jfore's Blog

A recent front page story in the Washington Post read, in part, "The U.S. military believes it has dealt devastating and perhaps irreversible blows to al Qaeda in Iraq in recent months, leading some generals to advocate a declaration of victory over the group."

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Well, what do you know. General Patraeus wasn’t lying after all. Isn’t that cause to celebrate? I would think so. What we’re doing in Iraq is working! We’re winning the war, folks!

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But ABC didn’t see it that way. Charlie Gibson reported on ABC’s World News Tonight "One item from Baghdad today. The news is that there is no news. The police told us that to their knowledge, there were no major acts of violence. Attacks are down in Baghdad, and today no bombings or roadside explosions were reported." To ABC the fact that things are going well in Iraq isn’t news. They are so desperate to see us lose that they don’t know how to handle good news from Iraq. Think about that folks. The fact that we’re winning the war ISN’T NEWS!!

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Remember the newsroom motto. "If it bleeds, it leads." Surely there is something bad to report coming out of Iraq. Surely we can find somebody who wants to gripe about something.

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Well have no fear folks. The crew at the Baghdad Bureau of McCarthy Newspapers came to the rescue. They tirelessly searched high and low until they came up with something bad to tell us about Iraq.

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It seems that the number of deaths in Iraq has dropped so much that the gravediggers in Wadi al Salam cemetery have had to take a huge pay cut. Burials are down by 30%. In fact, thousands of gravediggers all over Iraq are suffering similar pay cuts as the number on bodies to bury drops. What are we to do? Oh the humanity!

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You see, to succeed in the news business all you have to do is ignore all the good news and be willing to invest the time and effort to search every nook and cranny until you find something bad to report. Let’s applaud the dedicated crew at the Baghdad Bureau of Mc Carthy Newspapers for their tireless efforts above and beyond the call of duty to find something bad to tell us about Iraq. Never say die. Oops! Those gravediggers won’t like that. Sorry guys.