Sunday, May 13, 2012

The art of shoveling sh*t

This is about the New York Times and CNN. If you were hoping for some tips on scooping up dog turds, move along, nothing to see here.

Thom Shanker has a macho fluff piece in the NYT today about how America is taking its Afghan & Iraq experience and settling into Honduras to get serious about the war on drugs.

It's a story remarkable for the utter stupidity of its underlying assumptions. Here's just a few:

  • something was learned in Afghanistan and Iraq
  • that knowledge is transferable
  • drug cartels are interchangeable with resistance fighters
  • more guns will solve every problem
  • America knows what's best for the rest of the world

It is reasonable to question whether this increased involvement in Honduras is about drugs at all. If it is, how can the educated and urbane Times readership possibly believe that the further militarization of the war thereon will bring about better results?

Meanwhile, over at the CNN website, Ashley Fantz has an extremely long-winded overview of the Mexican war on the cartels. The story contains nothing new except a revisionist spin that locates its beginning two years before Calderon and Bush hammered out the Merida Initiative, thereby absolving the US of any responsibility.

The reason these news outlets peddle such abject shit is because there is an audience for it. There are people who find these stories entertaining at some level, and that's all news aims to be.

News doesn't have to be new.

News doesn't have to be true.

It just needs to find a consumer.

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