The "mainstream", by which I mean "mainly Liberal", press has been bending over backwards to be especially kind to the groups of people blowing things up in Iraq lately.  I'm surprised their spines haven't snapped by now... but it might be more accurate to wonder whether they have any at all. 

That there are groups in Iraq deliberately causing the deaths of innocent men, women and children (when they can't get Americans or other Coalition troops) is undeniable. The media seems to look forward to reporting the daily body count of innocent civilians and troops killed.  Whenever a soldier dies, their barely-hidden satisfaction is almost palpable. The total number of military deaths is invariably calculated using the words "...since President Bush declared major combat operations over in May".  Is there anyone so blind as to be unable to see the point they're trying to make of this?  Unless you just dropped in from the Twilight Zone, it should be obvious that the media is conducting a propoganda campaign of its own.  Why are we condoning the media's use of the deaths of our soldiers to score political points against our President? 

At the same time, all American media outlets, as if by common agreement, are refusing to name these groups of people for what they truly are, going out of their way to lend these groups legitimacy in American minds.  The killers of innocent Iraqis are not insurgents. They are not rebels.  They are not freedom fighters, anti-Coalition forces, the "opposition", former regime supporters, or simply criminals. 

They are TERRORISTS.

Anyone who targets non-military personnel in an attempt to cause fear and sow mistrust, as well as make a political statement or gain attention for a cause, is a terrorist.  Haven't you wondered why whenever an explosion occurs anywhere but Iraq, even in nearby Turkey, the American media immediately begins discussing terrorism... but when discussing events inside Iraq, that word is hardly ever uttered?

The latest terrorist attack in Iraq was upon the headquarters of the Shi'a, the religious group savagely oppressed by Saddam Hussein.  As reported by ABC News, for instance, the word terrorist never appears except in a single direct quote... even though the attack is almost identical to other terrorist attacks around the world.  "An explosion destroyed a Baghdad office of Iraq's largest Shi'ite party on Friday in an attack the movement blamed on Saddam Hussein supporters." the story reports.

Mohsin al-Hakim, a Shi'a party official, actually said "The men of the regime and terrorist elements are behind the attack."  Even so, the news agency reported that, "The Supreme Council of the Islamic Revolution in Iraq which works with U.S. occupiers, blamed Saddam loyalists, as it did after Wednesday's assassination of one of its leaders."  Why is the word "terrorists" missing?

Isn't it fascinating how they manage to discount the terrorist elements at the same time as they work in the reference to the US as "occupiers"? It's as if most Iraqis don't favor the coalition and condemn the attacks on them as terrorist acts, as the latest poll by Baghdad's Cultural Association shows they do. 

Ahh, that's journalism at its finest.  In a single well-turned journalism-school sentence, ABC News manages to bash the US, denigrate the SCIR for working with us, and delete the actual word "terrorism" from a direct quote to push its view of who murdered Iraqi civilians.  Allow me to edit that single sentence. Make it "The Supreme Council of the Islamic Revolution in Iraq which works with U.S. rebuilding efforts, blamed Saddam loyalists and terrorists, as it did after Wednesday's assassination of one of its leaders."  Is that less truthful, or far more so?

Any objective observer, even the Twilight Zone visitor, would be forced to wonder why "news" agencies openly favor the terrorists over the Coalition. 

I wonder that myself. So should you.