C. Amanpour on CNN: " We are banned from seeing US Soldier Deaths in Iraq"

[leftchick]

<snip>

CALLER: Hello, my question is for the panel this evening. The first thing I want to say is I want to commend President Bush and all of the United States military on all of the hard work and success that we've had with the war against terrorism in Iraq.

And my question is, why are the civilian reporters given more media attention than the American soldiers who are the everyday heroes that are wounded on a daily basis?

KING: You mean the media person who's wounded more attention than the soldier who's wounded? Is that what you mean?

CALLER: That's correct. It seems to me that the civilian media reporters are given more attention than the average, everyday American soldier.

<snip>

AMANPOUR: Well, I think it's an incredibly good question. The caller is absolutely right. And, as Bob Schieffer has just said, of course we focus on very well known people and members of our own community.

But the reason that the deaths and injuries of the American soldiers don't get as much publicity is because we are by and large banned from seeing it.

The United States government has made a decision that we are not allowed to see the coffins, that we're not allowed to see the burials, that we're generally not allowed to go to any of the areas where there are wounded, U.S. military hospitals.

Perhaps you can see a little bit more in Landstuhl in Germany. Perhaps when we go to the hospitals in the United States. But it's very, very difficult to get close to that kind of real tragedy that the American servicemen and women are going through as well.

KING: Why, Lara, can't you see them?

LOGAN: Well, I just want to say that Christiane is absolutely right, and on top of that there's a real irony in that caller's question. Because it's the military themselves that pressure us not to keep reporting the deaths of soldiers, not to focus on the deaths of soldiers and Iraqis ever single day in this conflict.

They tell us you don't tell the good news, you don't show the schools that are opening, you don't do this, you don't do that, why are you always focusing on the death?

And you try and say to them, it's because as a reporter I just feel like every time somebody else dies, I have a responsibility to make sure that death wasn't in vain. That somehow, in some way, it's acknowledged.

KING: So the lady from Ohio should take it up with the Pentagon.

LOGAN: Absolutely.

http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0601/30/lkl.01.html





a little truth on ameriKan TVs last night. The whole transcript is a must read.

[babylonsister]

1. Rec'd - sadly. nt

[dogday]

2. Wow wouldn't this be a good time to have

a first amendment that allows freedom of the press? Too bad our Constitution does not cover it anymore...

[calimary]

27. I don't understand why individual local stations don't just go ahead

and cover their local dead ANYWAY, REGARDLESS what the pentagon says. I just don't understand it. I guess everybody's still too skeeeeered of that mean ol' boogeyman with the beard and the turban that from whom jesus w. bush says only he can protect us.

:eyes:

[brokensymmetry]

3. Thanks and Kick!

I was looking for that transcript. Thank you!

[hopeisaplace]

4. it was a very good show last night...worth watching

[mike_c]

5. the lady from Ohio must have been sputtering and complaining...

..."buh-but that's not what I meant at all! That damned left-wing press!"

[leftchick]

6. as she flips back to Faux

and her comfort zone. :eyes:

[hvn_nbr_2]

19. She done spun herself dizzy, I'd say. n/t

[Beaverhausen]

42. No, I think the caller wanted exactly the answer she got

She set it up so the reporters could hit that one out of the park. and they did!

[The_Casual_Observer]

7. all of the hard work and success that we've had with the war against terro

A shill caller that got an answer they didn't expect. The answer they wanted was something along the lines of the left wing media only wants to cover the bad stuff.

I would like to hear about a single "success" in the "war on terror". I haven't forgotten that jr was protecting us on "September the eleventh two thousand and one"

[leveymg]

10. (Media has) the responsibility to make sure the death wasn't in vain

Put a nice spin on it. What else could it possibly be at this point?

[mike_c]

21. there've been lots of stunning successes....

Halliburton has made record profits. KDR will be spun off as an independent unit. Private security firms have become the utter shiznit for guys who like to work out for eight hours a day and carry assault weaponry around the rest of the time. Exxon has reported the largest single profit ever recorded by a corporation-- OK, that's arguably a secondary effect, but hey!-- they're selling gas to the government to practically give away in a country with one of the largest oil reserves in the world. Paul Wolfowitz rose from basement bureaucrat status to architect of a war of aggression, to head of the World Bank, where he now gets to sell whole countries into indentured servitude-- how's THAT for a Horatio Alger story? The NSA has achieved some real lifetime goals in a remarkably short time. And on the home front, things are really looking good for the blue plastic tarp industry. The list goes on and on. Happy days are here again!

[doublethink]

8. Thanks for posting this. Peace.

I'm sure most DU'ers are aware of this allready, but can never have enough of the truth out there. K&R. :kick:

[G_j]

9. wow

not the answer she wanted to hear, good for her!

[leftchick]

11. typical freeper call

They are so clueless.

[CrazyOrangeCat]

12. During Vietnam . . .

. . . we saw death and destruction every day on the front page and on TV.

There is nothing at all now.

Welcome to the machine.

:cry:

[leftchick]

14. I was 10 yrs. old in 1968

I remember TET, soldiers dead and dying, and many dead Vietnamese on my TV every night. EVERY NIGHT! Machine indeed. :(

[katty]

17. yes, everyday after school, early news, wounded/dead on TV

it's so unreal now in the U.S., this occupation is beyond sterilized-war coverage has been hermetically sealed off from Americans-censorship and fascism prevail.

[pinto]

13. Thanks for the post. Ms. Amanpour is right on. The cost is well hidden.

Across the board. With our military lives, our taxpayer dollars...

[ccpup]

15. I heart Christiane

I'm surprised that the bravery with which she speaks out against this misAdministration hasn't gotten her canned by the Grand Poobahs at CNN (Certainly Not News) yet. Nice to hear someone tell it like it is. We need more like her to get more screen/air time!

[leftchick]

18. she has been wiretapped by the NSA...

she and her democratic operative husband are surely terrorists. :eyes:

Welcome to DU ccpup! :)

[newyawker99]

52. Hi ccpup!!

Welcome to DU!! :toast:

[Rockholm]

16. Kick and Certainly nominated.

[seemslikeadream]

20. take it up with the Pentagon.

[leftchick]

22. exactly SLaD....

Remember when the photographer of these was fired and got in such trouble for going against the pentagon's wishes?

[wishlist]

23. Excellent responses to a question lots of Americans have been asking n/t

[journalist3072]

24. Quite simple, really

If you don't see it, then it didn't happen. At least, that's what Idiot Son thinks. Or wants you to think.

[Neil Lisst]

25. Christiane knocked that one out of the park, didn't she?!

The Bushies love to play that "you journalists don't care about American soldiers" card, but the reality is that it is the administration that wants to use soldiers as props, and that doesn't include showing the dead or wounded.

If the media are culpable, it's for NOT covering the war as it should be covered, in spite of the US official muscling them not to.

[tn-guy]

41. Actually, no

I hate to break your bubble, but Christiane told an outright lie. We recently held the funeral for a serviceman killed in Iraq in my church and I can tell you that the press was there and there was no attempt to keep them away at all. The event was covered in detail by TV, radio and newspapers.

There was no attempt to "ban" any member of the press whatsoever.

To answer the caller's original question of why injured members of the press get more press attention than do injured soldiers - it's a natural human tendency to pay more attention to events that affect oneself personally. An injury to a reporter strikes closer to home for a fellow reporter than an injury to someone else. Thus, it gets more attention and coverage. It's simple human nature.

[leftchick]

43. Wrong! Christiane stated the truth

There is a Pentagon policy in effect to BLACK OUT reporting of US soldier deaths from the battlefield to their return to Dover. No video, no caskets, what Lara and Christiane reported is US Policy. Why the fuck would they lie about it?

Thankfully local media do report and honor the dead as they arrive back to their home states and towns. Have you not read of this before? And bullshit about reporter getting more attention, coverage. During the Vietnam War it was equal coverage for all of the dead every night on TV, Vietnamese, US Soldier and reporters had equal coverage NIGHTLY.

It is a combination of the Corporate owned media and current pentagon policies for lack of coverage. I would post some links but all you have to do is Google... pentagon, dover and have at it...

[The Magistrate]

44. To Be Fair, Sir

The lady did not tell a lie. She said that reporters in Iraq are kept away from U.S. casualties, and from the hospitals, and from the ceremonies of returning the dead to the United States. None of those statements are false; all are established fact. She is a foreign correspondent for an international news service, and the local media's handling of funerals is not her affair; accordingly, she did not speak to it. Family fuberals frequentky make local news markets, but do not impact the national coverage, and generally do not impact even major local news markets: in both spheres, there are generally a great number of things viewed as more newsworthy on any given day. We both know that if one of the major networks were to adopt a policy of doing a five minute story on any funeral of a soldier killed in Iraq held that day, so that there were several such stories a week at least, there would be howls of protest from the right, claiming the "liberal media" was trying to turn public opinion against the war, and denouncing the broadcasters as traitorous allies of the "terrorists".

[tn-guy]

45. Read her own words

AMANPOUR: Well, I think it's an incredibly good question. The caller is absolutely right. And, as Bob Schieffer has just said, of course we focus on very well known people and members of our own community.

But the reason that the deaths and injuries of the American soldiers don't get as much publicity is because we are by and large banned from seeing it.

The United States government has made a decision that we are not allowed to see the coffins, that we're not allowed to see the burials, that we're generally not allowed to go to any of the areas where there are wounded, U.S. military hospitals.



My emphasis added.

I can speak from first-hand, eye-witness experience that, at the funeral I witnessed, the press was present at the burial and did see the coffin. To state that the press is not allowed to see the burials is a complete and total falsehood.

[Bridget Burke]

53. Yes, burials may be seen on local TV

And CBS runs reports on individual deaths. Just kind words about the deceased, with a good photo.

We are NOT allowed to see the coffins as they come in to the USA. The numbers might make people think. We are NOT given the numbers of wounded. We are NOT allowed to see the war "in action"--with the wounded being choppered to medical care. This happened in Vietnam; the public saw the bloody cost of the war every evening on the news. But that helped turn the public against the war. The government will not make that mistake again.

Perhaps you found one small error. Overall, I'll trust Ms Amanpour's words about war coverage.

[leftchick]

54. she no doubt meant banning coverage "homecomings on all military bases"

why nitpick the obvious point she made? The US restricts coverage of dead and wounded soldiers coming home. If the pentagon could ban coverage at a private funeral home I am sure they would. In fact I would not be surprised if rumdum is working on it......

http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A55816-2003Oct20?language=printer

Curtains Ordered for Media Coverage of Returning Coffins

By Dana Milbank
Tuesday, October 21, 2003; Page A23

Since the end of the Vietnam War, presidents have worried that their military actions would lose support once the public glimpsed the remains of U.S. soldiers arriving at air bases in flag-draped caskets.

To this problem, the Bush administration has found a simple solution: It has ended the public dissemination of such images by banning news coverage and photography of dead soldiers' homecomings on all military bases.

In 1998 at Ramstein Air Base in Germany, airmen carry the coffin of Senior Master Sgt. Sherry Lynn Olds, killed in the bombing of the U.S. Embassy in Nairobi. Such rites are now barred. (Kristin Bennett -- U.s. Air Force Via AP)

In March, on the eve of the Iraq war, a directive arrived from the Pentagon at U.S. military bases. "There will be no arrival ceremonies for, or media coverage of, deceased military personnel returning to or departing from Ramstein airbase or Dover base, to include interim stops," the Defense Department said, referring to the major ports for the returning remains.

[Neil Lisst]

57. Earth to tn-guy. We are talking about IRAQ, not your hometown.

She was talking about news coverage in Iraq, which she knows a lot about, and you clearly do not.

[Secular Agent Man]

26. Brian Williams just got in a little dig

about this subject on the evening news while reporting on the return of Woodruff and Vogt. Don't remember his exact words, but he pointed out we were not allowed to see the dead and wounded troops returning.

[NewJeffCT]

28. Brian Williams said that?

isn't he the guy that referred to "we" when talking about Republicans with a Congressman?

[Danieljay]

29. ummm...whos the woman in the purple sweater?

:dilemma:

:spank:



Oh ya...and DARN that liberal media!

[leftchick]

34. Lara Logan

CBS News and 60 Minutes....

(CBS) Lara Logan was named a CBS News correspondent in May 2002 and has also contributes to 60 Minutes.

She provided daily reports on the war in Iraq and was the only journalist from an American network in Baghdad when American troops invaded the city, reporting live from Firdos Square as the statue of Saddam fell.

Logan has reported extensively from the frontlines of Afghanistan and has followed the Green Berets as they search for Al Qaeda and Osama bin Laden.

Her other 60 Minutes II reports include an interview with the King of Swaziland, who was being sued by the mother of a girl who was forced to become his 10th wife, and a report on legalized assisted suicide in Switzerland.

Logan has served as a correspondent for GMTV, the weekday morning news program of Great Britain’s ITV (2000-02), and as a correspondent for CBS Radio News. She reported on the war in Afghanistan, the conflict in the Middle East, the Mozambique floods, the land invasions in Zimbabwe and the India earthquake.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/12/02/60II/main531421.shtml

[Danieljay]

36. thank you.... n/t

[NewJeffCT]

30. good job Christiane

Who is the 2nd woman in the OP?

[Danieljay]

31. I asked the same question.... n/t

[jimshoes]

37. I googled Lara Logan (images)

http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=&imgrefurl=http://www.nndb.com/people/796/000048652/&h=250&w=186&sz=17&tbnid=C5n2ioXkB2V8kM:&tbnh=106&tbnw=78&hl=en&start=1&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dlara%2Blogan%26svnum%3D10%26hl%3Den%26lr%3D%26safe%3Doff%26sa%3DG

[yourout]

47. Damn...she's married.

I think she leans a little to the right but damn she is hot.

[leftchick]

38. I am sorry

I thought most folks had seen her by now reporting out of Iraq. She is embedded with US marines and has been doing an excellent job for CBS evening news and 60 Minutes. I posted her Bio above.

[Danieljay]

39. apology accepted...I don't watch tv at home..unless its a DVD. n/t

[NewJeffCT]

48. No problem...

I reallly don't watch much in the way of TV news, except for the occasional viewing of Keith Olbermann on MSNBC.

[malaise]

32. Very good read

let's see if the Rethugs continue to accept this ridiculous violation of freedom of the press. Maybe the injury to 'high-ups' in the corporate media will facilitate exposure from journalists and reporters.

[Danieljay]

33. and CHECK this part out...wow...ON TARGET!!

CALLER: Yes, my question is, why hasn't there been more outrage on the part of the American people and the U.S. media, government, on the recent bombing in Pakistan, killing all those women and children? Ignoring sovereignty and international law?

I mean, I haven't seen anything in the American media that has really claimed how awful it was and the anger, the legitimate anger on the part of the Pakistani people. It just floors me that there's no outrage.

KING: Christiane?

AMANPOUR: Larry?

KING: Go ahead. Do you want to take that?

AMANPOUR: You know, I think -- well, certainly there's been a lot of reporting about it. Perhaps not enough for that view of it. As you know, there's not enough international reporting on American television anyway.

But I think to the bigger point, why are we there? We're there because if we're not, whose word are we going to take for it? For instance, over the bombing in Pakistan, and for instance, over the constant atrocities in Iraq.

Are we going to take the Pentagon paid Lincoln Group who are paying positive stories to be written in the Iraqi press? Are we going to take what the administration tells us? Do you remember at the beginning of this war, Donald Rumsfeld, secretary of defense, told us that these insurgents were just a bunch of dead enders who amounted to absolutely nothing.

Well, that was three years ago. You remember on your own show, not so long ago, the vice president of the United States said that the insurgency was in its death throes, in its last throes.

Well, we're there to report what's actually going on and we pay a heavy price for trying to get to the truth. And the truth is what our business is all about. And that's why we're out there, despite the enormous, enormous personal cost to us, to our families, and to our networks.

[leftchick]

35. and isn't this the truth....

"As you know, there's not enough international reporting on American television anyway."

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

40. Al Franken was making this point about Rush Limbaugh this morning

Franken mentioned that Limbaugh was whipping up the blood of his swine herd audience by telling them that the "Liberal media" was more concerned about the wounding of a reporter in Iraq than the deaths of our servicemen and servicewomen. And then Franken mentioned all the times that Limbaugh had previously blasted the media for focusing on military deaths in Iraq and not telling enough "feel good" stories.

[Nikki Stone 1]

55. Sounds like Limbaugh was whoring for the Pentagon again

GREAT POST

[cascadiance]

56. At least the "liberal media" doesn't put people in jail for talking

about the dead soldiers in Iraq like our secret service people do in the SOTU speech. If Rush is so worried about "censoring" talking about the deaths of our servicemen and servicewomen in Iraq, then shouldn't he be protesting the arrest of Cindy Sheehan last night? Eh?

I wonder how soon before this congress tries to pass a bill through congress changing the spelling of the word "free" to "freep". Then they'll have an easier time justifying what they do in a "freep country", or arresting those that violate "freep speech", just like they're all collectively trying to get rid of "probable cause" from the fourth ammendment.

Revisionism or hypocrisy? Of course not!

[mvd]

46. Bush doesn't know a thing about freedom

Just look at the state of this country.

With that, good night, all. I think we're getting them flustered, and don't give up!

[The Witch]

49. No wonder she's being wiretapped.

Remember that story??

[MountainLaurel]

50. Yes, I do

She also might want to avoid small prop planes as well as large hotels in Bagdhad.

[leftchick]

51. her reporting is truthful

and she is married to a Democrat. That is why she was spyed one. I would bet she is pissed about it too. Stay off of small aircraft Christianne!

[EFerrari]

58. kick