Agreed.

Yes, and that's good. But the issue here is different, it is "analysts" being much less independent than viewers and the TV companies think they are. And it is the (tax-payer's) Administration possibly using less-than-acceptable trickery to get their view across. If the story is true.

A government tries to shape/control information flow during time of war, wow what a revelation...

Los

What does it matter anyway? It didn't change anything. The war is unpopular and the president doesn't worry about poll numbers. So, spin or no spin, we would have been exactly where we are now.

I think what the article is getting at is that these supposed "unbiased" experts were spouting the party line and not really the facts.

There are also some slightly veiled references to these experts comingling their business interests with their reporting, and the fact that people were cut off from info if they didn't report what the pentagon wanted them to say.

Sadly, business as usual I guess.

Whatever the case, I still don't see it making any difference at all.

When the American public wanted blood, they were in support of war. When they lost the taste for blood, they stopped supporting it. Facts be damned when people want something. Like, now people want out of Iraq... and it makes no difference whether or not things will get better or worse, the masses want out and that is it.

In the end, it is up to the media to police their own.

Perhaps the best moment - one that exemplifies what 'disinformation campaign' & 'media manipulation' is all about, can be seen in Frontline's 'Bush's War' (the first part)

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/bushswar/

when V-P Mr. Cheney quotes a story by Judith Miller that they planted in the New York times as proof of their case, a classic.

most 'military experts' became mouth pieces of special interests.

The days we live in ...

(if you don't know who Judith Miller is:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judith_Miller_(journalist) )

Here's the problem with what these guys did.

1. They willingly carried the pentagon's water while publicly maintaining the pretense of independant military analysts. Had they disclosed at the beginning of every interview that they had derived much, most, or whatever the quotient is, of their opinions/conclusions from insider only information provided by pentagon employees that would have served to create the necessary skepticism for the audience.

These guys knowingly exploited the fact that the US military consistently is rated among the top 3 institutions in the country for dependability and integrity. When they go up before an audience as an ex military officer, they are trading on their perceived NON PARTISAN service to the country and the constitution.

In doing what they did, they have sullied that reputation. As a retired Army LTC who has not and will not carry any water for a political party without disclosing that is who I represent I find their conduct contemptible and undermining the confidence of the public which has given us a measure of credibility that other government institutions do not enjoy.

SB

If they carried the government's water, as you say, while believing in it, then it is of no great importance. If they did so while believing the opposite, then their conduct is at least contemptible.

tempering with newspapers or any news media like it was done, shows contempt for the very values they purport to defend.