Sunday, January 30, 2005

Can we Slow Down the Derailing Train?

With the Sunday news shows today we have an example of mass delusion. The righties really are trying to turn the elections in Iraq into a "See we told you so moment" aren't they? This really brings out the whole point of the Bush years, scream so loudly about fantasy early on that there is no room later when reality sets in.

Today Mrs. Bush -- Condi Rice -- is doing the sunday morning talk circuit with a vengeance trying to convince us that this is the point of the Iraqi war and not once mentioning or even hinting about the controversy of why we originally went to war in Iraq, WMDs. Of course there was no discussion on any of the news programs that the elections were a second, or third, or far further down the line of reasons for going into Iraq.

But it gets worse apparently on This Week with George S., both the Iraqi turnout estimates in the 70 percent and those from international observers of 50-55 percent were discussed. Peter Jennings urged caution over and over, stressing that it was still way too early to assume anything. We here can only agree with him and encourage news outlets to hold off on making predictions until more verifiable information is released.

And we should view with skepticism information and estimates that come from those who have the most to gain from a successful election. What do impartial observers tell us?

Fox "news" is naturally pushing (and even CNN are pumping out) the low 70s figure like its a FACT... rather than waiting for reality to set in... Who has a dog in the fight and thus who is more credible?

No comments: