Mark Bossingham

Jaw-dropping bullshit from AP

IT SEEMS every day I say, "It can't get any worse." And yet ,,, The following two paragraphs provide the perfect distillation of what passes for journalism these days. Hyperbole, mythical sources--in journo-speak the word "some" means "I" and intense sarcasm that belongs only on the editorial page of an unscrupulous rag. That this excrement can be found in a story about the possible deaths of 17 U.S. service members only makes it harder to bear.
Only eight months ago, Afghan and U.S. officials were hailing a relatively peaceful presidential election here as a sign that the Taliban rebellion was finished. That bravado has been yet another casualty in a war some feel could escalate into a conflict on the scale of Iraq's.
The loss of the helicopter follows three months of unprecedented fighting that has killed about 465 suspected insurgents, 43 Afghan police and soldiers, 125 civilians, and 29 U.S. troops. Afghan and American officials have predicted the situation will deteriorate before legislative elections are held in September.
Three cheers for writer/hack Daniel Cooney.

Fifth Column journalism

IN A simply hilarious attempt to control the damage done by President Bush's speech yesterday, the boomers at AP give us this:
"Iraqis Split Over Bush Pledge on Troops"
BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - Iraqis were divided Wednesday over U.S. President George W. Bush's rejection of a timetable for the withdrawal of American troops, which came a day after insurgents bent on starting a civil war marked the country's first year of sovereignty by killing more than a dozen people.
I saw the headline, and thought, gee, that's not what I've been hearing. So I read the story by one Frank Griffiths. And sure enough, he's right! He has exactly two sources. One wants the coalition to stay, the other wants the coalition to go.
And that is it boys and girls. That is the entirety of his story designed to prove the nation is split. Oh, I forgot, he does give us a second-hand "statement" by the Iraqi prime minister to make it look like he wants the U.S. out, too!
Iraqi Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari, who met with Bush in Washington last week, was quoted as saying in Wednesday's edition of the London-based Arab newspaper Asharq al-Awsat that he discussed the issue of troop withdrawal with the U.S. president.
"We want the foreign troops to leave Iraq as soon as possible," al-Jaafari was quoted as telling the newspaper in an interview. "No country accepts having foreign troops on its lands because this indicates our inability to defend our country and our acknowledgment that there is a security problem."
I don't know who Frank's translator is, but this fantasy quote from a strong proponent of the U.S. presence was yanked from a later write-thru of the story by his editors and replaced with:
Al-Jaafari, who met Bush in Washington last week, was quoted in Wednesday's edition of the London-based Arab newspaper Asharq al-Awsat as saying that while the Iraqi government wanted foreign troops to leave as soon as possible, a withdrawal before Iraqi security forces were ready could only benefit "terrorists."
Certainly, the AP thinks we are stupid, but even the cocooned, pencil-necked socialists in New York knew they couldn't get away with turning a strong Iraqi proponent of the U.S. presence into a "therapy"-offering, weak on national defense Democrat and get away with it.
Frank, you wouldn't pass the entry-level copy editing test where I work.

Failed revolution '76

HERE'S A good quote from a good story:
On the NBC News program "Meet the Press" with Tim Russert, the secretary (Rumsfeld) noted that according to historian David McCullough, author of a new book titled "1776," if the American Revolutionary War had had the same type of media coverage as the Iraq war, then "there wouldn't have been a successful revolution."

Lawmakers tour Gitmo

AFTER A months' long disinformation campaign by the media, the once-respected Amnesty international, and the U.N., a bi-partisan group of U.S. lawmakers took the president up on his offer to tour the Guantanamo prison. One quote from a usually shrill Democratic rep pretty much says it all:
"The Guantanamo we saw today is not the Guantanamo we heard about a few years ago," said Rep. Ellen Tauscher, D-Calif.
Indeed, what she SAW is not what she HEARD. And where did Tauscher HEAR about Gitmo? From journalists, the 85-percent of the members of my profession that are unmitigated, unethical, agenda-driven assholes.
What the hell happened to the Killing fields, the Gulag, and the Holocaust? They politicians, some of whom detest the current administration, went, saw, and got the real picture.
You should, too. Can't afford a trip to Cuba. Go here to get a fairly good picture of what's going on. It's interesting. Look around. Check out the Detainee Affairs link.
I had it a lot tougher in boot camp and subsequent training. Even if you insist that 50 percent of what you see are lies, you still won't be comfortable the next time a politician or a U.N. demagogue compares U.S. soldiers to death camp guards.
Don't think for a second that this constant comparison of the United States to Nazi Germany or the use of other absurd historical analogies isn't doing lasting damage or is something we can just roll-back once Bush is out of office.
You and I have a front row seat as we watch a nation commit suicide.
All this sensitivity to the needs of stone-cold killers may make Manhattenites feel
better about themselves, but their children and grandchildren will not thank them.

Kiyomi in England

KIYOMI RETURNED from a well-deserved bit of R & R in England and--eek--Belgium this week. She works these crazy 12-hour days and needed a break. She visited a former colleague from work and had a lot of fun. Played golf, but I am not allowed to divulge her score. They took a day-trip to Brussels, home of the wretched EU, but she's wisely not political and stuck to waffles and beer.
Meanwhile back on the home front, the Beast got fatter as I tried to bribe her to leave me alone and I lost weight. The Gitmo prisoners have gained an average of five to six pounds each. Maybe I should take a trip to Cuba.
True to form, Kiyomi is paying for her mini-vacation. She has to work all weekend. A promotion is long overdue.
On the other hand, I am still cranking out the pages at the paper and relatively content. I never read the NYT's portion of the paper, just the stuff we make and that's as it should be. I trust us. What I think of the faceless editors in Paris shall go unspoken, but if you have read anything on this blog, you should be able to guess.

Durbin apologizes

SENATOR DICK Durbin broke down in tears in the midst of his half-assed apology for betraying his country and all the men and women who have and are serving in uniform. Pathetic. No wonder bin Laden thinks we are a Paper Tiger, when our leaders cry on the Senate floor. It wasn't too many weeks ago that Voinovich started crying over the nomination of John Bolton, for Christ's sake. These sensitive wimps are true representatives of the "Worst Generation."

What happened to Tom Delay?

YO, DEMOCRAT hysterics, what happened to your jihad against House Majority leader Tom Delay? The AP was running multiple "get" Delay stories daily and then the assault comes to a screeching halt? Did you suddenly get some perspective on the issue? Naah, you hypocrites in the press gave up when dozens of members of your party were revealed to have engaged in even greater "unethical" behavior. Dropped that scandal that was "threatening the republic" pretty quickly. Kind of like the Halliburton scandal, and the National Guard scandal, etc.
    Now it's the Gitmo nonsense. Yesterday, even the Green Zone weenies were forced to report (by rewriting, as usual, the Armed Forces Press Service news release) the discovery of a real torture house in Iraq, with still-living victims. Kind of makes the Gitmo as Gulag reporting look pretty foolish. As did the comments by the Time magazine reporter Michael Duffy and author of their cover story on Gitmo when he compared the 9/11 hijackers to "children" we will never get to know.
    Actually I have no desire to get to know these now dead "children." Only an East Coast socialist being interviewed by another East Coast socialist would dare make such a "childish" statement.
    I am seriously wondering about the sanity of the antiBush brigade. Is their hatred for a passing administration so great that they would wish death and destruction on our own people and our allies? The answer is yes, and that's simply nuts. The Fourth Estate and the Fifth Column have merged into the Drooling Idiot Brigade.

The real deal

OK, THE previous post was fun, but hey, foolish socialists, there really is a problem out there that you are ignoring because you can't figure out a way (yet) to blame it on the United States/damage George Bush.
    Of course I am referring to the genocide taking place in the west of Sudan. As we speak, my hypocritical ones, Muslim militias, with the connivance of the Sudanese government, are ethnically cleansing the region.
    To date hundreds of thousands of black "infidels"--men, women and children--have been butchered. Ahh, but who cares when you can wail and weep about the lack of air conditioning for the 20th hijacker. Stop, don't open your mouths. I stopped listening to you years ago.

Durbin awarded Black Star

I AM always gratified to see our underappreciated public servants recognized for their contributions to our nation. This story from The MBNS restores my faith in politicians.
    WASHINGTON, June 17, 2005--A U.S. Senator was awarded the Black Star Medal for Betrayal today for remarks he made on the floor of the Senate recently.
    In a ceremony at the Pentagon, Secretary of the Army Dr. Francis J. Harvey, honored U.S. Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois with the the nation's second highest award for disloyalty. Harvey cited Durbin's unflagging efforts to destroy military morale in general and the morale of troops in Iraq specifically.
    "Senator Durbin's remarks on the floor of the Senate were in the highest traditions of previous Black Star awardees," Harvey said, adding that Durbin's comparison to U.S. military guards at Guantanamo Bay to Nazi death camp guards would be certain to put U.S. military service men and women in further danger around the world.
    Smiling broadly as the medal was pinned on his chest, Durbin said, "I would like to repeat that I have the greatest respect for our troops and I will be deeply disappointed it my remarks fail to lead to their deaths."
    The Black Star Medal citation read in part: "The recipient, at no risk to himself, displayed an ignorance rarely seen on the Senate floor. His comparison of the gas ovens and their overseers in Nazi Germany (about 6,000,000 dead), the Soviet slave labor camps (about 20,000,000 dead) and the killing fields of Cambodia (about 1.7 million dead) to Guantanamo (0 dead) did a disservice to his country that can only be admired."
     The citation continued, "Despite criticism, Senator Durbin refused to apologize for his blood libel of fellow Americans. The Army takes great pleasure in noting that the Senator's comments have been broadcast worldwide, on Al-Jazeera, and other anti-American media outlets, providing significant aid and comfort to the enemy. His continuing efforts to besmirch the name of soldiers, sailors and airmen deployed around the globe can only be considered above and beyond the call of duty."
    At the end of the ceremony, Durbin received a standing ovation from the assembled media, an almost unheard of honor from a group more prone to cynicism than praise.

Female trooper gets Silver Star

DEMOCRAT SENATORS maybe a pack of gutless cowards (Leahy, Durbin, Kennedy in particular) endangering the lives of U.S. service men and women everywhere, but there is at least a bit of gratifying news today. The Army has awarded Sgt. Leigh Ann Hester of the 617th Military Police Company the Silver Star for heroism. She's the first female so honored since WWII.
    During a fierce firefight Hester personally and permanently ended the human rights of at least three terrorists with her M-4 rifle. It is not known if she shot through their Korans in the process. Maybe Time magazine should be contacted. Regardless, she is credited with saving the lives of members of the convoy the Koranites were trying to kill.