This appears in Crikey’s Pure Poison blog today: Following is an extract from “Media War Junkies Unite”, an essay by Antony Loewenstein from… Left Turn: Political essays for the new Left… which is edited by Loewenstein and Jeff Sparrow, and which was released last week. *** The decade since 11 September 2001 has seen a litany of…
Showing all posts tagged Afghanistan
Memo to media; American killing of “militants” is often not the truth
Salon’s Glenn Greenwald: Earlier this week,… The New York Times… reported… that the Obama administration, in order to conceal civilian deaths caused by their drone attacks, “counts all military-age males in a strike zone as combatants.”… Although I wrote at length about the… NYT”˜s various revelations,… I… wrote separately… about that specific disclosure, in order to emphasize the implications for media outlets reporting…
Who believes that NATO won’t continue terrorising Afghanistan for years to come?
Despite much of the media coverage recently that suggested America and its Western allies would largely leave by the end of 2014, Thomas Ruttig from The Afghanistan Analysts Network – I spent time with this valuable NGO while in Kabul in April – offers the reality: When President Barack Obama stated at last weekend’s NATO…
Talking about war without celebrating war
It’s a tough call on mainstream, corporate TV. And so rare. This segment, Up With Chris Hayes on MSNBC, is an interesting attempt. Even talking about the immorality of US-led wars is a concept almost absent from so-called polite debate: Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy
What real war coverage should look like
This is remarkable. Returned US army vets giving back their medals of honour near this week’s NATO conference in Chicago. Powerful, poignant and the kind of voices almost never heard in the mainstream media. Much easier and safer to interview generals (hello ABC TV’s 7.30 last night) about a war in Afghanistan that they’ve ruined…
This is how Australian media reports Afghanistan
A feature in last week’s Murdoch Australian by Brendan Nicholson is typical of the kind of coverage about the war-torn nation. It reflects a reality of a reporter who has spent a lot of time with the military and little time with local Afghans. Note the main, patronising message; the West simply has to stay…
Destroying Afghanistan as we reach the door
Paul McGeough, Sydney Sun Herald: You will not hear the words ”mission accomplished” but that will be the sense of the spin. Never mind that Afghanistan will be more dangerously poised for self-destruction than it was in the aftermath of the retreat by Soviet occupation forces in 1989. The West walked away from Afghanistan then.…
Assange talks Caged Prisoners, Islam, terrorism and resistance
This week’s episode of … The World Tomorrow – here’s past episodes of this essential program – features former Gitmo prisoner… Moazzam Begg and Asim Qureshi, former corporate lawyer, whose human rights organization Cageprisoners Ltd raises awareness of the plight of prisoners who remain in Guantanamo Bay. They discuss the “war on terror”, Obama and Bush, Islam…
Don’t worry, vulture capitalists will make money in Afghanistan for years to come
Long after most Western forces have left, private security firms will still be there turning a profit (via EU Observer): The EU’s external action service (EEAS) plans to spend up to €50 million on private security guards for its Afghanistan mission over the next four years. The EEAS unveiled the tender on Thursday (10 May),…
New Zealand radio interview about Wikileaks
I was interviewed last week by the independent program Earthwise. We discussed the importance of Wikileaks and its challenge to the mainstream media: