Democracy, Not Quagmire

Everyone knows the war in Iraq's a quagmire. The media says so. Ted Kennedy says so. Europe says so. So it must be true, right?

Wrong again. The fact that Iraqis are at this moment holding their first free and fair election should be a sufficient rebuttal. The fact the terrorists oppose freedom and democracy, preferring theocracy, clarifies the stakes. Forget Europe--they're hardly neutral, having been bribed to become Saddam's poodles. As for Ted Kennedy's erroneous, blustery despair, he might more profitably focus on self improvement, as Iowa Hawk savagely, but accurately, suggests.

And, most importantly, the mainstream media lies: by phoning-in stories from "mahogany ridge" (i.e., some bar safely within the Baghdad "green zone"), by unverified statistics or by collaborating with our terrorist enemies:

• As milblog Blackfive previously reported:

  [M]any members of the media are hesitant to venture beyond the relative safety of the so-called "International Zone" in downtown Baghdad, or similar "safe havens" in other large cities. Because terrorists and other thugs wisely target western media members and others for kidnappings or attacks, the westerners stay close to their quarters. This has the effect of holding the media captive in cities and keeps them away from the broader truth that lies outside their view. With the press thus cornered, the terrorists easily feed their unwitting captives a thin gruel of anarchy, one spoonful each day. A car bomb at the entry point to the International Zone one day, a few mortars the next, maybe a kidnapping or two thrown in. All delivered to the doorsteps of those who will gladly accept it without having to leave their hotel rooms -- how convenient.

• The relative isolation of the press makes the media dependant on unsourced information, which could be wrong or misleading. For example, the BBC yesterday apologized and retracted its previous assertion that U.S. and Iraqi police forces caused 60 percent of Iraqi civilian deaths over the last six years. Seems they had "misinterpreted" the data--doubtlessly because they wrote first, investigated later.



• As The Belmont Club demonstrates, the press collaborates with terrorists. Worse still, as shown by Obsidian Order and The Adventures of Chester (follow-up here), the media falsely reports and photographs staged demonstrations as if they were terrorist bombings.

For years, the Iraq broadcasts became anti-American bias, often through the "Damning But." This is repeated on a daily basis without source or support. Meantime, the press missed the real story: for the first time in the Arab world, the people are speaking--that's called democracy. As Brent Rasmussen says:

Regardless of one's political inclination, irrespective of your confidence in the electoral process employed, or the decision to invade and occupy Iraq, no matter what the outcome, let us all stand united in our admiration for those courageous Iraqi's who will brave gunfire, RPGs, bombs, and reprisal, to determine their own fate? For they choose to do so in bold defiance of promised violence and certain intimidation.

(via Instapundit and LGF)