war coverage

[cellio]

There is something distasteful about the popular desire to watch a war in "internet time". Wars take time, guys; remember in the past when you made do with daily updates? I'd really rather that CNN, MSNBC, and the other news sites would go back to prominently covering other news. I should be able to find more hints of other doings in the world on the main pages of such sites. Sure, of course the current news from the war should be there, but what else aren't we seeing because it's taken over?

All that said, if you're looking for a summary of war news from varied sources around the world, check out http://www.agonist.org/ . I must conclude that the guy who runs the site has no job. I've been glancing at it about once a day to get the highlights, and I think it's providing better coverage than any of the conventional sources on the net.

Comments

[rectangularcat]

Talk about detailed!

I really enjoyed the article from by Arundhati Roy.. wait a minute it's from the Guardian!!!

My favourite quote from it:
Operation Iraqi Freedom? I don't think so. It's more like Operation Let's Run a Race, but First Let Me Break Your Knees.

but this one is a close second:
After using the "good offices" of UN diplomacy (economic sanctions and weapons inspections) to ensure that Iraq was brought to its knees, its people starved, half a million of its children killed, its infrastructure severely damaged, after making sure that most of its weapons have been destroyed, in an act of cowardice that must surely be unrivalled in history, the "Allies"/"Coalition of the Willing"(better known as the Coalition of the Bullied and Bought) - sent in an invading army!

I just wish that the US had totally exhausted all diplomatic avenues before starting all this. I had a good chat with my friend Cindy yesterday and she is buying all what the media is reporting. She's a smart girl but she hasn't been interested to search into this further. Is it that apathy to take the easy way and just believe mass media? I had a hard time trying to make my points across to her. I am sure she is convinced that I am some sort of hippie peacenik now ;) not that that is a bad thing but a funny image if you saw my mostly-black wardrobe!

[ealdthryth.livejournal.com]

I admit to being sucked into the TV coverage, flipping between CNN and MSNBC and the occasional foray to FoxNews. I can't believe that I watch this after seeing Vietnam on the news every night for years growing up. I agree it's distasteful and I am appalled at myself. I haven't been much of a TV-watcher in years, so I fail to understand my behavior in this instance.

They have finally started showing other news briefly, usually only in the crawl at the bottom of the screen. They managed to find news 24 hours a day before the war. Last time I looked the whole world hadn't stopped, so what happened to all the other newsworthy events?

[magid.livejournal.com]

There aren't any other newsworthy events, since everyone is busy watching the news... :-)

[jducoeur]

I've been thinking of this as "the OJ War". All coverage, all the time, with the media utterly transfixed by one story. It's a weird little syndrome that has been popping up more and more over the past decade...