Tell that to Pat Tillman’s family. He died in Afghanistan last week, not 2 years ago.
It would certainly be appropriate to include all the current military actions.
Yes, but what you didn’t mention is that Sinclair is a media outlet and they are prohibiting their ABC affiliate stations from running the segment. So, worse than an uproar, there was (or was going to be…I don’t know what happened in the end) censorship by the “liberal media”:
Not surprisingly, according to an e-mail I received from Common Cause: "Since 1997 through the end of 2003, Sinclair and its executives and affiliates have given 100% of their political contributions exclusively to Republicans, more than $165,000 in total. "
Yes John, I’m aware of Tillman’s demise. Is there some reason that it’s inappropriately political to ever focus on just the one where the most americans are getting killed? At ~4.6 deaths per day in April, Iraq is running at about a third the rate of Vietnam. Don’t those numbers deserve a little more attention than the president’s wink and nod routine? What do you think would be an appropriate way to highlight this continuing sacrifice? Whatever your answer is to that, you’ll have to implement it yourself, because the administration seems content to leave a vacuum around the issue.
If that be the case, why didn’t ABC broadcast the program during prime time in the middle of the ratings sweeps? They would be assured of much higher ratings and lock in a substantially higher ad revenue stream than broadcasting on a Friday night late, traditionally the worst viewing period for broadcasting.
(Now I am not saying ratings did not enter the collective minds at ABC. Koppel is well respected and the broadcast coicides with the one-year anniversay of Bush’s “Mission Accomplished” speech. Just remember that the number of deaths – especialli just for the month of April – and the anniversay date are just coincidental to the sweeps month.)
If you wish to carry your thought further, I suggest taking a look at the news specials your local stations will have for the next month, not to mention the network news specials. I’m sure you will find your local youcals covering whatever they can find in a “special investigation,” “undercover investigation,” etc., during May. You should also notice these local news sprecial reports only coincide during the three sweeps periods during the year.
So your local government corruption scandals, local business scandals, etc., go unnoticed nine months of the year …
WTF? And “major combat operations” were over in Iraq precisely 1 year ago. But people are still dying in both countries.
Next thing you know, they’ll be wanting to paint over the Vietnam Memorial. Heaven forbid we list the names of the dead soldiers!
Cockbites.
Even though it isn’t, you know what? So f*ing what if it was a war protest. That doesn’t give anyone the right to censor it. It isn’t like anyone is lying, or making up facts - if admitting that people are dying makes you squeemish and ignites anti-war sentiments in you, fine, live with it. You want war, you got it, people die. You have two choices: You can bury them deep down and never look their way again, or you can honor their sacrifice. What many “outraged” people seem to prefer is the former. That’s OK, willfull ignorance isn’t anything new, but don’t try to put your blinders on the rest of society.
And, by the way, those (like Sinclair) who feel this show by ABC is too much of a war protest should remember back to the days of Jimmy Carter when Walter Cronkite signed off every night by reminding Americans that it was the XXXth day for the capitivity of the Americans in Iran. Some argue that this alone did a lot to insure Carter was not re-elected. And, I don’t recall a whole lot of conservatives complaining about this. (Actually, I don’t recall anyone complaining about it…although I am willing to believe one can find some quote from some partisan on the Carter side who was irked.)
Here is a description that I found thru google on a message board type thing:
Heck, those of us who are old enough farts to remember will recall that that’s how Nightline got started in the first place.
They who? Seriously.
What’s the matter – not proud enough to have one rule created in your behalf and sticking it in the mods’ faces?
Oh, I dunno. Lemme pull a name out of my hat.
Sinclair?
I wasn’t calling any poster here a cockbite, I was calling Sinclair and any other censoring body cockbites. I’m sorry if that was unclear.
Heh: someone hasn’t become a blog junky yet. 
It’ll hook you sooner or later…
A few thoughts: I wish ABC had decided to air this before sweeps. Looks better that way. OTOH, it appears that the network didn’t sell any ads anyway during the program so the whole ratings debate is moot.
I take Koppel’s comments at the end of the program at face value. As he says, if the program is politicized, it can be done effectively by those on either side.
As for the Afghanistan dead, perhaps they could be honored in a show in the future-- but this program was about the Iraq war dead. That’s it.
Perhaps this should be another thread but I don’t want to start another as this topic has been done to death: I thought war was suppose to be the absolute last resort. I believe even Mr. Bush has been quoted saying something to that effect.
My question is-- in what way was this was absolutely necessary? If war was the last resort, does that imply that our country was certainly doomed to destruction if we didn’t invade Iraq last year? Can even the pro-war people make the case that we were in imminent mortal danger from Iraq?
At the end of the broadcast, Koppel made a statement in which he acknowledged that some would take this show as a political statement. However, he also said that “he did not think that we were wrong to go into Iraq” [paraphrased], which I was a bit surprised to hear.
I think that part of the genesis for this show was the recent stories on how the government seemingly doesn’t want us to see the coffin pictures of the dead and related stories that this action hides the true cost of war from many American’s, most of whom get their news from mainstream media sound bites and newspaper headlines. Without regular photo’s of the dead (and wounded), this very real cost of war tends to get lost in all the other media noise of the moment.
I personally feel that this show should be updated and repeated monthly.
Sure, but the attempt of the right to conflate the two wars is political bullshit.
I know, but that undercuts the ABC premise that it’s simply about humanizing and honoring the dead.
I sound too critical of them, though. This was well worth doing, it just needed completeness.
ElvisL1ves wanted completeness…
Oh yes, completeness.
Let’s begin with pictures of the 3000 men and women who were in the twin towers when they crumbled to the ground.
Completeness.
Let’s show 500 blank screens to represent the crazy pig kissing bastards who murdered the 500 American soldiers who had come to Iraq not to conquer but to free the Iraqis from state terror, poverty, and oppression.
But most of all “Completeness” needs an ending.
So let’s have two endings…
One is a street scene ten years from now where busy Baghdad streets bustle and prosper, and healthy Iraqi children romp about laughing and playing in schoolyards that have been financed by Iraqi oil.
The other future is more ominous. The streets of Baghdad are streets of fear. Women hide in their houses, children die in poverty, as the power grabbing factions within the Iraqi government vies for political control.
One way or another, Ted Koppel, in ten years the Iraqis will be with us still.
Yea, that was pretty funny.
OK, I said that just to piss you off. Was it worth it?
How does one murder a soldier?
Didn’t Hitler liberate Sudatenland Germans, too?
Yea, we sure did do a good job.
In ten years, the American military and World Trade Center companies will still be with us, too, so what the fuck are you whining about?
I could get you some footage of this… pretty quick.
But in ten years, I hope to vacation in the hanging gardens, I really do. If the actions of this administration are successful, they will be honored by history and you can say “I told you so” until the ice in your tea melts.
There were several shows including pictures of the victims of 9/11, you almost could not escape the heart-wrenching sight in the immediate aftermath. I want to be aware on a human level of the human cost of this war, the war in afghanistan, any war that we undertake. This is a legitimate presentation of imformation in the public interest. Even if it is political, it is legitimate. I don’t agree that it is political, but there you go.
I love the whole, “If it was political, we have a right to censor it” concept.
Sorry, bub, this is America. So what if it was political? It should be censored because you don’t agree with it? F* off. If they want to show pictures of the dead Americans, so be it. Change the channel, for Allah’s sake.
Zagadka with much shallow thought said…
Oh I do so much love the spokesmen for the Left, such sophomoric articulation, such youthful directness of thought.
Now tell me little boys, do you get your jollies telling grown folk to “fuck off”?
(Maybe it was permissive parents; maybe it was TV. God only knows?)
A little gallows humor?