WASHINGTON, DC -- Poll results showing the American public solidly behind the U.S. bombing of Iraq reveal nothing more than the effectiveness of the propaganda war against Saddam Hussain, Arabs, Muslims, and Islam.
After years of biased media coverage of events relating to Arabs and Muslims, how else is the American public to react?
Thoughtful voices opposed to U.S. imperial policies are seldom heard. How often are persons like former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark, professor and prolific writer Noam Chomsky, historian Howard Zinn, or informed journalists like Robert Fisk asked to appear on major TV news or talk shows? How often do we see lawyers on network TV arguing the fine points of law relating to U.S. foreign affairs like they do in the domestic affairs of O.J. Simpson, Monica Lewinsky, and President Clinton?
Self serving media critics fail to inform the public, or chastise the media, when elementary rules of journalism are not followed.
Is it not relevant when one writes about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, to mention neighboring Israel's? Is it not relevant when one writes of Iraq's violation of United Nations resolutions to mention Israel's? Is it not relevant when one writes of Iraq's use of chemical or biological weapons to mention Israel's, Britain's, and ours?
Would the poll results be any different if Americans were told that the U.S. invasion of Panama to sieze President Noriega (itself a violation of international law) resulted in about ten times as many deaths as did Iraq's invasion of Kuwait?
One could write a dissertation on the subject. However, the interested reader can get a good feel for what establisment media fails to report by reading News & Views at The Wisdom Fund web site http://www.twf.org.
After years of biased media coverage, the results of polls regarding the U.S. bombing of Iraq are as predictable as those of a lynch mob, or of Hitler's willing executioners.
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