It's the media's fault!

Some conservatives are sinking back into the dark pits of paranoid fantasy.

Make no mistake. Along with the multitude of Republican gaffes, and the hard work of the Democrats, there can be no doubt that the left-of-center mainstream media helped to manufacture this election victory for the Democratic Party. For parts of the last two years, many in the media have worked in concert with the Democratic spin doctors to indoctrinate the American voter into believing this election had to be a referendum on President Bush and the "failed" war in Iraq.

Horrified by Mr. Bush's re-election in 2004, as well as the historic Republican gains in the House and the Senate that year, some liberals in the media were determined to do everything in their power to ensure that there was no GOP celebration in 2006, even if that meant confirming to the world that they proudly abandon professionalism and ethics in the name of partisanship and ideology.

To make the election of 2006 a referendum on Mr. Bush and "his" war, the media knew full well they had to present that conflict in the worst possible light for as long as possible on their nightly newscasts, cable programs and front pages. Then, after force-feeding the American people a steady diet of this carnage for weeks at a time, the same media outlets would then "poll" the voters to get their impressions of Iraq and Mr. Bush.

This trope is getting old.

Is the bias of Western journalists the reason Iraqi men are tattooing their names on their bodies so that loved ones can identify them when they die?

Is the bias of Western journalists the reason that 1.8 million Iraqis have fled the country and another 1.6 million are internal refugees -- more than 12 percent of the entire Iraqi population?

Is the bias of Western journalists the reason sectarian violence is killing dozens and sometimes hundreds of Iraqis a day?

Is the bias of Western journalists the reason more of them have died in the three years of fighting in Iraq than died in the entire 20 years of the Vietnam war?

I could go on. The situation in Iraq is bad enough that the media didn't have to lie about it, even if they were inclined to.

politics, midtopia