General Sanchez: The REST of the Story

Paul Harvey fans will recognize our headline allusion to a regular feature of his mini-radiocasts. For the uninitiated, Paul spins out an unusual, often gripping story about a famous person without mentioning his name. Cut to a commercial, then back for "the rest of the story," the punchline, in effect.

I drove back into work this morning to finish some stuff I should've finished yesterday. On all-news WTOP-FM, I heard reporters breathlessly pitching the comments of Lt. General Ricardo Sanchez, who roundly savages Congress and, most importantly (for the MSM), the Bush administration for the inept management of our current war efforts. WTOP also posted on its website an AP report underlining the General's anti-administration remarks.

Sanchez—now retired—headed up the military in Iraq before being replaced by General Petraeus. He was, unfairly we think, tarred with blame for the Abu Ghraib kerfuffle, which the media has trumpeted nonstop since 2004 to undercut the war effort. (But they support the troops.)

I was pretty torqued off when I heard this report. But, I suppose, like anyone else accused of malfeasance or forced from office or command, the General is entitled to his say.

Checking out the blogosphere after hearing this report, I was astounded to discover that the General had actually reserved his greatest vitriol for the MSM's lazy, casually destructive Marxist propagandists. The Democracy Project blog has posted this menu pick, and we're going to deliver some tasty slices here. Funny. Not a single word of this emerged in the AP report. Nor have the Stalinist pond scum at Media Matters had anything to say about this reportorial dereliction of duty.

So, HazZzMat fans, let's get down with "the rest of the story," with a hat tip to Democracy Project and to Instapundit's Glenn Reynolds who pointed us there. (Note: for some reason, the cited remarks appear in ALL CAPS.) Referring to MSM "assessments" of what's going on in Iraq, the General notes the following:

MY PERCEPTION IS THAT THE SENSATIONALISTIC VALUE OF THESE ASSESSMENTS IS WHAT PROVIDED THE EDGE THAT YOU SEEK FOR SELF AGRANDIZEMENT OR TO ADVANCE YOUR INDIVIDUAL QUEST FOR GETTING ON THE FRONT PAGE WITH YOUR STORIES! AS I UNDERSTAND IT, YOUR MEASURE OF WORTH IS HOW MANY FRONT PAGE STORIES YOU HAVE WRITTEN AND UNFORTUNATELY SOME OF YOU WILL COMPROMISE YOUR INTEGRITY AND DISPLAY QUESTIONABLE ETHICS AS YOU SEEK TO KEEP AMERICA INFORMED. THIS IS MUCH LIKE THE INTELLIGENCE ANALYSTS WHOSE EFFECTIVENESS WAS MEASURED BY THE NUMBER OF INTELLIGENCE REPORTS HE PRODUCED. FOR SOME, IT SEEMS THAT AS LONG AS YOU GET A FRONT PAGE STORY THERE IS LITTLE OR NO REGARD FOR THE "COLLATERAL DAMAGE" YOU WILL CAUSE. PERSONAL REPUTATIONS HAVE NO VALUE AND YOU REPORT WITH TOTAL IMPUNITY AND ARE RARELY HELD ACCOUNTABLE FOR UNETHICAL CONDUCT.

As a journalist himself, Wonker can assure you that most editors will instinctively give top billing to a story that raises hell. Whether the hell it raises is ultimately valid or fair is of little matter if it sells papers and ads. If it undermines the troops or the administration, that's their problem, not the reporter's. If the reportage proves false or incomplete, it is surreptitiously corrected if indeed it is corrected at all. Whatever its validity, it has a way of becoming the perceived truth. As the General is all too aware:

ONCE REPORTED, YOUR ASSESSMENTS BECOME CONVENTIONAL WISDOM AND NEARLY IMPOSSIBLE TO CHANGE. OTHER MAJOR CHALLENGES ARE YOUR WILLINGNESS TO BE MANIPULATED BY "HIGH LEVEL OFFICIALS" WHO LEAK STORIES AND BY LAWYERS WHO USE HYPERBOLE TO STRENGHTEN THEIR ARGUMENTS. YOUR UNWILLINGNESS TO ACCURATELY AND PROMINENTLY CORRECT YOUR MISTAKES AND YOUR AGENDA DRIVEN BIASES CONTRIBUTE TO THIS CORROSIVE ENVIRONMENT. ALL OF THESE CHALLENGES COMBINED CREATE A MEDIA ENVIRONMENT THAT DOES A TREMENDOUS DISSERVICE TO AMERICA. OVER THE COURSE OF THIS WAR TACTICALLY INSIGNIFICANT EVENTS HAVE BECOME STRATEGIC DEFEATS FOR AMERICA BECAUSE OF THE TREMENDOUS POWER AND IMPACT OF THE MEDIA AND BY EXTENSION YOU THE JOURNALIST.

The General elaborates:

IN MY BUSINESS ONE OF OUR FUNDAMENTAL TRUTHS IS THAT "THE FIRST REPORT IS ALWAYS WRONG." UNFORTUNATELY, IN YOUR BUSINESS "THE FIRST REPORT" GIVES AMERICANS WHO RELY ON THE SNIPPETS OF CNN, IF YOU WILL, THEIR "TRUTHS" AND PERSPECTIVES ON AN ISSUE. AS A COROLLARY TO THIS DEADLINE DRIVEN NEED TO PUBLISH "INITIAL IMPRESSIONS OR OBSERVATIONS" VERSUS OBJECTIVE FACTS THERE IS AN ADDITIONAL CHALLENGE FOR US WHO ARE THE SUBJECT OF YOUR REPORTING. WHEN YOU ASSUME THAT YOU ARE CORRECT AND ON THE MORAL HIGH GROUND ON A STORY BECAUSE WE HAVE NOT RESPOND[ed] TO QUESTIONS YOU PROVIDED IS THE ULTIMATE ARROGANCE AND DISTORTION OF ETHICS.

Now the General gets to his "money graf."

THE DEATH KNELL OF YOUR ETHICS HAS BEEN ENABLED BY YOUR PARENT ORGANIZATIONS WHO HAVE CHOSEN TO ALIGN THEMSELVES WITH POLITICAL AGENDAS. WHAT IS CLEAR TO ME IS THAT YOU ARE PERPETUATING THE CORROSIVE PARTISAN POLITICS THAT IS DESTROYING OUR COUNTRY AND KILLING OUR SERVICEMEMBERS WHO ARE AT WAR.

Precisely right. This is how the MSM is "supporting our troops." By killing them.

Bottom line: It seems that Lt. General Sanchez is supremely pissed at today's entire political and journalistic construct when it comes to discussing the Iraqi theater. And indeed, the entire Global War On Terror (GWOT)—which descriptor, BTW, the Democrats and the MSM quietly agreed to abolish earlier this year so as not to dignify "Bush's War" with a greater purpose.

The bulk of Sanchez' remarks and vitriol, however, are clearly directed toward the juvenile delinquents who run today's media empires and who "report" for them. For these lazy, overcompensated leftists, the primary directives are money, fame, and career, not to mention an important value-added benefit: the cooing and fawning adoration they get from their colleagues and the Democrats' cocktail circuit whenever they successfully destroy a Republican or a military reputation. What of the future of America and its free society? Who cares? Pass me a free-range carrot.

Click this link to read the whole thing. Don't expect to see much of this part of the General's jeremiad on CNN. Small wonder the 'Rats are trying to extinguish the conservative blogosphere. Without it, you'd have no chance of learning the unvarnished truth at all.