Ther it is Again: "Most Americans..." (Score 1)

"Most Americans are convinced that technology...will carry the day for us"

Although Katz appears to have matured in the wake of the murderous terrorist acts of 911 he still resorts to old ways. This piece is a case in point.

Katz's premise is wrong: he, like many, mistake significant journalistic bias for the beliefs of the American people.

Nearly everyone I know is fully supportive of the need to pursue this action with conventional, old-fashioned military strategy i.e. men with machine guns and tanks killing other men with machine guns and destroying their tanks. Technology certainly gives us a great edge, but it won't win this or, probably, any other war. Journalists have tried hard to find dissenting voices, but there just aren't many, discounting a few thousand hippies in San Francisco, and Lord knows the media has given those relaitve few tremendously disproportionate coverage (e.g. last Fiday's "Newshour" piece, "Voices of Caution", 'Caution' presumeably being a term less fraught with historical disdain than 'pacifism'. Journalists are merely spewing in an attempt to provoke reaction and, because at heart many of them are anti-war, to hamstring political support for the war. 'Vietnam' is still a seminal event for many liberals and, therefore, many journalists. Their constant tendency to compare any American conflict with our supposed humiliation in Vietnam (which we did a great job at, despite activist and media disinformation - refer to American Heritage, May 2001 "The Meaning of Tet": e.g. 30-40 Vietcong soldiers dead to our 1, the victory of Tet, etc) is a telling reminder of their bias. Journalists know full well their unfortunate influence on many Americans: Our defeat in Vietnam is proof of their power in these sorts of times, and that's why we hear so much about it.

I was reminded of all this today: I took the day off and spent a bit of time watching a couple of press conferences. I caught both Ari Fleischers and Secretary Rumsfeld's. Each conference quickly reminded me of one of the primary problems we face in waging this, and any, modern war: self righteous, provocative, and biased journalists. Watching a press conference is entirely different than catching the sound-bites from it that make the evening news. The full measure of journalist-induced nausea can't possibly be conveyed in a soundbite.

Many members of the Fourth Estate have at least one thing in common with Attorneys: they're 'neccesary evils'.