Getting The News From The Enemy, Update VI

A must read in the ongoing saga of AP shenanigans is in the NY Post today written by Robert Bateman who covered the AP’s deliberate use of a fraud to report on a supposed Korean war massacre:

THE most powerful media institution in all of human history is the Associated Press. Its news feed is ubiquitous – used, directly or indirectly, by every U.S. newspaper and TV news program and a vast number of foreign ones, too. AP maintains the largest world-wide coverage, and its reader base is nearly immeasurable. Unfortunately, and repeatedly of late, this behemoth has not only been getting it wrong – but increasingly refuses to acknowledge any wrongdoing.

Instead, acting more like a politician or the mega-corporation that it is, the AP crew spins, obfuscates and attacks. Now they’re at it again in Iraq.

I have got direct experience of this – from challenging the AP’s seriously flawed 1999 "scoop" about the massacre near the South Korean village of No Gun Ri during the opening days of the Korean War.

Bad things did happen at No Gun Ri, of this there can be no doubt. My own research and other historians’, as well as the joint U.S.-Korean government investigation, confirms that a tragedy occurred – there were civilians who were killed there, by our side, and that was wrong.

But the AP’s sensationalistic story painted it as a deliberate massacre, done with machine guns at extremely close range.

The most sensational account started in the 57th paragraph of the 3,448-word story, sourced to one Edward Daily. As AP told it, Daily was the only soldier at No Gun Ri who directly received orders from his officers to turn his water-cooled .30 caliber machinegun on the civilians and shoot them down in cold blood at point-blank range.

Daily’s account was chilling. It was also – as AP should have known – a fantasy.

The AP story took at face value Daily’s claims that he was a combat infantryman who won a battlefield commission just a few days after the events at No Gun Ri, and had been awarded the Distinguished Cross and three Purple-Hearts.

In reality, he was an enlisted mechanic in an entirely different unit, nowhere near No Gun Ri. He had fabricated his biography and credentials as well as his entire account of the events at No Gun Ri.

When I later confronted AP editors with the facts and records that showed their source Daily to be a fraud, they blew me off. What would a historian know about this topic after all, or a soldier?

The AP didn’t issue a retraction, or even attempt to reinvestigate; and it certainly didn’t withdraw the story from the Pulitzer competition. Instead, it attacked the messenger.

Many of us have known that the MSM spins stories in such a way that it supports the leftist agenda. But with the Jamil Hussein story we have the AP making up news to support that same agenda. The reporter made it up out of whole cloth and sold it to his editors who could care less if its real or not. It fits in with their view of Iraq.

When I and many others confronted the AP about this story they reacted with smug arrogance. Who are we to question them? We are not there. When asked to produce the one person who could put this whole thing to rest we received silence.

Now we have this account from Mr. Bateman about the same kind of behavior. They used a fraudulent source to write a blood and guts article in which the US is seen as despicable. A typical leftist view. When confronted they tried every trick in the book to get Mr. Bateman to retract his story almost at the same time that the AP’s source for the article was pleading guilty to fraud charges for taking $300,000. Three hundred grand was given to him by taxpayers money for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder for combat he never saw in Korea.

They used a fraud in 1999, they used a fraud in 2006. We can only imagine how many frauds they use every single day in reporting the news for the world.

A quote comes to mind about the AP of today:

The AP has a monopoly on the news of the world. They know it, we know it. So they can do whatever the hell they want to spin the news THEY see fit.

Question is, what are we going to do about it?

UPDATE 0940hrs PST

A new article just out by the AP by Sameer Yacoub alleges that US forces killed 7 women and 8 children:

U.S.-led coalition forces killed 20 insurgents, including two women, Friday in fighting and airstrikes that targeted al-Qaida in Iraq militants northwest of Baghdad, the military said. The mayor of the area said 19 civilians were killed, including seven women and eight children.

[…]Under continuing fire, the troops called in air support, killing 18 insurgents, including two women, the command said in a brief statement. The military declined to specify which branch of the coalition was involved, but the U.S. provides the bulk of the air support in most of the country.

[…]The raid was conducted in an area where intelligence reports had indicated that "associates with links to multiple al-Qaida in Iraq networks were operating," U.S. command said.

Amir Fayadh, the mayor of the al-Ishaqi area, east of the lake, and local police said 19 civilians were killed during airstrikes on two houses, and Fayadh said the dead included seven women and eight children.

You will recall that Mr. Yacoub was the author of three articles involving Jamil Hussein.   Something smells fishy.

Curt

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