TV News Winds Down Operations on Iraq War

[DeepModem Mom]

NYT: TV News Winds Down Operations on Iraq War
By BRIAN STELTER
Published: December 28, 2008


(NBC)
Richard Engel, a top correspondent for NBC, is no longer based in Baghdad.

Quietly, as the United States presidential election and its aftermath have dominated the news, America’s three broadcast network news divisions have stopped sending full-time correspondents to Iraq. “The war has gone on longer than a lot of news organizations’ ability or appetite to cover it,” said Jane Arraf, a former Baghdad bureau chief for CNN who has remained in Iraq as a contract reporter for The Christian Science Monitor. Joseph Angotti, a former vice president of NBC News, said he could not recall any other time when all three major broadcast networks lacked correspondents in an active war zone that involved United States forces.

Except, of course, in Afghanistan, where about 30,000 Americans are stationed, and where until recently no American television network, broadcast or cable, maintained a full-time bureau. At the same time that news organizations are trimming in Iraq, the television networks are trying to add newspeople in Afghanistan and Pakistan, with expectations that the Obama administration will focus on the conflict there....

For (Michael) Yon and others who continue to cover Iraq, the cutbacks are a disheartening reminder of the war’s diminishing profile at a time when about 130,000 United States service members remain on duty there. More than 4,200 Americans and an undetermined number of Iraqis have died in fighting there since 2003....

The staff cuts appear to be the latest evidence of budget pressures at the networks. And those pressures are not unique to television: many newspapers and magazines have also curtailed their presence in Baghdad. As a consequence, the war is gradually fading from television screens, newspapers and, some worry, the consciousness of the American public....

***

CNN and the Fox News Channel, both cable news channels with 24 hours to fill, each keep one correspondent in Iraq. Among newspapers, The New York Times and The Washington Post continue to assign multiple reporters to the country. The Associated Press and Reuters also have significant operations in Iraq....

Mike Boettcher, a Baghdad correspondent for NBC News from 2005 to 2007, said nightly news segments and embed assignments with military units occurred less frequently as the war continued. “Americans like their wars movie length and with a happy ending,” Mr. Boettcher said. “If the war drags on and there is no happy ending, Americans start to squirm in their seats. In the case of television news, they began changing the channel when a story from Iraq appeared.” A year ago, Mr. Boettcher left NBC after the network rejected his proposal for a “permanent embed” in Iraq and he started the project on his own. In August, he and his son Carlos, 22, started a 15-month embed assignment with American forces in Iraq. His reporting appears online at NoIgnoring.com....

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/29/business/media/29bureaus.html?hp=&pagewanted=all

[Inexpensive Wino]

1. Welcome to America, ADD

That's what the BushGang was counting on, our total lack of focus and an attention span that lasts only 'til the next commercial.

[DeepModem Mom]

3. Thanks for your post, Inexpensive Wino -- welcome to DU!

[Inexpensive Wino]

5. Why, thank you, ma'am.

Delighted to be here.

Inexpensive Wino

[Gregorian]

4. The truth is so ugly. Ew, please don't show us the killing we voted for.

I just watched 12 Angry Men. What a movie. It reminded me so much of this forum. Faced with a story, we weed through it to try and discover what the truth might be.

The media is our biggest problem.

And welcome aboard. I wish I were only 11 posts old. :)

[PSPS]

2. “Americans like their wars movie length and with a happy ending,”

“Americans like their wars movie length and with a happy ending,” Mr. Boettcher said. “If the war drags on and there is no happy ending, Americans start to squirm in their seats. In the case of television news, they began changing the channel when a story from Iraq appeared.”

Translation: We stopped real news many years ago and the Iraq fiasco doesn't fit into our infotainment package.

[gratuitous]

6. No, it hasn't exceeded the news ability to cover the Iraq war

But it has sure as hell exceeded its appetite. And these are the same douchebags who so vociferously cheered the prospect of war. They wanted the blood, the mayhem, the carnage and the explosions (Oh God, YES! the explosions!) so badly they couldn't be bothered with little niggling questions. Questions like "What if Saddam is telling the truth, and he really hasn't got any weapons?" Or "What is 'victory' going to be? What's our objective?" And the basic questions: How much? How long? Who goes? And so forth.

Now, not even six years into this excellent exercise in empire building, the media have lost their appetite for the wars they wanted so badly. War correspondents can make their career! Ooh, you report from a war zone, and you have instant credibility, ready-made cachet in the Fourth Estate. Think of the book deals, the glamour, the, oh, everything!

Now? Gee, there sure is a lot of carnage. A lot of bodies. What happened to that guy? Does it matter? Hard to tell if he's an American or an Iraqi? Should I be happy or sad about this death?

Nope, not many answers at all. But they can all send out six reporters to cover Paris Hilton's latest fart.