"Did you know that 47 countries have re-established their embassies in Iraq?" the anonymous polemic asks, in part. "Did you know that 3,100 schools have been renovated?"
"Of course we didn't know!" the message concludes. "Our media doesn't tell us!"
Ms. Goudreau's newspaper, like most dailies in America, relies largely on The Associated Press for its coverage of the Iraq war. So she finally forwarded the e-mail message to Mike Silverman, managing editor of The A.P., asking if there was a way to check these assertions and to put them into context. Like many other journalists, Mr. Silverman had also received a copy of the message.
How simple is it to peruse U.S. military websites such as Defend America to check up on construction updates and the likes? And make a few phones calls or even visit commanders nearby? All one has to do is look up the Iraq Weekly Progress Report on the internet reported by the Defend America military website. The IWPR has been reporting these reconstruction news and other good news for more than 16 months!
The bottom-line question was, people wanted to know if we're making progress in Iraq," Ms. Goudreau said, and the A.P. articles were not helping to answer that question.
"It was uncomfortable questioning The A.P., knowing that Iraq is such a dangerous place," she said. "But there's a perception that we're not telling the whole story."
Mr. Silverman said in an interview that he was aware of that perception. "Other editors said they get calls from readers who are hearing stories from returning troops of the good things they have accomplished while there, and readers find that at odds with the generally gloomy portrayal in the papers of what's going on in Iraq," he said.
Mr. Silverman said the editors were asking for help in making sense of the situation. "I was glad to have that discussion with the editors because they have to deal with the perception that the media is emphasizing the negative," he said.
"We're there to report the good and the bad and we try to give due weight to everything going on," he said. "It is unfortunate that the explosions and shootings and fatalities and injuries on some days seem to dominate the news."
Suki Dardarian, deputy managing editor of The Seattle Times and vice president of the board of the Associated Press Managing Editors, said that the discussion was "a pretty healthy one."
"One of the things the editors felt was that as much context as you can bring, the better," Ms.
Dardarian said. "They wanted them to get beyond the breaking news to 'What does this mean?' "
"What does that mean?" ?? Are they actually that clueless? Newsweek got it about President Bush that he is really human. For the AP reporters they make these phone calls to determine how many were killed or injured in blasts or firefights as a part of their confirmation process from their hotel rooms. What makes them think they can't get other information besides deaths and injuries??
Mr. Silverman said the wire service was covering Iraq "as accurately as we can" while "also trying to keep our people out of harm's way."
"The main obstacle we face," he said, "is the severe limitation on our movement and our ability to get out and report. It's very confining for our staff to go into Baghdad and have to spend most of their time on the fifth floor of the Palestine Hotel," which is home to most of the press corps. The hotel was struck by a tank shell in 2003, killing two journalists.
Ok. Ever considered using the phones, Instant Messaging for real time chat interviews, check the internet or even do email interviews with U.S. commanders on what's happening out there, construction-wise? How hard is that when bloggers are getting most of the alternate news out to the people? But then the famous CYA response comes from the AP:
By the end, she said, editors were acknowledging that even in their own hometowns, "we're more likely to focus on people who are killed than on the positive news out of a school."
More likely they just want to keep doing what they've always been doing considering the history of the AP and an agenda to report only bad news and their dislike for President Bush' administration. The AP continues to report the deaths and bombings with the gloom and doom scenarios they portray in Iraq.
UPDATE: Michelle Malkins makes a note about the AP's excuse on reporting the war, albeit one day late to mine. But has lots of links to others who reported about the weak-kneed AP's excuse.
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