PunkAssBlog.com

Colonel Jeffrey Snow insists the media is like an insurgent obsessed with the 18-35 demographic:

“Our soldiers may be in the crosshairs every day, but it is the American voter who is a real target, and it is the media that carries the message back each day across the airwaves,” he said.

“So when the news is not balanced and it’s always bad, that clearly leads to negative perceptions back home,” he said.

The commander’s point is that the media’s driving the country bonkers with bad news, and if the elections go poorly for the warmongers, we’ll be forced to pull out of Iraq early and lose what he seems to think is a winnable mission.

Okay, then, why don’t you spell out for us precisely how well things are going, Commander? What exactly would you like them to say?

“The way I would answer that is that attacks here recently are up in our area. However, the overall effectiveness are down,” he said.

“So you may perceive that as double-speak. I don’t have the precise numbers in front of me,” he added.

No problem. That’ll sell like hotcakes.

Seriously, though, what news is he watching? No MSM outlet other than Comedy Central seems willing to admit that things are kinda in the shitter over there, and while some networks are beginning to run a few more features on our troubles, I’d hardly call the media antagonistic towards the military.

Snow calls for balance, but clearly there’s been at least that (actually, still too much flag-waving for me, but I’ll split the difference for the moment) and we’re still in a holding pattern. He has no evidence that antsy voters are doing anything other than making up their own minds on this issue. Unless Snow would like the media to stop reporting simple facts like the Iraqi Body Count, he can hardly blame them for his troubles.

Let me be clear, though, I am not blaming him, either. Colonel Snow has been put in an unwinnable situation. I respect that he refuses to give up and believes in his abilities, but I would refer him to recent occupational disasters around the globe for some contextualization of what he faces. This is our Afghanistan. Well, along with Afghanistan.

We we did was wrong. What we’re doing is wrong. Some of our troops are going crazy. Let’s suck up our pride and get the fudge out.