For some mysterious reason, NBC Nightly News anchor Brian Williams augmented his tour of Afghanistan with an interview with The Huffington Post, where most bloggers think of the American presence as comparable to cancer, or maggots. One spot in his interview with Danny Shea suggested that the Americans weren't so welcome in Afghanistan:
SHEA: There's all this talk of making the cities more secure. Is there any sense that the people in the cities want the foreign troops there?
WILLIAMS: Whereas some of the locals in Iraq (depending on the circumstances) will often be comforted to see U.S. dismounted infantry patrols, (in ways they were not until fairly recently) and will ask them for help and to stay with them, the situation here in Afghanistan is different. The two societies are vastly different.
It is not helped by the fact that U.S. forces often take a very aggressive posture -- arriving in small towns in massive armored vehicles with machine gun turrets, each infantryman with his hands on his M-4 rifle in front of him...and often on the trigger with the safety off.
Of course there's a reason for this: they get shot at and killed, and they are soldiers in an unforgiving place -- surrounded by an enemy they often can't see. So it's a Catch-22 of sorts. It made big news here when Gen. McChrystal started the practice of removing his body armor while on walkabouts, or when meeting with local leaders. By his reasoning, the locals aren't wearing such armor. It should also be pointed out that he gets around in a massive, armored SUV with security vehicles in tow, dismounted infantry flanking him and able to unleash fearsome amounts of suppressing fire, and air support overhead whenever he is out and about.
But this part didn’t translate well. Why would "good" be in quotes, or in air quotes?
Even when U.S. troops are handing out something "good" -- food supplies, medicine, school supplies for the Afghan children, its not as if local villagers tending to their goats on a Thursday afternoon sit around thinking, "If only a dismounted platoon of heavily-armed American soldiers would come visit us today, preferably accompanied by an armored mechanized column..."
—Tim Graham is Director of Media Analysis at the Media Research Center.
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"good"
October 31, 2009 - 09:49 ET by absalom_daakThe reason good is in quotes is to make the point to the reader that even though it sounds good it really isn't -- although I'm pretty sure you were just asking it as a rhetorical question. It is basically a form of mild sarcasm. This is the art of "neutral" reporting, both sides do it, though in this case it seems a bit heavy handed.
"Vice is a monster of so frightful mien,
As, to be hated, needs but to be seen;
Yet seen too oft, familiar with her face,
We first endure, then pity, then embrace."
-- Alexander Pope (An Essay on Man: Epistle II; 217-220)
I guess Williams got the
October 31, 2009 - 10:41 ET by Radical1979I guess Williams got the memo from Obama to put a negative spin on Afganistan. He'll be on the "nice" list this Christmas.
Does Williams need a memo?
October 31, 2009 - 11:37 ET by ThisnThatDoes Williams need a memo? Williams learned how to put a hate spin on anything American when he interned for the Carter administration.
__________
"mmm, mmm, mm. Barrack-Hussain-Øbama↓." - The liberals coolaid drinking song
Well back during the
October 31, 2009 - 11:41 ET by Radical1979Well back during the campaign this was the war to win. Now apparantly, it isn't. The media needs to be informed as to which way the wind blows.
I get it.
October 31, 2009 - 10:59 ET by Willis_Leon_JohnsonA "HATE AMERICA FIRST" talking headfor the media is 'interviewed' by a "HATE AMERICA FIRST" website(?), and the main thrust of the 'interview' by a nutjob that works for a 'website' tries to pass on their strongly held belief that everybody HATES AMERICA as much as these two fools?
Point A. The puffington poast IS NOT a credible source of anything of value in the world.
Point B. Brian Williams has as much credibility as a 'journalist' as a sun-blackened rock in the Mojave Desert.
At least the rock keeps its mouth shut and pays attention to the world around it.
http://gjresult.com
Riiiight!
October 31, 2009 - 11:25 ET by iveseenitallEVERYONE hates The Ugly American --- including Obama, Williams, Ayers, Wright, Jones, Dunn, Jackson, Sharpton, Mahar, Moore, Penn, Glover, the czars, Castro, Putin, the N.Y. Times , the Iraqies, the Afhgans, the U.N., the European Union, the black caucus ---on and on it goes. Yet it is America which holds all of these clowns on its shoulders. But watch out, soon Atlas may shrug and all the shits will be on their own.
NEVER,NEVER trust a "liberal"
retspook Yest Brian that
October 31, 2009 - 12:33 ET by retspookretspook
Yest Brian that is the way troops are trained in combat. Safeties off, finger on the trigger and ready to respond. However, after more than two years in Afghanistan and much more time working on the Afghan project, there is some truth the fact that Afghans do not like foreigners and especially foreign troops on their home turf. They did however like us in our civilian clothes but maybe that was because of the big sums of money we were paying out
Entering villages
October 31, 2009 - 18:57 ET by Patrick MichaelAdmittedly the left would prefer if our military entered Afganistan towns and villages with our hands up apologizing at the top of our lungs. Thankfully our military sees things differently. Stay Free!!!
Th
November 1, 2009 - 08:52 ET by jessieHThis is why we need to bailout the newspapers? So this idiot can bad mouth American soldiers? As far as I'm concerned, they can rot in their obama coverage. Let the mesia that is obama organize the Iraqi people. Acording to the media, he's bullet proof.