Tuesday, May 24, 2011

Libya and Iraq - A Lesson in Mainstream Media Hypocrisy

Nato is stepping up its involvement in Libya. "To what end?", one might ask. What is the goal in Libya? Are we nation building? Are we looking for weapons of mass destruction? (Qaddafi got rid of those after we captured Saddam Hussein) Are we protecting our national security? Are we protecting our oil supply? Are we engaging in regime change? What's the purpose? Has any of this been defined, spelled out, argued in favor of? What defines victory? How many civilians are being killed? What about Congressional approval? What about UN approval?

Have we heard anything from Cindy Sheehan? What about Code Pink? Anything on the nightly news about the horrors of bombing civilians or of not getting involved in the internal affairs of a country? Is there anyone on the left opposing the war in Libya? I did find two: First, Dennis Kucinich, Congressman from Ohio. Remember him? Remember that he was opposed to the invasion of Iraq? Remember we heard quite a bit about him during the Iraq war - he was on the nightly news quite a bit - Sunday news shows and such. I bet you didn't know that he is opposed to the Libyan invasion. I bet you didn't know that he is saying President Obama has violated the UN Resolution and the US Constitution and that it might be an impeachable offense. I also found that Cindy Sheehan is opposed to the Libyan invasion. Remember her camping out at Bush's Texas ranch? We saw quite a bit about her in the news back during the Iraq war - not so much now.

What a contrast!

Bush gave Saddam Hussein two years of warning - telling him that he had to abide by the UN resolutions that he had been violating for more than ten years. When Saddam refused, Bush obtained Congressional approval and approval from the UN before a coalition of forces led by the U.S. invaded Iraq. He also set forth the purpose of invasion in a statement to Americans. He had a goal to remove the threat and to give the government of Iraq back to its people. He had clear military objective.

Nevertheless, Bush faced daily negative news stories about the war. People like Dennis Kucinich and Cindy Sheehan appeared on all of the news stations and on the Sunday news shows. Bush faced daily protests. He was hung in effigy. He was accused of being Hitler. His life was threatened. When searching for Denis Kucinich and Libya I found that some political blogs brought up his opposition back in March, but the only television news organization that has reported this recently is Fox News.

What's the difference? Obama is a Democrat and Bush is a Republican. Obama can get away with an itchy trigger finger and not clearly defining goals or purpose when invading another country. Bush can spend two years making a case for an invasion of Iraq and get all the requisite approvals and still be ripped to shreds by the media and the progressives.

Will we hear similar opposition on our nightly news about Obama? No, we will not. The mainstream media does not want to undermine President Obama during the upcoming election. They may want you to think they are objective, but comparing their coverage of Bush and Obama show their bias. That is why Americans need to look at all different sources for their news - not just ABC, NBC, CBS, AP. Get a well rounded version of events from other organizations and sources and then decide.

Next blog: Libya and Iraq - A Lesson in Obama's Hypocrisy

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