NY Times Demands More Photos Of Dead U.S Serviceman In The Field
Okay … I’m gonna be LATE for my family picnic over at my daddy’s …
However, LBA sent this to me, and I just can’t let it go … So, instead of going to Dad’s and stewing over there until I jump back in my car and race back here to the computer … Here goes:
LBA’s Previous coverage of background story here
We are winning, and HAVE won, in Iraq.
It has NOT been quick and easy … And IF you listened with an open ear, you were TOLD it wouldn’t be either.
So, if you’re the American liber/leftist anti-Bush antiwar MSM what can YOU do to help bolster the enemy into fighting? Hmmmmmm …???
Take a guess?
Give `em trophies, of course. And no better showcase these days than the MSM to display those trophies and insight more enemy into the fight … NOT to mention try to manipulate a lazy-assed American public in a run-up to a presidential election in November.
So, this piece of shit over at the NYTimes is bemoaning the fact that the DOD and such are controling what is and isn’t permissible for print or broadcast in this war. Hey, just a reminder … THIS has ALWAYS been the practice … and the NYTimes should just STFU because in the last several years some of the bullshit they’ve pulled off concerning this war and the GWOT security measures in this country SHOULD have been tagged and dealt with as an ACT OF TREASON!
So, they want American troops in puddles of blood and dismemberment, and body bagging, and coffins arriving home to American soil under the US Flag?
Go the fuck down to the city morgue and have at a few homeless corpses to get off …
Stay the fuck away from our troops and their families in grief.
A newspaper, and a MSM that has done NOTHING to even acknowledge our successes of our troops in the war theater(s) has NO right to demand they be allowed to splash their blood across their pages or the TV screens.
You want dead bodies? How about digging out the horrific pictures from 9-11? Or the numerous beheadings since this all began?
Dirty fucking bastards.
——————————————————————————————
(NYTimes)
TWO hundred twenty-one American soldiers and Marines have been killed in Iraq this year, but until eight days ago, The Times had not published a photo of one of their bodies.
The picture The Times did publish on July 26, of a room full of death after a suicide bombing in June, with a marine in the foreground, his face covered and his uniform riddled with tiny shrapnel holes, accompanied a front-page article about how few such images there are.
The Times reported that the freelance photographer who took the picture, Zoriah Miller, was barred from covering the Marines after he posted it and other graphic pictures of dead Americans and Iraqis on his Web site. A second photo accompanying the article, of a dead Army captain in a pool of blood in 2004, got that photographer in trouble at the time, too.
The article by Michael Kamber, an independent photographer and journalist working in Iraq for The Times, and Tim Arango, who writes about the media, highlighted a longstanding tension between journalists who feel a duty to report war in all its aspects and a military determined to protect its own.
Although the written ground rules for reporters and photographers embedding with military units do not forbid photos of the dead and injured, commanders have used a variety of tactics to prevent them. That, combined with the declining number of Western photographers in Iraq — The Times has two — has meant fewer than half a dozen graphic photos of dead American soldiers in five years of fighting, Kamber and Arango reported.
Gail Buckland, an author and professor of photo history at Cooper Union in New York, said she tells students that because of the lack of a comprehensive photographic record of the war in Iraq, they are “more impoverished today than Americans were in the 19th century,” when battlefield photographs by Timothy O’Sullivan and others documented the Civil War. “The greatest dishonor you can do is to forget,” she told me. “Photographs are monuments.”
But before war photographs pass into history, they are news and records of events that are still raw for everyone involved — soldiers, families and journalists. The experiences of The Times in recent years with searing pictures of injury and, in one case, imminent death, suggest how emotional, complicated and unpredictable the issues can be.
In January 2007, Robert Nickelsberg, an independent photographer working for The Times, and Damien Cave, a Times correspondent, were embedded with an Army company helping an Iraqi unit search for weapons in a dangerous Baghdad neighborhood. Suddenly, there were shouts that a man was down: the sergeant whom Nickelsberg and Cave had been chatting with minutes before had been shot in the head. Nickelsberg said he and Cave helped evacuate Hector Leija of Raymondville, Tex., and Nickelsberg followed the stretcher downstairs to an armored vehicle, taking pictures the whole time. Leija died that morning.
The Times waited four days, until Leija’s family had been notified of his death, and then published a photograph of him on the stretcher, with another soldier’s hand covering the wound. The newspaper also posted a moving five-minute video, narrated by Cave, documenting the grief and frustration of Leija’s fellow soldiers and their determination not to leave until, at great peril, they had recovered all his equipment.
Michele McNally, the assistant managing editor in charge of photography, said The Times was trying to both tell the story and be sensitive. But friends said Leija’s family was upset by the coverage, and the Army reacted with outrage, although Nickelsberg said that no one in Leija’s squad tried to prevent him from taking the pictures and soldiers later thanked him and Cave for sticking with them through a tough day. After the photo and video were published, Cave said, the military told him and Nickelsberg that they — and The Times — would be banned from embedding with the military. After lengthy discussions, the ban was lifted.
Bill Keller, the executive editor, wrote a letter to the family expressing regret for their pain, although he said he does not regret publishing the photo and video. Cave said he sent a message of regret to the family through an intermediary and e-mail to Leija’s brother. The family did not respond to any of the communications. My efforts through intermediaries to talk with them were unsuccessful.
The Times reported that Lt. Gen. Raymond Odierno was furious and accused the newspaper of violating a ground rule requiring written permission from a wounded soldier before his picture can be published — often an impossibility with seriously injured people who are evacuated within minutes.
Joao Silva, an independent photographer working for The Times, said he did not ask for permission in late 2006 when he took a dramatic series of photographs of Juan Valdez-Castillo, a Marine lance corporal seriously wounded in Karma and heroically rescued by Sgt. Jesse Leach. A graphic shot of Valdez-Castillo lying bloody and bandaged by a muddy lane, with Leach tending to him, ran at the top of the front page. An audio slide show of the full sequence of pictures was posted on the Times Web site.
Far from objecting, the Marines asked for copies of the pictures to support a recommendation that Leach receive a medal. The newspaper provided them, and Leach got his medal. The difference, almost certainly, was life and death. Valdez-Castillo lived. Leija died.
Jim Looram, a retired West Point graduate and Vietnam veteran, feels strongly that images of dead soldiers should never be published during a war. “I cannot describe to you what it is like to see a dead American soldier,” he said. Civilians cannot understand what happens on a battlefield, Looram said, and it dishonors dead soldiers to try to convey through pictures what they went through.
His daughter, Meaghan, is the Times picture editor who handled the photographs that accompanied the article by Kamber and Arango. She loves her dad but disagrees with him on this. “Looking at photographs of the gravely wounded or dead is a profoundly affecting and emotional experience,” she said. “However, I do feel that it is my duty as a journalist to see that a truthful account of the consequences of war is given.”
Like Jim Looram, Tom Langseth is a retired Army lieutenant colonel. He wrote last year to thank The Times after a graphic photograph of his severely injured grandson appeared on the front page. The picture — and an audio slide show on the Times Web site — showed how hard everyone worked to save his grandson Tommy, Langseth told me last week. “It eased our minds a whole lot. We would be less without it than we are.”
I asked Langseth if he would have felt differently had his grandson not survived. “I don’t think I would,” he said. “But the first time I looked at it, it would have killed me.”
Painful as these issues are — C. J. Chivers, a Times reporter and former Marine officer who wrote about Valdez-Castillo, told me he is “pretty tortured” about them — I think The Times has an obligation to pursue stories and photographs that report the entire experience of war, including death.
Keller said, “Death and carnage are not the whole story of war — there is also heroism and frustration, success and setback, camaraderie and, on occasion, atrocity — but death and carnage are part of the story, and to launder them out of our account of the war would be a disservice.”
Have at them/him:
E-mail: public@nytimes.com
Phone: (212) 556-7652
Address: Public Editor
The New York Times
620 Eight Avenue.
New York, NY 10018
Be respectful of others and their opinions. Inflammatory remarks and inane leftist drivel will be deleted. It ain’t about free speech, remember you’re in a private domain. My website, my prerogative.
If you can't handle using your real email address, don't bother posting a comment.
Race to the bottom
August 3rd, 2008 at 9:59 amOn one hand I hate to censor the war. But, I’d hate even more for the MSM to take these photos and use them for their own liberal agenda. Because I can see this shit on the front page of every paper and the lead story of every news broadcast. Not that these people don’t deserve to be recognized, and not that we should hide the reality of war. However, we should
August 3rd, 2008 at 10:06 amHowever, we shouldn’t let these fucking media pukes use these photos for their anti-war agenda. All these will be used for is to attempt to weaken America’s resolve even further than they have. They don’t care about these dead troops, they care about their bleeding being a leading story. They care about showing how ‘evil’ the Bush administration is. And these photos are perfect for their leftist propaganda.
August 3rd, 2008 at 10:13 amPiss on them. Fuck the MSM. I think we’re all plenty aware of the realities of war. We don’t need dead bodies of our troops laid out all over the news like some indie slasher film.
Eat shit NY Times!
All of this shit is from the same ‘intellectual filter’ that says a Cross in a jar of urine is ‘art’.
August 3rd, 2008 at 10:20 amNOTHING but their own ‘opinion’ is sacred …not codes of behavior and certainly not codes of decency.
Fuck that AND the POS Sulzberger that runs the NYSlimes.
Regarding the ‘morality’ of Meaghan Looram displayed by her comments:
Looking at photographs of the gravely wounded or dead is a profoundly affecting and emotional experience,” she said. “However, I do feel that it is my duty as a journalist to see that a truthful account of the consequences of war is given.”
…..
Really? But what are the consequences of giving in to a murderous ideology?
What really are the consequences of war? Freedom for millions?
Your a simpering child who cannot see past your nose to a need or cause greater than your own greedy self.
Your duty as a journalist? Do not try to honor your biased work as ‘duty’. Your have shown that your ‘duty’ is to yourself, putting yourself above the wishes of the family and the nation that provides you freedom and security that is the envy of the world. Your behavior in saddam’s iraq would have resulted in your imprisonment and likely death.
Your a pornographer that wants to taunt the public with the emotional strain of seeing one of our own fallen on the field of battle. You do this for yourself above all other concerns.
I hope karma deals you a dark card.
August 3rd, 2008 at 10:25 amI wish I could finish my comment. But it keeps telling me I’m entering a duplicate.
August 3rd, 2008 at 10:36 amNY Times Demands More Photos Of Dead U.S Servicemen in the Field.
Oh really now? Well I would like to propose to the traitorous assholes at the N.Y. Times that I would love to see more dead N.Y. Times employees all the time.
N.Y. What a lovely place, with such a nice patriotic newspaper.
August 3rd, 2008 at 10:38 am
August 3rd, 2008 at 10:48 amThe salient point which the Times uncharacteristically failed to omit from the original story was the argument for publishing the photos of the wounded and the dead and the source of the angst over the paucity of such photos was from those who are self described as opponents of the war, civil liberties advocates and journalists (interesting combination that) because
“the public portrayal of the war is being sanitized and that Americans who choose to do so have the right to see — in whatever medium — the human cost of a war that polls consistently show is unpopular with Americans.”
If the Times and the rest of the miscreants under the rubric of those who are opponents of the war, civil liberties advocates and journalists want to publish photos which display the human cost of war, let them fill their pages with photos of dead Taliban, al Qaeda, Iranian provacateurs and their shia allies.
August 3rd, 2008 at 10:54 amFUCK YOU.COWARD.TRAITOR.FUCKING POS. GOD BLESS OUR TROOPS
August 3rd, 2008 at 10:54 amThe mutha fuckas…
August 3rd, 2008 at 11:00 amPinchie and Looram can’t see the dignity of our troops with their lips around Obama’s dick.
NYT: Burn Baby, Burn!
August 3rd, 2008 at 11:06 amWould this FUCK would cash in on dead pictures of his own family?
August 3rd, 2008 at 11:12 amI sent the editor the following email. I posted this earlier but for some reason it did not make the board. I am trying again.
To The Editor,
Where does you paper thirst to splash on the front pages the bodies of our fallen men and women who serve this country come from? What perversion is it you enjoy pasting their final moments in the paper? I have NOTHING but disdain for your paper and find it’s only usefulness in wiping my ass with it when I need to. How about if I find the graves of all your past journalist and piss on them in return for all you have done for those of us who have served. It’s as if your profession can no longer find a story worthy of printing unless it can find a body to splash on your headlines. No regards to the family, the military or to the country.
Can you explain why I and many other Americans have turned away from your paper and towards blogs to find the real news that should be gracing the headlines across the country. How about General Petreaus and the military turning our losses to victory? How about the Iraqi military standing on it’s own? Hey, did you report that Iraq now has 300,000 trained police? How about the Diayla offensive currently in progress in Iraq primarily by the Iraqi military who planned it? Did you report of the over 100 captured Al-Qaeda in that offensive?
Your disdain towards the military and the men and women who serves and have served proceeds you whereever you go. I hated you when I served and despise you even more so now that I am retired. Go fuck yourselves and I pray that the death of your paper is just over the horizon. I will never touch your paper again.
Sincerely,
Carter Cobb
August 3rd, 2008 at 11:48 amUSN Retired
That article is just plain disgusting. I need to puke after reading it.
August 3rd, 2008 at 12:02 pmHas anyone ever considered showing pictures of the dead bodies of the NY Times Editor Staff and Editorial Board and reporters? I’m sure they will post those. Right Mr Keller?
August 3rd, 2008 at 12:36 pmI want to see more pictures of the dead terrorists!! That is the only propaganda that should be floating around out their, that and dead NY Times employees hanging from trees for their treachery!!
August 3rd, 2008 at 12:49 pmNice letter. It likely won’t pass muster on their ‘blog’ though. Email it to the Ombudsman.
August 3rd, 2008 at 1:33 pmMy letter was similar except I included the hypocrisy of their not printing the cartoons that enraged the Mooselems so much.
Now the war looks like it is won the MSM is starting a “was it worth the cost” strategy. I have seen two different stories from different news services today with the same theme. Families being in contact with a son in Iraq via email with their loved ones thinking all is well, then receiving news of their son or husbands death or major injury only hours later. Followed by a in depth account of the greif and hardship shouldered by the family. (as if the MSM realy cared.)
In all these types of stories the casualty numbers are alway prominent.
Picures of dead bodies would certainly help drive this point home, but certainly won’t help the PTSD the MSM are so concerned about.
With all the reporters in war zone why is it we don’t see more pictures of our military acting heroic or humanely? We know these thing happen, there must be some pictures. Please let’s start seeing those photos on the front page or leading the news. I guess you would have to get out of the green zone to get those shots.
August 3rd, 2008 at 2:39 pmAbout time for another deep hole in the ground in NY.
August 3rd, 2008 at 4:01 pmIn Viet-Nam the enemy was the guy in the pajamas with the AK47,
August 3rd, 2008 at 8:01 pmin Iraq and Afghanistan the enemy is the guy with the camera and the NYT credentials.
I don’t believe I have anything else to add…
My first reaction is you sick mother fu**ers. My second is maybe just maybe it will make America wake up and become the NATION at war we should be and not just a military at war. But I love too many soldiers over there. I lost my son over there. I would not want to see his body pictures in the paper. Hell I get upset when the put his picture up without warning me first. It knocks the breath out of me and blindsides me every time. Do these people have no consideration or caring for the families of these men and women? Have they not sacrificed and gone through enough? It’s bad enough for us families to see our loved ones smiling faces used in their leftist freaking scoreboard. This is too much. At some point freedom of the press has to be tempered with simple respect. I never thought freedom of the press meant more than the press had the right to discuss, debate, disagree with and expose the government not a private party.
August 3rd, 2008 at 8:23 pmI’ll gut the Mother Fusser! And send you the pictures of his body lying in a puddle of piss
August 3rd, 2008 at 9:48 pmKnottie,
We know who we are and who they are. Their time will come.
God bless.
August 4th, 2008 at 4:06 am