Tuesday, November 28, 2006

Kristof mis-reads Early Bird - and you

I an excessively childish rant titled The Cowards Turned Out to be Right, Nicholas Kristof sounds more like a know-it-all 10 yr old asthmatic child than someone whose writing is usually respected, even by those who do not agree with him. The title gives you a hint on the substance, I'll let you read it for your self.

What caught my eye though, was a little something at the bottom where he let a little ankle sneak out from under his skirt.
Take the Defense Department’s Early Bird news clipping service, which traditionally had been a dispassionate collection of outside articles to keep senior military officers informed. Lately it has been leading with in-house spin. The Early Bird of Nov. 20, for example, began with three separate unpublished letters to the editor by Pentagon officials before getting to the news from around the world.
'Ole Nick here lets out two aspects of his world-view WRT the military. Did you catch it?

1-Senior military officers need the MSM (via the Early Bird clips) in order to be "informed" about what is going on. Ummmmm, no Nick. The Early Bird is used in order to see what the MSM reports on about things the Senior Leadership knew about days, weeks, and months ago. What spin or twist is the MSM putting on what facts you know as a primary source? Is it accurate? That is 85% of the use of the Early Bird, Nick. Shocking, but most Senior Leadership, and ahem, many of the pauchy middle leadership, not only read more than one paper a day, but often more than one book at a time.

2-Why would the Early Bird publish "unpublished letters to the editor?" Simply, there are MSM reports in the Early Bird that are know to be totally false or misleading based on the facts as known by the Pentagon. The MSM will not police or report the corrections so the Early Bird is the only way to do it. I guess it depends on where you stand.

Both the above point out the condensation and arrogance of the MSM that Nick represents. Reminds me of that smear in Rick's book Fiasco where he states that most officers prefer to read Bass fishing magazines. Nick needs to perhaps address some of his own faults. He has him. Mote like.

He is a better writer than this article. Do better Nick.
UPDATE: For more MSM foolishness, Bookie has a good review of the latest.

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