Wednesday, December 14, 2005

"Everything I thought I knew was wrong."

Think about everything you’ve heard about the conditions in Iraq, the role of U.S. forces, the multi-layered complexities of the war.

Then think again.

I’m a journalist. I read the news everyday, from several sources. I have the luxury of reading stuff newspapers don’t always have room to print. I read every tidbit I could on Iraq and the war before coming.

Everything I thought I knew was wrong.

….

But then I realize it’s not a conflict of interest. If I am truly unbiased, then I need to get used to this one simple fact; that the untold story, might in fact, be a positive one. It takes a minute to wrap my mind around it, as a news junkie that became a news writer. The great, career-making, breaking news stories usually don’t have happy endings; they usually revolve around disturbing news, deceit and downfall. Nasty political doings. Gruesome crimes and murders. Revealing secrets.
Read the whole thing.
(From the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner blog.)

3 comments:

ambisinistral said...

It's a her, and wasn't that a pleasure to read.

chuck said...

It's a her, and wasn't that a pleasure to read.

It would have been more pleasurable if she had laid out her preconceptions and tried to account for them. Maybe that will come.

ambisinistral said...

chuck,

I think she was mainly talking to the readers of her newspaper, and they would have known the coverage of the paper.

It seems, not only in this article but in others, there is a shift in perceptions. The doubters aren't even much discussing their beloved civil war in Iraq anymore, instead the goal posts shift to a much murkier 'political' defeat in Iraq.

In the confusing the War on Terror the definition of victory will be dickered with. However, to paraphrase the comment on pornography, folks may have trouble defining it, but they know it when they see it. It seems more and more are seeing it.

This article, and others like it are a pleasure to read -- they sure beat the drumbeat of defeatism we've been treated to.