During the Bush administration, journalists and liberal politicians were up in arms against a Defense Department policy that forbade the photographing of caskets coming back from Iraq and Afghanistan. Now that we have a Democrat as a commander in chief, however, the caskets are old news, and are getting little to no coverage.
Critics of the Bush Administration's policy of refusing to allow the photographing of caskets returning from the battlefield claimed that the Pentagon was attempting to hide the true cost of war from the American public to maintain support for the war efforts.
A lawsuit in April 2005 forced the release of hundreds of such photos. University of Delaware professor Ralph Begleiter, who brought the suit against the administration, citing the Freedom of Information Act, said of his victory that it was "an important victory for the American people, for the families of troops killed in the line of duty during wartime and for the honor of those who have made the ultimate sacrifice for their country."
He added that the decision would "make it difficult, if not impossible, for any U.S. government in the future to hide the human cost of war from the American people."
As Byron York notes in today's Washington Examiner,
In April of this year, the Obama administration lifted the press ban, which had been in place since the Persian Gulf War in 1991. Media outlets rushed to cover the first arrival of a fallen U.S. serviceman, and many photographers came back for the second arrival, and then the third.
But after that, the impassioned advocates of showing the true human cost of war grew tired of the story. Fewer and fewer photographers showed up. "It's really fallen off," says Lt. Joe Winter, spokesman for the Air Force Mortuary Affairs Operations Center at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware, where all war dead are received. "The flurry of interest has subsided."
On Sept. 2, when the casket bearing the body of Marine Lance Cpl. David Hall, of Elyria, Ohio, arrived at Dover, there was just one news outlet -- the Associated Press -- there to record it. The situation was pretty much the same when caskets arrived on Sept. 5, 9, 10, 12, 13, 14, 16, 22, 23 and 26. There has been no television coverage at all in September.
The journalists that rushed to show the country what two wars really can cost, and the pols that ceaselessly defended them, are silent now the country has an agreeable (liberal) president. That Obama allows the photographing of caskets seems to have taken all of the spice out of it. Coverage at Dover Air Force Base was seemingly more about Bush's policy of forbidding coverage of the return of fallen warriors than it was about the warriors themselves, as so many claimed.
York again:
So far this month, 38 American troops have been killed in Afghanistan. For all of 2009, the number is 220 -- more than any other single year and more than died in 2001, 2002, 2003, and 2004 combined.With casualties mounting, the debate over U.S. policy in Afghanistan is sharp and heated. The number of arrivals at Dover is increasing. But the journalists who once clamored to show the true human cost of war are nowhere to be found.
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But the journalists who
September 29, 2009 - 08:06 ET by NewsbusterbrownBut the journalists who once clamored to show the true human cost of war are nowhere to be found.
They're not journalists. They're propagandists.
“There are no easy answers' but there are simple answers. We must have the courage to do what we know is morally right.” - Ronald Reagan (1964 Republican Convention)
Their reasoning can be
September 29, 2009 - 12:07 ET by motherbeltTheir reasoning can be summed up in borrowing from Ron Silver:
Oh, right... those are OUR caskets now!!
They don't want LBJ again
September 29, 2009 - 08:07 ET by legacyrepublicanThe media is so in the tank for O, they don't want a repeat of what happened to LBJ with the Living Room war causing him not to run for a second full term.
They remember what the Liberal media did to their own.
Too Many Failures to Ignore
September 29, 2009 - 08:09 ET by MAS1916Even the media is going to have a difficult time covering up for the Obama failings this Autumn. From Iran to Health Care, Obama's agenda items all seem headed for a collision with failure within the next several short weeks. ( http://www.conservat... )
By no longer covering the casket story, the media is blatantly showing that it no longer has to cut a Republican President down to size. However, Obama is going to be cutting himself down to size when health care, Iran, Poll numbers and 2009 Governors Races all go against him at about the same time.
The media may reignite the casket story then to take pressure off the President then.
"This Week"
September 29, 2009 - 08:21 ET by Red JeepI wonder if ABC's "This Week with George Stephanopoulos" producers regret now their "In Memorium" segment where they list names of the military service personnel killed each week. I suspect this was started to show the cost of the war in Iraq because they were against it.
Now they are stuck with running the segment or look like hypocrites.
During the the Bush
September 29, 2009 - 08:32 ET by BDDuring the the Bush Administration CNN made it a policy to show a US casualties photograph, name, and hometown as they went to commercial breaks. The goal being to show a recent casualty.
But an unusual trend started during the final months of the Bush Administration - CNN began running out of "fresh" casualties and began "Recycling them." Casualties from months previous began to resurface in the mix as the casualty rates in both Iraq and Afghanistan began to fall precipitously post surge.
I have not seen this same coverage since the new administration was inaugurated. Has anybody else seen this?
I doubt the producers of "This Week" regret
September 29, 2009 - 08:38 ET by JerI doubt the producers of "This Week" regret it at all. It's a very tasteful, very respectful and quite appropriate segment.
Jer
Agreed...
September 29, 2009 - 10:07 ET by Corny_McPooIt is a truly fitting notice of the sacrifices that our REAL heroes were willing to make for freedom. Regardless of their initial motives, I hope "This Week" continues this segment.
Signed, Corny McPoo
Do Something Amazing!
I have noticed
September 29, 2009 - 08:23 ET by BDI have noticed very interesting trends in the past year since Obama took office.
Haleluah we are saved we are
September 29, 2009 - 23:17 ET by Dan The Man 2Haleluah we are saved we are saved. It proves that the annointed one is changing the minds of the people and his speeches have healing powers.
Yeah, but if the press were
September 30, 2009 - 07:57 ET by BDYeah, but if the press were honest they would approach the leaders of the protests held at our main gate for the past six years and ask them the obvious question.
I am assuming after all that the press can FIND these protestors since they profiled them in their articles. But perhaps that would require effort?
I am with Bush
September 29, 2009 - 08:28 ET by beauxdogThere is no need for the media to cover returning war dead to demonstrate the human cost of war. All politics aside, they are violating a grieving family's privacy by plastering their dead child all over the place.
The media has many tools to demonstrate their opinion about war and the human cost. They don't need this one.
For example, they can give lots of coverage to Cindy Sheehan who lost her son in Iraq... the son she abandoned as a child... the son she had nothing to do with until he was killed and became a convenient tool to bash Bush.
Funny... poor Cindy is still out there protesting... but she doesn't seem to get any coverage now that the One is in office.
Thank you.
Beauxdog
Cindy Sheehan
as an old US ARMY VET-
September 29, 2009 - 08:30 ET by JIMMY1660i understand only one thing that comes from the left-keep the military out of sight-behind glass-break glass only in emergency-keep them from voting.
GWB made many mistakes-our new POTUS-is weak and the world knows it.GWB made it very clear- we shall come hard and strong militarily if provoked. BHO is a young naive boy.
BHO- THE PROGRESSIVE PIRATE
media
September 29, 2009 - 08:31 ET by cajun2The conflict of media coverage has nothing to do with agenda nor ideology. The liberal media are trained seals with the attention span of gnats. The results are then interpreted by sundry others.
Cindy Sheehan can't even
September 29, 2009 - 08:57 ET by nicksmith112Cindy Sheehan can't even get a spot on the news anymore.
Remember when the "Patriot Act" was heinous??
What if the 9/11 coastguard drill happened during the Bush years?? The media would have gone wild.... evil Bush using fear.
I'm a refugee from the Democratic Party.
Remember when . . .
September 29, 2009 - 09:07 ET by GalvanicMaureen Dowd told us that no one could disagree with Sheehan because, as the grieving mother of a soldier KIA, she had "absolute moral authority?"
It only took the election of our Dear Leader for the MSM to throw Sheehan under the bus. Sheehan proved to be what Lenin (or was it Stalin) defined as a "useful idiot" of the Left.
York has made an astute observation . . .
September 29, 2009 - 09:03 ET by GalvanicJust like the MSM (like NBC's Charlie Gibson) now dismiss the once-glorified anti-war activitst Cindy Sheehan as a loon for protesting Obama's failing to terminate the wars as he had promised, their insincerity shines through once again.
It was never about honoring our fallen warriors; it was always about using them as another stick with which to stick Bush/Cheney in the eye.
These Dead should be Honored
September 29, 2009 - 09:10 ET by Airforce_5_OYet the President allowed the desecration of their death by making it political. Now that the reality has set in as to what really needs to be done in Afghanistan sets in the President finds himself having to fulfill a campaign promise to “Win the right war” or pull out and break another promise he made.
The media no longer sees the death of soldiers in the “right war” as news worthy because it doesn’t hurt the “evil warmongers”. It is not news worthy because no one is “shocked”.
"Hoo Humm, our Presidents in Office, nothing to see over here!"
Liberalism: The haunting feeling that someone, somewhere, can help themselves.
Of Course...
September 29, 2009 - 09:47 ET by TenebrousI really wonder why anyone ever thought that the left had a drop of patriotism in their bodies. These are the same people who invested heavily in the "America is evil" campaign meme during Bush's years, because back then whatever was bad for the country was good for the left. It was a cynical and nose-cutting maneuver, but it's one that they created and stuck with. Sheehan, Code Pink, and the rest were just useful idiots, exploited by the left to harass Bush.
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Random-jumbled-thoughts.blogspot.com
The media were never
September 29, 2009 - 09:50 ET by celatorThe media were never interested in the coffins or the men and women in them. They were using the issue as a tool to hammer President Bush.
No citizen's right to life, liberty, pursuit of happiness, or property is safe as long as Obama is President of the United States.
Besides using the coffins as nothing more as a means of...
September 29, 2009 - 10:11 ET by Prester John...bludgeoning W, the fact is of course that the MSM and Left does not only not understand the military, they don't want to understand the military, and couldn't even if they wanted to.
To them enlisted military are nothing more than a bunch of redneck white trash from the sticks or poor ignorant blacks and hispanics with no other option, and the officer are nothing more than a bunch of wannabe SS officers and sadists.
They don't give a rat's a$$ about any of them.
Prester you are
September 30, 2009 - 08:00 ET by BDPrester you are correct.
The american left believes that the average enlisted person in the services is part of the dregs of society possible only to employ in the that peculiar social program that is the US Military.
ANd Officers? We are just psychotics to them on peculiar power trips who like fancy clothing.
And not only do they not care about us, they actually dispise us.
What is the human cost of appeasement?
September 29, 2009 - 10:18 ET by JWFany U.S. government in the future to hide the human cost of war from the American people.
We never saw the people that jumped from the twin towers. What is the cost of ignoring growing threats.
Are we going to have pictures when an Iranian nuke goes off in some city?
Where are the pictures of the guy that tried to kill a Saudi official with a bomb planted in his rectum?
things that disappeared after inauguration
September 29, 2009 - 11:19 ET by candance-The war in Iraq.
-Patriotic dissent.
-The evils of lobbying.
-Cronyism.
-The concept of a flip flop.
-Soldiers who protest war.
-Soccer moms who protest anything.
-Afghanistan.
-The "ignored threats" of North Korea and Iran.
-Deficits being a bad thing.
-Publicizing Al Qaeda arrests to scare the public.
-Intrusive government.
-Using religion to sell politics.
-Ignoring the will of the people.
-The beltway being out of touch.
-Congress' role as watchdog.
Liberal Ghouls
September 29, 2009 - 12:41 ET by Captain KirockIf you believed the liberal ghouls who wanted to parade these photos in front of the American public 4 or 5 yearss ago, GWB's policy was not just a violation of the First Amendment, but a threat to the very fabric of the Republic itself. Yet somehow, we survived and now that the photos are available, they have no interest in them because they have no propaganda value.
Apparently dead Americans
September 29, 2009 - 18:04 ET by RR GOPApparently dead Americans under Bush is somehow different than dead Americans under Obama.
One of the 34% who thinks George W. Bush was a great President. One of the 86% who wants to bring back the stock and pillory.
And the worst dead Americans
September 30, 2009 - 08:03 ET by BDAnd the worst dead Americans are those killed in the waning months of what the left feels is a lost cause. Everything to the left is a lost cause unless it is diplomacy....... Talk about a REAL lost cause.