dangerous liberty

Katrina: What the Media Missed by Lou Dolinar at RCP.

Lou reports on the heroic actions of the National Guard during Katrina, noting the lack of media attention to this incrediblly under-reported story:

Do you remember the dramatic TV footage of National Guard helicopters landing at the Superdome as soon as Katrina passed, dropping off tens of thousands saved from certain death? The corpsmen running with stretchers, in an echo of M*A*S*H, carrying the survivors to ambulances and the medical center? About how the operation, which also included the Coast Guard, regular military units, and local first responders, continued for more than a week?

Me neither. Except that it did happen, and got at best an occasional, parenthetical mention in the national media. The National Guard had its headquarters for Katrina, not just a few peacekeeping troops, in what the media portrayed as the pit of Hell. Hell was one of the safest places to be in New Orleans, smelly as it was. The situation was always under control, not surprisingly because the people in control were always there.

From the Dome, the Louisiana Guard’s main command ran at least 2,500 troops who rode out the storm inside the city, a dozen emergency shelters, 200-plus boats, dozens of high-water vehicles, 150 helicopters, and a triage and medical center that handled up to 5,000 patients (and delivered 7 babies). The Guard command headquarters also coordinated efforts of the police, firefighters and scores of volunteers after the storm knocked out local radio, as well as other regular military and other state Guard units.

As I recall, the predominant images from the Superdome were not of arriving helicopters, but of complaining survivors…

Dolinar’s post is lengthy and will make you proud to be American, because the US Military has perhaps the most intelligent logistical operations. Ever.

Got this link from Instapundit: Captain’s Quarters, as usual, has the best skinny on the situation in Iraq. Recently captured Al Q documents show a bleak picture for Islamist Jihad in Baghdad.

Centcom has a great page “What Extremists Say“, which has regularly updated video and translated documents.

UPDATE: It does concern me that our military is using MS IIS servers for their webpages. I’m surprised it isn’t hacked regularly and can’t stand seeing %20 in the URLs! But I’m picky that way.

Powerline discusses misreporting a recent hearing in the New York Times in The verdict, take 2. The entire hearing can be viewed here. The particular clip they deal with in their post is here.

After hearing the testimony, I think Powerline has it right. All the judges agreed the president has inherent authority which sometimes trumps statutes. Most seemed to agree presidents would be remiss to cede authority, which is the reason for presidential signing statements.

Iraq the Model’s Omar points to this story (scroll to bottom of pg.6) in Centcom’s The Advisor weekly, billed as the “Official Weekly Command Information Report for the Multi-National Security Transition Command - Iraq”

Obviously, this weekly is the product of DOD Public Affairs officers, so expect it to be on the positive message the DOD wants told. However, it isn’t as if the Iraq ‘news’ product being delivered by MSM outlets is not the negative message editors and producers want told!

Regardless, it gives me hope for the people of Iraq.

An excerpt:

The students are continually struggling to understand a new language and different ways of doing things while simultaneously fighting for their lives and worrying about keeping their identities secret to protect themselves and their families from harm by insurgents.

But for them, they say it is worth it because they no longer fight for just one man — they fight for their country.

For Iraqi Capt. S., who was also an officer during the previous regime, that shift in mentality is priceless.

“I recently went to visit an Iraqi soldier in the hospital,” he said. “He had lost both his legs, and we went there to comfort him. When we were leaving, we told him, ‘May God be with you.’ He called back out to me, ‘For Iraq, I would give up my whole life, not just my legs.’”

Most of the Iraqi airmen have businesses or farms and are relatively well off already. But when the opportunity came to return to the service they love, regardless of the risk, they jumped on it.

Since Jan. 14, when the squadron was officially formed, the airmen have been sneaking in the shadows and many have hid their allegiance to the Iraqi Air Force to family and friends, some even to their own wives.

Captain S’s wife, concerned for her family’s safety, continually pleads with him to quit and has also asked his father to pressure him. But the captain, whose own son does not know he is currently serving, said, “If I don’t do it, who will?

“I dream that Iraq will someday be safe,” he said. “We will be at peace, and at peace with our neighbors. I wish for a civilized country and a better place for my children.

“I try to teach my son to respect the armed forces when he sees them in the streets,” he said. “One day when he grows up, I want him to know his father sacrificed during the worst period in his country in order for his children to have a better Iraq.”

Iraqi Flight Engineer J. also fights for the same dream and a chance to build a new Iraqi Air Force. He has been a flight engineer for 10 years, but until now has never felt able to express concerns to his superiors because of his rank.

“I’m impressed at how Americans treat each other as far as rank,” Engineer J. said. “They treat each other equally. During the previous regime there was a huge difference between a flight engineer and pilot. Now, we work together.

“Because of the treatment we’ve experienced from our instructors firsthand and the friendship they’ve shown us, it’s made me change my views on all Americans,” he said. “We understand the true (meaning of) American kindness.”

A pilot in training with the 23rd Squadron (transport), Iraqi Air Force, loads his baggage April 18, 2005, in Talil, Iraq, before taking off in one of three C-130 aircraft that the United States provided to the Iraqi Air Force. U.S. airmen from the 23rd Advisory Support Team, 777th Expeditionary Airlift Squadron are teaching the Iraqi pilots to use their new aircraft. U.S. Army photo by Sgt. David Foley
Hat tip, Iraqi Bounty Hunter

Despite the litany of Global Warming hysteria we have heard in the MSM, more than a few Earth Sciences professors are taking issue with the pseudo-science behind it. Friends of Science has a video featuring several experienced scientists who make a simple and effective case that it is much ado about nothing.

I’ve mirrored the video here. (50 mb .wmv) It is about 25 minutes long. Watch and pass it on.

Keven Drum brings John Stossel into the Dan Rather pile-on, recounting a story where Stossel’s reporting was false and he apologized on air 6 months later. Drum muses:

If recklessly reporting untruths because they fit an alleged underlying political bias is a firing offense for a prime time journalist on a TV news magazine, then it’s a firing offense. If it’s cause for a reprimand, then it’s cause for a reprimand. I don’t quite see why standards should be different just because it’s a bunch of conservatives howling this time around instead of liberals.

Does Drum fail to recognize the difference between shoddy journalism which attempts to influence an election and that which attempts to influence opinions about organic food?

It sure seems like it.

Study finds press pro-Kerry (via Instapundit)

Repeat after me, my Democratic friends, “There is no partisan media bias, there is no partisan media bias…”

Recent news stories detailing a call up of ‘retired’ military from the Individual Ready Reserve seem to leave out some important information - namely that the IRR is a part of a soldier’s overall service contract and, especially in times of war, should be expected to be put in use.

Military Bloggers are all over it and much more knowledgeable than I: Sgt. Stryker, and Blackfive both illuminate “The rest of the story”.

I don’t know if it is generous or not, but I’ll believe the media is just lazy on this one. Too lazy to double-check stories which tickle their anti-war fancies, anyway.

Andrew McCarthy explains the particulars of the NY Times recent corrections on NRO.

$$$:

Even now, the Times feebly endeavors to minimize the importance of the collaboration evidenced by the newly reported document. It says the information indicates “that Iraq agreed to rebroadcast anti-Saudi propaganda, and that a request from Mr. bin Laden to begin joint operations against foreign forces in Saudi Arabia went unanswered. There is no further indication of collaboration.” (Emphasis added.) Nevertheless, the reader who has the patience to wade through several paragraphs of the Times disingenuously letting itself off the hook for refusing for weeks to report on this document will learn that what the newspaper really means when it says bin Laden’s suggestions “went unanswered.” In actuality, “the document contains no statement of response by the Iraqi leadership under Mr. Hussein to the request for joint operations[.]” Translation: Maybe there was a response and maybe there wasn’t, but this document does not tell us one way or the other.

Why is this important? Because it is the continuation of a pattern — another instance of an effective but misleading tactic repeatedly used by the Times, the intelligence community, the 9/11 Commission staff, and all the Iraq/Qaeda connection naysayers. To wit: When they can’t explain something, they never say they can’t explain it; they say it didn’t happen — even if saying so is against the weight of considerable counterevidence.

Too right. argumentum ad ignorantiam reigns supreme!

Over at Captain’s Quarters, a great post pointing of what appears to be a bit of exhonorating information regarding Secretary Rumsfeld and the interrogation methods he approved.

It would be nice if the mainstream media would stop being so damn lazy and eager to ‘get’ administration officials. If arrogance wasn’t so endemic with those folks, one might think they’d begin to see a pattern in their own coverage.