reuters) - From the day in July when a man walked out of a crowd near a Baghdad museum and shot dead a British television cameraman, foreign journalists in Iraq have been wondering if they were all targets for postwar attacks.

Thursday morning's bomb blast at a hotel serving as the bureau of U.S. television network NBC, which killed a Somali guard, left little room for doubt ...

Anxiety began to rise after the July 5 killing of Richard Wild, who had arrived in Iraq just a week before to work as a freelance cameraman ...

http://foi.missouri.edu/jouratrisk/reporters.html

[brg5001]

11. True, just as the media can't transmit the smell of Abu Gharib

But with spokesmodels like Tony Snow continually obfuscating the situation, it's no wonder that the story has become so difficult to understand. The chaos was planned, the disinformation is intentional, and MSM's prime directive is to focus on celebrities and colorful disasters. Tony Snowjob is so full of liquid crap, it's flowing out of his ears.

[struggle4progress]

12. Letter from Iraq (Committee to Protect Journalists 2004)

BAGHDAD, Iraq

Security is tenuous for everyone in Iraq, but conditions for journalists have deteriorated to the point that many major news agencies now rely on local stringers and employees for newsgathering. Among nearly every constituency here, hostility toward journalists has increased.

Journalists, by necessity, are fixated on personal security. News organizations have established themselves in compounds of private homes surrounded by blast walls, or in large hotel complexes with extensive security checkpoints. Such precautions, though not unique to the media, reflect a change from a year ago, when journalists preferred lower-profile, less-secure accommodations on the theory that it would make them less likely to be targets.

This bunker mentality has taken hold among the press corps in Iraq for a few reasons. Insurgents have attacked less-secure hotels once used by Westerners, including journalists. The U.S.-led coalition is largely indifferent to journalist safety, and, worse, Iraqi authorities are openly hostile.

And with U.S. government contractors moving almost exclusively within heavily guarded compounds, journalists have become primary Western targets ...

http://www.cpj.org/Briefings/2004/DA_fall04/Iraq_Prothero_DA_fall04.html

[sinkingfeeling]

13. Sure he does! That's why he didn't know that Iraq was made up of Sunnis, Shiites, and

Kurds. And, Tony, we don't have any journalists left in the USA. We just have those who share your background, spinning pundits!

[struggle4progress]

14. From Iraq to Philippines, murder is top cause of journalist deaths in ‘05 (CPJ)

... Iraq, the most dangerous place for journalists in 2005, also became the deadliest conflict for the media in CPJ's 24-year history. A total of 60 journalists have been killed on duty in Iraq from the beginning of the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003 through the end of 2005. The toll surpasses the 58 journalists killed in the Algerian conflict from 1993 to 1996 ...

http://www.cpj.org/Briefings/2006/killed_05/killed_release_03jan05.html

[Dyedinthewoolliberal]

15. and, Tony?

What are you trying to tell us?

[struggle4progress]

16. 2006 a deadly year for reporters

Jan 1, 2007

Journalists suffered one of their deadliest years ever in 2006, with Iraq once again proving the most dangerous place in the world for the media to work, two media watchdogs said on Sunday ...

"2006 was the worst year on record. A year of targeting, brutality and continued impunity in the killing of journalists," IFJ General-Secretary Aidan White said in a statement ...

For the fourth year running, Iraq claimed the highest number of deaths, with 39 journalists killed there against 24 in 2005 ...

http://tvnz.co.nz/view/page/411366/949009

[struggle4progress]

17. CNN Executive Says G.I.s in Iraq Target Journalists (2005)

by Roderick Boyd

The head of CNN's news division, Eason Jordan, ... speaking in a panel discussion titled "Will Democracy Survive the Media?" said "he knew of about 12 journalists who had not only been killed by American troops, but had been targeted as a matter of policy," said Rep. Barney Frank, a Democrat of Massachusetts who was on the panel with Mr. Jordan ...

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0209-01.htm

[durtee librul]

19. Exhaustive briefings?

So that's why he sleeps thru them? Or did he just pass out? again

[daleo]

18. An intelligent kitten could grasp the situation better than Bush

Or Tony Snow.

[pinniped]

20. Ya, fill in the blanks then, asshole.

.

[maxsolomon]

21. "i need to know whats happening on the iraq/SA boder

200 miles NW of Basra - stat!"

"sir, its uninhabited desert, sir - nothing to report"

"see, its peaceful in LARGE AREAS of iraq, you defeatists".

[neuvocat]

22. Relax, he just means "Fox News".

When you have such a right-wing slant, you're bound to lose sight of what's really going on.

[LynnTheDem]

23. We know, Tony; ‘Significantly Underreporting The Violence In Iraq’.

That is what you mean, Tony?

Just in case Tony misundermistood;

‘BUSH ADMINISTRATION Significantly Underreporting The Violence In Iraq’

http://thinkprogress.org/2006/12/07/isg-underreporting-violence/

Stupid lying MFer.

[Maeve]

24. Is this man a real idiot? Or does he just play one on tv? eom

[tom_paine]

25. What an idiot broken record

Comrade Squealer, from Animal Farm.

That's just what Comrade Tony Snow is.

[aaronbees]

26. Operation Snow Job

working overtime.

[HuffleClaw]

27. "He knows more than anybody in this room" ??!!

that is just laughable. once again they desperately try to blame the media.

[maddezmom]

28. MR. SNOW: Describe the spectacle ~from the transcript

~snip~
Q So if you want to move forward right, what you have to move forward to do is national reconciliation. And the message that the Iraqi government has for allowing that --

MR. SNOW: It allowed what?

Q A spectacle.

MR. SNOW: Describe the spectacle.

Q Well, there was a cell phone video in there; there were people shouting "Moqtada, Moqtada." I mean, that's about as far from national reconciliation as you can get.

MR. SNOW: I think the government has made it clear that they understand that reconciliation is going to be a critical piece.

Q You don't think that shows that there's somebody in that government with connections to al-Sadr?

MR. SNOW: It's hard to say. Let them do -- they're doing an investigation here. I think it's worth taking a look at.

Q Can I just follow up on this --

MR. SNOW: Yes, sure.

Q -- because everybody is trying to parse a little bit what that image is, and --

MR. SNOW: I think -- well, go ahead, David.

Q Well, I just -- the larger point about reconciliation that Martha brings up, which is this threshold question for this administration, as well, is, do they want it more than we do? And if you watch this and you watch the violence, do you not come to the conclusion that Iraqis appear to be more interested in killing each other, settling scores, the politics of division, than they are in forming a democratic government that we wish for them to have?

MR. SNOW: I think that's a perfectly appropriate question, David, and the Iraqis have demonstrated through incredible sacrifice that they do, in fact, believe in democracy -- not merely in elections, but you still have people signing up for the military, signing up for police forces, trying to create businesses, demanding equal rights. What you have are people arguing for the conditions that we think they deserve and ought to have, which is security, political freedom, the ability to build a secure economic future. All of those are parts of the long-term puzzle.

But what is -- yes, you have people who have engaged in sectarian violence, you do have some people in criminal gangs, and you do have some people who have been outside inciters. All of those are factors. But you still also have the fact that throughout much of Iraq, and even in the most violent areas, people are standing up and saying, no, we want better, we demand better. And they certainly deserve better.




http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2007/01/20070103-3.html

[truthisfreedom]

29. Tony, Tony, Tony.

Your job sucks the big one, huh?

[krispos42]

30. Of course not. They can't show that much explicit gore on broadcast TV! n/t

[salin]

31. Snow's "full picture" = the own in W's head...

and of course the media can't capture *that* picture, as it *only* exists in bush's head.

[Garbo 2004]

32. That's because it's too fucking dangerous in Iraq for journos to get the full story.

Which no doubt is worse than we get to see/hear through the corporate media.

Bush the knowledgeable? In "touch with reality?" Can Bush even now find Iraq on a map without assistance?

[damntexdem]

33. Hey, for once he isn't lying:

our embedded, prostituted media cannot possibly give a full picture -- although it has begun to give a slightly more-accurate picture as things have gotten so much worse in Iraq.