Editor&Publisher: L.A. Times is the ONLY major paper "taking bold stands on Iraq"

[DeepModem Mom]

Why the 'L.A. Times' Called for Iraq Pullout
Few American papers of any size have called for a reversal of course in Iraq, so it was a shock to see one of the largest, the Los Angeles Times, take this step recently. How does the editorial page editor explain this sudden change in heart -- and will others finally follow?

By Greg Mitchell

(June 13, 2007) -- “I see no moral reason to wait until fall,” Jim Newton, editorial page editor at the Los Angeles Times told me earlier today. “We need to evaluate in real time. That’s part of the motivation for the editorial this week. Besides Gen. Petraeus, others have a right to assess the facts as well.”

Newton was referring to an editorial in his paper on Tuesday calling for peace talks and a ceasefire in Iraq. It’s the kind of talk we heard often in relation to Vietnam and later conflicts but is oddly missing in regard to Iraq. But the Times is taking all sorts of bold stands on the war these days. Six weeks ago the paper advocated – hold on to your hats – that the U.S. actually start to disengage in Iraq.

That editorial was titled simply, if eloquently, “Bring Them Home.”

Rather than chide the vast majority of newspaper editorial pages, yet again, for continuing to endorse, or at least accept, the continuing (now expanding) U.S. mission in Iraq, I am happy to tip my hat to the only ultra-large paper that has come out for the start of an American pullout. That position, until now, has been left to papers such as the Seattle Times, Minneapolis Star Tribune, Orange County Register and Roanoke Times.

What’s happening at the L.A. paper, which as recently as January backed the “surge”? It’s as if a little-noted earthquake struck Spring Street this spring and really shook things up.

That May editorial reflected, “This newspaper reluctantly endorsed the U.S. troop surge as the last, best hope for stabilizing conditions so that the elected Iraqi government could assume full responsibility for its affairs. But we also warned that the troops should not be used to referee a civil war. That, regrettably, is what has happened."

It concluded that "the longer we delay planning for the inevitable, the worse the outcome is likely to be. The time has come to leave."...

http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/columns/pressingissues_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003598764

[Peace Patriot]

1. Thank you, DeepModem Mom, for posting this. I am amazed that it has sparked

so little interest here at DU. A major newspaper finally comes round to the position held my 70% of the American people, and virtually all of us here at DU, and you'd think people would be cheering, or hissing at the belatedness of it, or SOMETHING.

I do sense a slow-moving temblor rumbling through (or is it toward?) our war profiteering corporate news monopoly establishment. Circulation down, is it? Credibility all shot to hell? And then there's McClatchey, giving AP a run for its money by providing actual journalism on the Bush Junta. McClatchey, I think, is sincere--or at least sincerely interested in serving the majority leftist market. I'm not so sure about the LAT. Of them and any others who begin seeing "the handwriting on the wall," one could suspect it's "mission accomplished." Boffo war profiteerings. Boffo tax cuts for the rich. Boffo corporate regulation, and environmental regulation, and labor rights, down the tubes. Lots of rightwing corporate shills sitting on federal benches. Boffo U.S. soldiers in the Middle East "theater" forever more. Time to get the readers back--to set them up for the next round of corporate-government thievery and crime. (War on Venezuela? Who knows? Some further diabolical shit that makes the rich richer.)

Yikes. I'm the one hissing. But, really, I welcome this editorial, and I hope there are more just like them. If it helps save even one U.S. soldier's or Iraqi's life--no matter how grim our future under the Corporate Rulers may become--it is worth it, for that.

[DeepModem Mom]

2. At the risk of being snarky, I had some of the same thoughts. It's much more difficult...

generally, in my experience, to get response to a post that reports something positive than it is to get response to a post that provides an opportunity to vent. I'm, in fact, probably guilty of this myself -- although I've been trying lately to post responses that start something like, "Well, I'll praise xxx for this."

In any case, THANK YOU for your thoughtful post!