Control of the Media

LA WEEKLY reminds us how tough it is for the public to obtain unbiased information during times of government-controlled lockdown of the media. Sample:

"Naturally, the vast, wired American landscape does boast some prominent dissenting voices, including Harper's, Salon, The American Conservative and the eloquent Grammy-night philosopher Fred Durst. But given that the vast majority of the world's people oppose the war, it's startling how few of their voices have a regular platform in major outlets, especially television, where Hardball's suddenly watchable Chris Matthews is the only talk-show host who consistently asks aggressive questions about invading Iraq. Traditional liberal redoubts such as the Washington Post and The New Republic have been riding gleeful shotgun for the joy ride to Baghdad — though TNR's editor is now getting cold feet. And even the supposedly leftish New York Times ran George Packer's seminal article on "liberal hawks," which began by scoffing at peace marchers for being dopes and ended with an Iraqi émigré silencing a peacenik with pleas for his country's liberation.

The other night, CNN's agonized liberal Aaron Brown grew defensive over claims that the network had been ignoring the peace movement. "For a variety of reasons, it seems to us, the anti-war movement has been slow to organize and slow to build. It hardly existed in the U.S. Congress." While this is certainly true of our spineless Democrats (Robert Byrd's jeremiads notwithstanding), it's flat-out wrong about popular resistance to the war, which is years ahead of the Vietnam timetable. Despite September 11, millions of ordinary Americans are shocked and awed by the president's brazenness in passing Saddam off as worthy of a war."