Conversations with my Brother part 1

Addendum... I changed this from "Conversations with my Mom part 2" because apparently having read this post, she feels I'm mischaracterizing her views --actually this is more a responce to my Brother's continuing "Liberal Media" complaints.

Maybe I got the wrong message from them altogether. What I thought they were saying was that the News didn't mention that the Chechnyan Separatists were Moslem, and that was more evedence that the news media is biased toward the left.

It occurred to me that I knew they were Moslem because everybody knows Chechnians are primarily Moslem.

It would be like saying "The news somehow neglected to mention that the Iraqi insurgents are Moslem!"

But even if it wasn't common knowledge, are you saying that for every "terrorist" act in the world it's important to report the religion of those who did it? Was it a liberal or conservative bias for the media not to mention that Timothy McVaigh was a protestant? or that the Japanese subway poison gas bombers were Buddhist?

Maybe its suspicious to you that the press isn't being "anti-muslom" enough?

What really bothers me is that no one said anything about the war that had been going on between Russia and Chechnya. They had been at war for a long time with brutal attacks on both sides, but I suppose because the Chechnians are Moslem it's OK to kill them and their children, but when they do it back it's "Terrorism" and they're just evil. Bush called it "Just another example of what lengths terrorists will go to." And since when is Putin a good guy? Man it's all of a sudden a weird world. If Waco happened now, they would just have been labeled "terrorists" and all of a sudden they would have had ties with Al queada and they would have just bombed the place right off. This whole "war on terror" really scares me.

From a congressional report:

"Sadly, this tragic situation shows no signs of ending soon. The fighting goes on. Russian forces conduct sweeps, sealing towns and villages and searching house to house for fighters. Often these sweeps are subsequently followed by reports of the beatings, rape, and torture of civilians, of extortion, or the disappearances of young men."


More about the "Liberal Media"

The "Liberal Media" neglected to say anything about Halliburton until evil people like Michael Moore yelled their heads off about it for like a year --and then it was sort of dismissive and more making it look like a cooky conspiracy theory.

The "Liberal Media" never said much about human rights abuses at Abu Grhaib till the pictures were already circulating even though the Red Cross had been complaining for almost 2 years.

But to assume liberal bias in the media because they report "every time one of our soldiers gets killed..." I mean what are they supposed to do? At best its like a home news station not reporting when the opposing football team scores a point on the home team, and at worst its like an insult to the sacrifice that the soldiers are making over there. If I lost a loved one over there I'd be pissed if there was nothing on the news about it, like it never happened. Is that what they should do? That would be like having our own Al jezira (or what you think al jezira is based on what OUR news says about them).

<>Anyone who thinks there is a liberal media has forgotten the entire 90s. Just one example: . There were 13,641 stories about Bill Clinton 'dodging the draft' …and (before moveon.org and michealmoore.com) there were 49 stories about Bush and the National Guard.

Here's another thought to consider: The Republicans have the House and the Senate and the White House. And they have governership of most of the states. If there is anything bad to report about they aren't going to after the democrats because the democrats aren't in any position to be blamed much anymore. The press will naturally go after who's in power and right now it's the GOP.

OK I must sleep now... Thanks for meeting me for lunch. You are very sweet and I love you both. And your big scary dog too.