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Media Coverage of War Casualties Skews to Left
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by BMCWrites | January 28, 2008 at 01:49 pm
668 views | 15 Recommendations | 3 comments
I find it odd how members of the mainstream news media choose to report on matters such as the combat death toll among members of the U.S. military. Instead of focusing on the fact that the number of deaths during the so-called Global War on Terror has been extremely low when compared to previous conflicts, they strive — predictably, I might add — to stir controversy.
Case in point: A link I found to USA TODAY’s “FULL COVERAGE: U.S. casualties in Iraq.”
I came upon the link while reading a recent USA TODAY article in which it was reported that rural Americans are dying in Iraq and Afghanistan in numbers disproportionate to the populations of their hometowns.
“Full coverage,” in this case, consisted only of publishing a list of annual casualty counts interspersed with feature stories about sacrifices made by brave warriors in uniform and those they left behind. Had USA TODAY wanted to offer truly complete coverage, they would have turned months earlier to statistics published in a July 2007 Congressional Research Service Report for data.
There, they would have been able to offer something more substantial, such as a comparison of the number of military deaths during President George W. Bush’s first six years in office to the number during President Bill Clinton’s eight years in office (1993 thru 2000). Had they followed such a path, they would have found that 8,792 service members died during the years 2001 through 2006 under Bush while 7,500 died during the years 1993 through 2000 under Clinton.
Again, those numbers:
Bush = 8,792 died during Wartime (2001 through 2006); and
Clinton = 7,500 died during Peacetime (1993 through 2000).
But did the news media report the Clinton-era deaths in the same light as they reported deaths during the Bush Administration? No. As usual, they chose to skew left. There is, as we all know, an election to be won in 2008 and, if it takes biased reporting to help a Democrat win the White House in 2008, it appears USA TODAY is willing to make a contribution.
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Most RecentMost Recommended Comments (3)
at 14:43 on January 28th, 2008
Hello BMC.,
This article is excellent with a good integration of fact and opinion based on fact. I found it interesting to read and it caused me to think about it myself.
I agree, USA Today has some 'splainin' to do.
~ Swan
at 20:33 on January 28th, 2008
BMCWrites, BTW Good stuff.
at 07:21 on April 11th, 2008
This article is following a similar argument to a spam email that has been doing the rounds, one that has been discrdited in the very CRS Report that is linked to here.
As this article is based around figures and how they are presented lets start with that. This article has put forward the millitary deaths that occured during Clinton & Bush's presidency. It seems to suggest & at first glance the numbers do as well. That the difference between the two is not that great. That now the "biased" media is picking on Bush.
But lets look at these numbers more closely. Note that the number for Clinton is for a 7 year period. While for Bush it is for 5 years. So taking this into consideration, there has been a 61% increase in millitary deaths during Bush's term.
61% is a large increase by any measure.
Note that most people wouldn't notice the difference in timelines and one could aruge this is a tactic to skew the figures. The very thing the article is complaining about.
Now lets look even more closely at the numbers, if people actually bothered to look at the CRS Report, particulary table 5. You would see that during the Clinton years, 1 member of the milliraty died in hostile action. While up until 2006, 2596 members died during Bush's term. (REMBER that it is only up until 2006, we have another year of war to count)
1 vs 2596
So how did all those people die during Clinton's years? Well when you operate a 1.5million strong millitary, accidents, illness, homicide and suicide occur. Tragic, but looking at the figures a fact of life when running such a large force.
So it seems when looking at loses other than the ones that are inveitable running such a large force, there is a huge difference.
So shouldn't we being looking at different numbers?
Left, Right. Isn't it about the truth, and smart intelligent choices? It's laughable that this article is complaining about skweing, it is obvious that this article is polictcally motivated.
Ultra patrsianship weakens America & Democracy. The ignorant masses running around sucking at the teat of Cable News, Reality TV need to get educated. Learn some history and about the power strucutes that control a lot of the world. I'm not saying that they are bad or good.I'm saying ignornace and the kind of patrsianship that is present in America currently is a threat to this great nation.
I would love to see some polls for the general American populace to see what percentage know about the island of Diego Garcia & what happened there. The CIA's history in Iran and Iraq. etc. etc.