Lots of smoke. Strange, crystalline smoke. And buildings appearing by the sheer will of Allah! (Or maybe David Blaine.)
Are the end times nigh? Is God tracing his signature across the skies of the Levant in ominous blacks and greys? Or has somebody discoved the clone stamp and lasso tool on his spanking new Photoshop install…?
Tell you what. How ‘bout you decide.
For those of you who haven’t been following the Reuter’s Adnan Hajj doctored photo, er, dustup, Charles Johnson—who broke the story—covers it here. LGF readers have uncovered what they believe to be the original photo, though its possible the “new” photo was simply taken from the same vantage point (and in fact, this is the way I’m leaning).
Charles provides a series of photo comparisons and overlays that show the photo to be clearly doctored. Professional photogs discuss it here. And Allahpundit, Dan Riehl, and Rob from Left and Right, do additional examinations of the alterations—which Allah calls “the worst Photoshop I’ve ever seen.” Potentially even more damning, however, is this:
Charles notes that Adnan Hajj was present at Qana and had a ringside seat for the ceremonial presentation of the child corpse by the green-helmeted Lebanese death pimp we’ve all come to know and love. But that can cut one of two ways. It could suggest that Hajj is cooperating with Hezbollah, which would explain how he got such a plum position for the money shot. Or it could suggest that he’s an honest photographer, since the money shot shows no signs of having been doctored. And as I’ve said, if you’re out to tar Israel, a shot of a dead child at Qana is exactly where you’d want to do it.
Contributing to the suspicion that Hajj could be sympathethic to Hezbollah—and that perhaps his sympathies are clouding his professional judgement (or, at least, filling it with a lot of billowing, computer-generated cloned smoke), is a curious disrepency in the time difference between an AP photograph and Hajj’s photo of the rescue worker carrying the dead child. Jeff Harrell explains:
Adnan Hajj is a prolific photojournalist  and I’m using that term loosely here  for Reuters who came under some pretty intense criticism in the wake of the recent incident at Qana in Lebanon. On July 30 at 2:21 p.m. Eastern time, a somber photo credited to Hajj appeared on the Reuters news wire showing a Lebanese rescue worker removing the body of a child from the rubble of a collapsed building.
The only trouble is, AP photographer Kevin Frayer had a photo of the same child being carried by the same rescue worker on the wire, a picture that photographer had taken more than ninety minutes earlier.
Both Hajj and Frayer had other photos of the same rescue worker and child on their respective wires that day, photos taken at widely divergent times ranging from 12:45 p.m. Eastern to 4:30 p.m. Eastern.Now, the fact that these photos appear to have been taken over a span of nearly four hours isn’t necessarily damning. Timestamps can be recorded erroneously, editorial assistants can mis-type information when submitting photo to the wire service. There are a lot of ways in which this seemingly bizarre sequence of photos could have ended up being distributed to news outlets around the world.
But the whole situation contributed to some very skeptical attitudes on the part of a lot of folks who look at the press critically these days. Were these photographers actually recording the events as they took place? Or was the body of a child being paraded in front of the cameras all afternoon in an attempt by one party or another to influence public opinion? And if the photos were staged, why the hell were these photographers  these journalists  letting themselves be used that way?
Further, though it doesn’t prove anything by itself, we know that Hajj certainly has access to Hezbollah. Which, combined with the plum dead child photo and Hajj’s other recent “work,” in which smoke takes on the replicated likeness of a Bashar Assad DNA strand, is fairly damning—and creates a portrait of Hajj as perhaps a not quite disinterested “observer.”
So. Reutergate? Perhaps. Michelle Malkin and others applied a bit of well-timed pressure to Reuters, and Reuters, seeing the (digitally enhanced) writing on the wall has recalled the photo (h/t OTB)1. Which is all well and good—and another victory for media watchdogs.
But what this should remind everyone is that modern wars are as much about propaganda as they are about battles being fought in the trenches. Which is why an ideological media that believes themselves to be part of the story—and that believes themselves responsible for revealing “larger truths” (which, naturally, they decide upon, and which flow conveniently from their ideology)—is so very dangerous to a democracy, particularly when they pose as objective or neutral observers but are not, in fact, constrained by any sense of journalistic ethics redounding to that pose. Which is problematic precisely because when the information from which the people are being asked to form their judgments is being massaged and finessed through a front-ended ideological filter in an effort to help us reach the “correct” conclusion, then democracy becomes nothing more than the righteous mask placed over a sham in order to disguise its ugliness beneath a veneer of moral authority.
****
update: In an email, Charles (who can’t get to his site right now) notes that the the “corrected” photo from Reuters still contains a phantom building first noticed by Allah at Hot Air and suspects that this photo is altered, too.
And Dan Riehl finds this 2004 complaint against Hajj:
Another morgue picture taken by the same photographer features a teenage brother and sister who were supposedly gunned -down by IDF troops. But an initial investigation indicates that their deaths were caused by an explosive device planted by the Palestinians. The photojournalists are a rather homogeneous bunch -hardly representative of an international press core. These are the names of the photographers and photojournalists from AP, Reuters and AFP who covered the action for the Palestinian side of the street in Gaza these past two weeks: Mohammed Salem, Suhaib Salem, Mohamed Azakir, Goran Tomasevic, Khalil Hamra, Adnan Hajj Ali, Nasser Nasser, Hussein Malla, Lefteris Pitarakis, Ahmed Khateib, Salah Malkawi, Abbas Momani, Said Khatib, Mohammed Abed, and Awad Awad.
Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice…
The major drawback of a propaganda campaign, of course, is that,once it is uncovered, the credibility of those behind it is shot.
Unless, of course, an army of true believers excuses such gambits as part of the “struggle” and continues to allow themselves to be shaped like so much shrieking, outraged putty. Useful idiots, I think the term is.
****
utterly convincing smoking gun of update: from oseaghdha, in the comments: before and after (h/t Dorkafork).
****
1note to Reuters: if you are going to recall a photo, then recall it. Otherwise people might begin to suspect you aren’t quite so contrite as you try to appear.
Not that this sort of thing is unprecedented. . . .
There’s more.
Is anyone else having trouble reaching LGF at the moment?
Ah. I missed that before my previous comment.
You have to wonder how many they get away with for every one that’s caught…
The “Zionist Pig” story is from a few months ago.
CNN spiked storeies from prewar Baghdad for access. Tim Harper was just threatened with expulsion from Cuba if he reports anything Castro’s goon squad doesn’t want to see.
The media will lie for access in non-free nations. Since they are willing to lie out of fear, and they are willing to lie out of partisanship (Rathergate, et al), why believe them at all?
Judging by the NYT stock price, the public has caught on.
I’d better go. I’ve got to write a letter to the Post Standard thanking them for shrinking their Opinion section from eight pages to four. I’ve a suggestion for them that will save them even more money.
@#$!!
You’re right.
Dang, I must need a vacation.
Yes, but Jeff, it’s fake but accurate.
I applied to Reuters for a job, explaining that with my new install of PhotoChop 23.0 I can do a better job on that photo.
Haven’t heard back.
Yet.
TW: Position….position, position
Once upon a time, I did a lot of photoshopping. I know from bad cloning, having achieved it on more than one occassion.
FAKE FAKE FAKITTY FAKE FAKE. (To borrow from an expression recently heard.)
I can
heh
TW: indeed Kinda freakin me out here.
Uh, chimpy….
Please tell us you are joking, or profoundly stupid.
It’s gotta be one or the other.
Before/After
This clown is going around pasting that BS all over the place. I don’t know what his trip is.
Now, now, Mark, they provide an essential service.
The Universe is infinite, for all practical purposes. That means that anything at all can happpen. Even our little planet, a teensy subset of the Universe, can have Sagans and Sagans of possible events.
If you read it in the NYT or on an AP feed, you can be absolutely certain that that particular event did not occur. This gives us much information. Out of all the possible things that could have happened we know which ones didn’t.
And the Turing Word is: anti. The NYT and the AP provide us with anti-news. Good to have the AI on track.
Regards,
Ric
Chimpy: Please go be aggressively stupid someplace else. It’s Sunday.
Ah, I found out he’s apparently a troll who got banned from LGF.
tw: tool.
LGF is up, but getting hammered. Accoring to their very own counter, the London offices of Reuters seem to have a renewed intrest in the Lizardoid Nation.
Heh. If he keeps it up, Charles is going to have to put a taxidermist on staff.
If I were Charles, I’d make sure I was well-armed at all times. He’s their nightmare.
Hey, give Reuters a break. How were they supposed to know those photos were faked? They just received them in a fax from a Kinko’s in Abilene.
Occam’s Razor points to the idea that the “new, improved” (supposed original) photo now served up by Reuters is also doctored.
Look at it, it’s pretty much just as “bad” as the first, now-acknowledged fake one. There is plenty of smoke in the “real” one and raises the question as to why anyone would have doctored it further from this point.
My guess is that this now-vetted Reuters photo is itself doctored, and only served as the foundation for the “fake” (or, faker fake).
BTW, Yahoo has not yet removed the “genuine fake” as of 1:00 pm EST:
http://news.yahoo.com/photo/060805/ids_photos_ts/r3101797657.jpg
If you want to comment, here is the Yahoo News contact (it’s hard to find):
http://help.yahoo.com/help/us/news/beta/beta-19.html
You then click on the “submission form” link.
One of the commenters on the photographer’s forum writes:
The non-altered photo shows smoke emanating from a single building, which would indicate a highly-selective precision strike. The same volume of smoke rising from several buildings, as in the altered version, would be construed as evidence of indiscriminate carpet-bombing.
SarahW you don’t…do you?
Chimpy:
Smoke doesn’t product a repeated pattern like in the doctored photo. It’s an obvious use of the clone tool in Photoshop.
If you still don’t see it after viewing this, then you’re a hopeless shill.
Is Chimpy for real? The killed the picture at 3 am and this person is still comment bombing?
more like it.
The doctored image smoke shape appears to me the image editor was attempting to make it look “mushroom” cloud like instead of just more sinister smoke.
Look at the picture agian, he was trying to make mushroom clouds.
Mike: good point, I hadn’t considered that.
Chimpy is a troll who apparently has a history with LGF judging by the Google of “treblanews” from his email. He’s been living the same stupid message on blogs all over the place.
Crying out loud, the “smoke” cloning reiterations are obvious to ANYONE. These idiots who doctored the pic even cloned some of the second tier buildings in the image lower left. No one but an idiot uses the clone tool on something geometric, like a building, unless they are making wallpaper. Chimpy is Darwin Award material. Al-Reuters is beneath contempt for pimping an obviously doctored image. Fuck ‘em!
Photo is down, BTW. As of noon MDT, all I’m getting is 404 errors.
It used to be NOT OK for photo journalists to pose the natives.
Victorian-era archeologists were appalled by the nudity and toilet habits of the “natives” they were supposed to photograph, so they made them bathe and dress-up, sometimes in Western clothes, before snapping a shot. This was photo-journalism then.
This sparked a debate that raged in Britain’s universities and in polite society about the appropriateness of posing the natives, because, after-all, didn’t the Queen’s science want to learn how the natives “really are?”
In the end, at least temporarily it would appear, those who prefered a realistic portrayal in their parlors and librairies won out over those who believed that there are limits to what the silver-haired ladies at a bridge-club in Oxley should be allowed to see.
Now, in 2006, it’s looks like it’s OK to pose the natives again. Even little, dead persons, like the Livingstonian “natives” of precolonial central Africa, can be posed* to tell a story, whenever a photo-journalist has a story to tell.
-Steve
* As in when photographers become playwrights, using dead little girls as props – posed as grizzly extras in a skit they never auditioned for, and that the journalists help to write.
It looks like they finally got smart. The link to the forged pic on Yahoo! now returns an error.
TW: fiction loses to fact. Wow, that thing’s good!
Since there are attempts to gain a propaganda advantage against Israel over children killed at Qana, wouldn’t it be nice to remind the world how the school children in September 2004 was attacked somewhere in Russia by Chechnian [spelling = ?] rebels.
In fact the su*k ass supporters of hezbollah can be taunted how it is only imaginary thinking in the mind of hezbollah that they are true men because a true man really wouldn’t rig a school with explosives and kill children.
In addition the world can be reminded if hezbollah, hamas etc are true men they wouldn’t cover their faces in ski masks as contrasted to Jewish men.
I’ve still got the forgery popping up at my blog. I’m using this link: Clone photo
TW: Someone needs to pen a letter to Reuters.
Chimpy is for real, but not worth paying attention to.
I read the apology from Reuters about the picture, and it seems disingenuous. They state that photos are scrutinized by a group of photo editors prior to release to the public. How does this photo get past this process without a nod to the fraud being committed?
This photo is an obvious fake even to the untrained eye. The alteration was that bad. It is Photoshop 101, performed by a flunky. For years I managed graphic artists and this sort of work would get shamed and criticized into the toilet, yet it passes the scrutiny of Reuters’ photo editors? I don’t buy it.
But you know where this is all going to lead. Nowhere. It’s “fake but accurate” all over again. The larger media won’t touch it.
Or not.
Hmm, flushed the cache and everything. Maybe it got stored in the database.
TW: swift reaction
I am wondering why the “artist” went to such effort to clone smoke, when the result is not all that different from the original. The difference that the doctored photo made was to make the scene appear more menacing and dark. But s/he could have done that w/o cloning the damn smoke, not that it should be doctored at all. Seems like the work done with the smoke was quick-and-dirty, and exposed the overall intent of the fraud: to create a menacing scene.
Thats not smoke, it’s the fist of Yaweh.
I knew it looked familiar.
This reminds me of when Dino De Laurentus wanted to have black smoke on the set of Dune and the only way that you can get that color of smoke is to burn tires. The government liasion for the film said no way, you’ll just have to use the hollywood smoke pots that produce white smoke. Bruning tired is illegal. So he agreed, and had the assoc producer take the guy to lunch and burned the tires for the shot because it “looked better.”
This is the same thing except:
a. it’s not a movie
b. it doesn’t look better (learn to use the dodge tool for God’s sake
and c. it underbudget which Laurentus never managed to be
TW: if it’s worth doing then at least make it believeable
– The “original” was also altered. Possiblt the editors never bothered with the original original.
-As for the why, scrool up the comments. Mike pretty well covered that most likely.
TW: How many more times will the MSM need to get caught in a lie before they believe the blogsphere really exists, has teeth, and isn’t going to go away soon.
The weird part is the left-o-sphere has kind of stunk up the sphere in general lately, so perhaps it’s a Rovian like plot?
I wouldn’t run too far with this. David Irving, the Jailbird Holocaust denier, once proved the smoke over an Auschwitz crematorum was brushed in a photo. Did that prove anything beyond the photo?
Yoni the Blogger makes several interesting observations:
“This is nothing new, Israel having to battle not only on the battlefield but also battle the lies that the MSM puts out against us.
When the MSM arrives in the Middle East who do they hire as their staff?
Arabs.
Arab photographers, Camera men, and how do the MSM gain access to the terrorist for their interviews, they pay them, that’s how.”
Here’s his link:
http://www.yonitheblogger.com/
Has anyone seen the “original” original? That before/after link Jeff posted….that I assume is the altered original, not the first generation original.
Even after reading Mike’s comment, I don’t see the same thing he does. Either photo looks like the smoke is coming from a single building, unless there’s a comparison I haven’t seen yet.
My curiosity is still piqued about the “why”, and it seems s/he was going more for the effect of gloom and doom, rather than submitting a photo that didn’t have the same punch.
– ABC in Oz is still showing the pic. Either everyone is on vacation, or they didn’t get the memo on showing fake but accurate only if it’s undetectable. Here.
– Another poster over at LGF ran across this additional offering from the Reuters “artists”. Here and here.
– FOX is doing a report on the whole mess at 5 EST.
The more I look at this story, all they can be accused of is bad artistry. The photos essentially show the same thing, unless there is some law that states that news photos should never be altered in any way. It would be a “gotcha” if the original showed no smoke from an attack, and an altered one did, thereby “creating” a military strike where there wasn’t one.
I have yet to see anyone claim that’s what happened here. What did happen is that they let a Photoshop flunky do some work on a legit photo.
A more legit story was last week, with Green Helmet Guy appearing everywhere in photos, giving the impression (one that’s still out there) that things were being staged for photographers.
Reuters doesn’t even need a photo to get their Photoshopping done.
Walid Phares over at Counterterrorism Blog notes.
There’s more. Including:
Brian,
Looking at the Before/After (or “Org”/Fake as they are labeled) pix, the plume of smoke on the left is stretched vertically in Fake to make it appear as if the smoke were rising straight up from the source, rather than wafting from left-to-right, as in the “Org” photo. Also, the section of the plume in the middle is darkened so as to make it appear as though it were a distinct plume from a different source from that on the left of the screen. The efforts make it appear as though there are at least two separate sources for the smoke.
Hmm, what if one could track down some of Nouahid/Noueihid’s postings on those radical Islamic websites and put a big ol’ spotlight on them?
I have a serious question.
he Islamists keep sceaming and yelling that Allah is great, and Allah is on their side, and Allah willing and all this cap. Yet they are continually getting their asses kicked by everyone they attack. Israel is a tiny drop in a sea of Islam, yet they have yet to lose a single war with them. We have cleaned their clocks repeatedly. Iran and Pakistan and other Islamic countries are contiually getting flattened by earthquakes and other natural disasters (tidal waves) to the tune of thousands of little rug crawlers at a time.
Isn’t it time for them to take a step back and realize that just maybe Allah isn’t on their side and is, in fact, pretty pissed off at them for their actions and the way they are going about things?
Just a thought.
Allah has nothing to do with it Hose. That’s just a faux cover story so they can get to their share of 72 year old virgins before alMart runs out of stock.
TW: Virgins for everyone. Allah’s gotta plan Stan.
Brian,
The point is that the photo was faked, however, poorly. Rinse and repeat. The photo was faked.
What can we conclude? The photographer is a bad actor. His editors are either biased, incompetent, or both. That’s not necessarily new news with Reuters, but it is significant.
Reuters should not be trusted.
Oh and Brian. Kos should put out a memo to knock off the cheerleading, and equivacating for the enemy. Otherwise your side can do the bend over in future election cycles. Hopefully you’ll follow your usual erudite reasoning, and not listen.
The doctored photos aren’t all that important in and of themselves; they’re merely an egregious example of something that’s been a problem all along.
The “news” agencies have now spent fifteen years learning to contort themselves so as to offer the likes of Saddam the choice of anal or oral from the same approach, in order to “maintain access”. In the process they have fired, or worse, any “stringer” who wouldn’t go along with that policy. As a result, they don’t have any stringers over there who aren’t at minimum apologists, at max overt propagandists like Nouaihid, for the jihadist/death to Israel and/or America loons. And they’ve “rightsized” and “outsourced” their operations to the point that they don’t have any way whatever of checking what those stringers are putting out.
That’s why the Mooreons can get away with “peaceful kite-flying Baathists” and “well-run tyranny”. Even the loons at HRW will admit that there are dozens, if not hundreds, of mass-grave sites where Saddam’s thugs did such charming things as tossing live infants in a ditch, then smothering them with the bodies of their parents and covering the result over without checking whether it worked or not. Does any of that show up on AP/Reuters/AFP/NYT et al? It is to laugh.
The constant stream of reports from only a single propagandist viewpoint pouring into HQ gives the editors and bosses a gestalt of the situation that’s completely consistent and completely misleading—and other stories which might be submitted are judged against that impression. The result is that the “news” agencies don’t have any news, only Arabist/Islamist propaganda.
If you look at any mainstream “news” agency’s reporting from the Middle East and assume that it’s as slanted as possible against Israel, the United States, and any “moderate” who might be willing to differ, you can triangulate in on a surprisingly accurate, meaning predictive, view of what’s going on. By “predictive” I mean that later stories aren’t utter surprises but follow naturally from the understanding so derived.
The function of that particular Photoshop exercise was nothing more than to add one more black pebble to the overall impression of Israel and the IDF. In the real photo, clearly one building out of literally thousands has been damaged, and the resulting plume of smoke is an important clue that there was something there besides drywall and telephones. In the modified one, the clear impression is of generalized destruction, with the wailing of poor people as they watch their shanties go up in Jewish flames. The real photo gives a picture of determined but careful warmaking. The modified one looks like irresponsible revenge-seekers flattening anything and everything in their path, which is what the Islamist “stringers” have been working their butts off to establish as the Narrative of the Lebanese Incursion.
Regards,
Ric
Gotta Know-
Um – I got much better at cloning. I think I could fool you. Maybe Allah would have some doubts. Only the hard drive in my home computer knows for sure.
unless there is some law that states that news photos should never be altered in any way
Indeed, news photos are not supposed to be retouched in any significant way. For example, the Charlotte Observer just sacked a photographer for enhancing a sunset. A SUNSET.
Changing the direction, pattern, and density of smoke to alter the record of a wartime event – to change the image of the destruction witnessed by the camera is beyond the pale and against the policies of every legitimate news organization (on paper, anyway.)
Here the motive was to alter the scene to shape public opinion about the attack, just the way Ric Locke spells out above.
Spot on, Ric. They have a prime directive: Make sure the Jews look bad. It’s all in a days work, and our fearless stringer is probably shocked that anyone would even think to question him, based on his premise.
The question is, now that he’s been exposed, will anyone bother to notice? Present company excluded, of course…
Brian, the why is: to our post-modern media, modern art IS an accurate representation of reality.
Plain and simple.
-Steve
Just ‘cuz Freud said so.
Well, sure, but your formulation is a little more limited than the reality, Pablo. The directive is to make the West look ineffective and cruel; it’s most important with the Jews, but everybody’s fair game according to their predilections. Thus Americans are flailing violently and uselessly, Jews are simply being vicious, and Europeans in general are too pusillanimous to defend themselves so can be killed with impunity. The point is recruiting. The dumbest potential jihadist has to believe what he does is likely to work before he’ll volunteer. The message the Army of God and likeminded organizations have to get out is that it’s working and only needs a few more small pushes, and maybe you, yes you there, Abdul could be the one whose final touch topples the mighty corrupt edifice.
What the news agencies are all about is quite different. I used to ascribe it all to “bias” like a lot of people, but I’ve since come to understand that it’s complex and multifaceted. Nuanced, if you will. The full discussion is a long essay that I don’t feel like emitting at the moment, but add outsourcing, bias, misplaced idealism, and a bit of extortion, and you’ve got most of it.
Regards,
Ric
SarahW:
I don’t know, I’m pretty hard to fool, but a bit disappointed Allah might know.
Hey, Dickshine, I happen to be on the same side as you. Just because I am skeptical does not mean I am a Kossack. Helluva way to jump to a conclusion, the same inclination you’re likely using toward a goddamn photo.
Fucker.
Brian,
Settle down. The conclusion was reasonable, given the context, if BBH hasn’t been paying close attention to the posting records of commenters. I generally don’t.
The picture is doctored. No reasonable debate is possible. If you don’t agree I feel safe in dismissing you as an idiot. (Actually, all the artifacts Chimpy mentions, above, are present. The interpretations, ah, differ.)
The question is why, and I agree that one doctored picture is a minor thing. What it is, though, is a highly-visible artifact of something that’s been going on for a long time, a loose bit of string that begs to be tugged on in the hope that the whole, profoundly dishonest, “narrative” being spread by the media and the Left will come unraveled. As a single slander it’s of near-nil significance. As an indicator and guide to exposing the rest of the slanders it’s of profound importance.
Regards,
Ric
As much as I disagree with the general political bent of the commentors here, as someone who has studied propaganda for a while, I agree with Ric in that this doctored image is just part of the discourse. It promotes a perception, and therefore an end. I can remember a number of re-purposed images from America’s 9/11.
Apparently Mr. Chimpy is posting his arguement on any blog he can find in order. He posted the same bit on our blog.
As we are a tech blog and not a political one we had our own photoshop expert look at it and call it a fake both in comments and in a different post.
I think it’s pretty sad with one’s political views or personal views prevent you from admiting a fact. It’s the old line from Dr. Who in play:
This is not healthy.
So why is this such an issue? Either side of a conflict have doctored or altered images to favor their own campaign. It’s a non-issue; anyone with blinders off knows how to read this stuff.
Cynn,
Yes, everything is equal–there is no right or wrong. It’s all gray…blah…freaking blah.
Amazon has a great deal, $29.95 for new moral compasses. Buy one.
wishbone: Please defend your position, instead of issuing a facile digital wedgie. Where did I make a judgment call? Don’t both sides try to tweak the discourse, or am I wrong? Nothing the matter with trying it; just don’t hide behind the skirts of righteousness.
And that’s okay with you?
Journalists who are supposed to be preenting a factual description of events, circulate a doctored image aimed at creating a false perception, and you ask
What “campaign” is Reuters engaging in?
You got a wedgie because you deserve a wedgie.
OK, cynn, read carefully…
What you see here is the presentation of propaganda under cover of MSM “reporting.” With the use of ummm, let’s call it “enhanced” photos that supposedly depict indiscriminant IAF bombing, Reuters is serving as a shill for Hezbollah and Israel-bashers everywhere. Get it?
If not, then I suggest you compare coverage of almost daily Hezbollah rocket attacks on northern Israel that WERE indsicriminant with what we see now.
Hint: There was none.
Cynn,
I remember a year or so ago it was revealed that the Pentagon was feeding stories to local reporters in the Middle East. Even though, as I recall, nothing that these reporters were being fed was untrue there was fairly widespread outrage among journalists that the Pentagon was engaging in propoganda and the program was dropped following a great deal of bad publicity.
When the outrage among the MSM begins over being fed this propoganda from the other side, let me know, will ya? I’m not holding my breath.
Didn’t I present a case in the post? Because I’m pretty sure I presented a case in the post.
Jeff,
You did, but it appears it was either not read, or ignored…
Guys, I get it. Even as a total lib, I don’t trust the mainstream press. They seem to want to frame this war. And I’m not buying what they’re selling. So where do I go? Not to you red stiffies conveniently here in the USA. I interact with those who are on the ground in the ME.
Jeff,
One should never let reality get in the way of moral equivalency. Then we have to choose sides and that means maybe America and the Israelis would be right occasionally. And cynn can’t have that.
QED.
And believe me, the last time Cynn and I interacted the earth moved.
Chill, the amusing right is always hyperventilating about something. All I’m saying, is that you 1) Don’t have to reduce yourselves to shitty invective; and 2) you just might admit that both positions use the same tool to advance our ends. And yes, Jeff, I read you!
Ric, I never questioned the photo’s lack of authenticity. I questioned whether it revealed something sinister at work, and whether it was worth being turned into a brouhaha. I got the answer to my question, which I posed in a later thread here on PW.
I am worn down to cynicism about where this will go. The MSM (domestic and int’l) will ignore it. And if you think otherwise, you’re an idiot. We can’t ignore the fact that our enemies play by different rules than us, and are happily enabled by the very media we support with our money, time, and airwaves. The civilized world is playing defense, and getting kicked further back behind scrimmage with each passing day. Playing offense will finally be when we shelve our pretenses about being “right” and push back with overwhelming offense, be it propaganda, or arms.
http://www.rogerlsimon.com/mt-archives/2006/08/mind_games_of_t.php
Really, cynn?
Then, you must be able to point to an example or two of the MSM deliberately altering an image, in order to make Hizb’allah look bad?
For example, an image of an Israeli city that has taken hits from Hizb’allah missiles, with more smoke added (a literal counterpart to the deception perpetrated here)?
Or shots of Israeli children who are casualties, being paraded around by rescue workers for several hours?
Perhaps you could be so kind as to have the MSM presenting conciliatory Israeli politicians (think B’tselem spokespeople) as the standard-bearers, and Hizb’allah hard-liners as their counterparts?
What you’re failing to recognize, in your sophistry, is the following:
We are not talking, here, of nations or political parties or even combatants framing the pictures and stories. We are talking about the press itself taking sides and presenting the bias, without the government/political parties’ actions.
This is not the Israeli Propaganda Ministry, nor Hizb’allah Propaganda Department works. This is the work of Reuters journalists, people who were recently awarded by Reuters for their photographs.
To sustain your argument, you must either accept that Reuters has Hizb’allah propagandists on staff, in which case, the argument that we can trust Reuters goes out the window (especially since Reuters doesn’t seem to have Israeli propagandists on staff), or
you must be arguing that Reuters is too stupid to recognize Hizb’allah propaganda when it publishes Photoshopped pictures (yet, again, somehow doesn’t do the same with Israeli propaganda photos) or
you would have to provide evidence that Reuters has published photos provided by its own photographers that are consistent with Israeli propaganda (i.e., is untrue).
TW: Faith, The Left retains its faith in the veracity of the MSM when documenting the sins of the West, and otherwise has faith that both sides are equally morally culpable when its first belief is betrayed.
Jeff, this post is art, on a whole lot of levels.
Or maybe, just maybe Cynn just likes me better than he will ever like the rest of you.
If you don’t get it, you don’t. It’s not about the press; its about you. Think for yourselves, you morons.
What is it that we don’t get cynn…
…that Israel is blamed universally for the ills of the Middle East, including the Palestinian refugee promblem–a mess created by Arab violations of the UN partition plan in 1948?
…that the MSM prints photos obviously altered to create a certain public opinion effect and then has the gall to offer half-assed justifications for such behavior?
…or that the MSM picks up on a friggin YouTube piece as part of a dark winger plot?
Here’s what I do get: Your side of the debate is totally hypocritical and full of shit. When the Israelis start talking of running the Arabs into the sea or draw maps with borders from the Nile to the Euphrates maybe you’ll have a point. Until then, how about you taking you sanctimonius condemnations and shoving them up your tight ass until they fill the empty spot in your skull?
Linked from Old War Dogs >> Reutergate 4
Brian wonders:
Next we’ll find out that the IDF has put Lebanese babies in their latest batches of MRE’s for the troops in the field.
And you wonder if there’s something sinister at work. Only if you object to propaganda being sold as objective, news-worthy, fact.
Otherwise, carry on.
One could take your position as being that if someone is so ignorant they believe fraudulent propoganda it is okay to fool them. Is this what you are trying to say?
Instead of letting you tell us what to think? Cool. I think we’ve got it covered.
So, Cynn, what you’re saying is that Reuters is part of Hezbollah?
Just to clarify, that is what you just said, right?
Darth,
If you can step back for a moment and read my comments elsewhere in the thread rather than jump to conclusions about a single comment (as Big Bunghole Hunter did), you would see that I presented a healthy skepticism toward the two photos. I’m not inclined to join in the commentariat’s witch hunt as quickly as others, even here at good ol’ PW.
Why is anyone surprised by this?
The MSM long ago gave up even appearing to be impartial observers and recorders of the events of the day. They even openly admit that they are biased toward the Islamofascists now. Of course they are doing their best to try to dismiss and discredit people like Charles Johnson and others in the blogosphere. Why? Because the MSM is little more then a bunch of cockroaches and the blogosphere is constantly shining a spotlight on them. Their propaganda campaigns can not work if people keep on showing them to be fraudulent.
The MSM knows not what it is doing to itself for there will come a time (and it is coming soon) where no one except those who share their same idealogical viewpoints will believe anything they put out. We are already seeing that in the loss of viewers/readers of MSM outlets and the upswing of readers/viewers of the blogosphere and Fox/Sky News. Soon there will come a time where the owners of the MSM decide that it is just not worth it to keep pumping money into businesses that generate no revenue and pull the plug. In five years I fully expect a few major papers to fold, MSNBC to be gone and at least one broadcast network close their news division.
I’d be curious to know just who these folks in the ME are that cynn is getting his info from. From the tone of his posts, I’m betting there are no Israeli’s that he is communicating with.
So spill cynn, who are you talking to and what are they telling you?
As to the doctored photo, I can only say that I hope Reuters learns a lesson about bias and propoganda from this, and I know based on their history that they won’t.
Well, good for you.
Now, how long did it take you to realize they where…retouched[*]? and is it a witch-hunt, per se, to wonder aloud how such poorly done slight-of-hand work slipped past the professional editors[**] at al Reuters?
That leaves us the uncomfortable position that the aforementioned editors are either a) incompetent (and thus untrustworthy), or b) turning a blind eye to obviously manipulated images (and thus untrustworthy). I suppose for completeness sake, I should add in c) so sleep deprived they couldn’t function (and thus only as trustworthy as the source), or d) where under the influence of perception altering drugs (and thus only as trustworthy as the source).
Cases a), c) and d) are curable. Painfully, perhaps, but it is possible. b) can also be cured, but it is about 10 times more difficult. A good reputation is a terrible thing to piss away, and a bad reputation is a very hard thing to lose.
Until the cures have taken effect, it means that al Reuters isn’t worthy to have their works line the bottom of my bird cage.
[*] I actually thought someone was tweaking al Reuters, it was so painfully obvious.
[**] we’re just a bunch o’ unwashed masses…how can we know more than al Reuters and their professional staff?
Damn, damn, damn. The trackback won’t track back. Here’s what it would have tracked back to had a trackback trackbacked wood:
Sometimes “false but accurate” is just bad news
wishbone: Please don’t be talking such catachlysmic smack. Israel is NOT unilaterally blamed for problems in the ME; I certainly don’t, and nor do many actual nation-states around the actual globe. THE GLOBE! It’s a big place. Your precious Israel is unfortunately located, and while I wholeheartedly agree that it has a right to exist, I am allowed to be circumspect in how my country deals with their latest existential issue.
As for the photos and Reuters, I’ll admit I thought the whole initial uproar was about the apparent “soldier” images which I immediately saw. You know, basic propaganda; sex in the ice cubes. Buyer beware. But I still think with media in general, it’s trust, but verify.