Michelle Malkin has a link to leftist reporter Christiane Amanpour's meltdown on Larry King Live. Amanpour as a member of a media panel -- that included CBS' Bob Schiffer and Peter "Baby-Milk Factory" Arnett -- lets the mask fall as she spins a negative response to a phone-in questioner wondering why news reporters' activities in Iraq receive more coverage than the soldiers' everyday heroism.
There's nothing new here, but one thing she said got me so angry I need to respond. Leftists like her love to whine that DoD doesn't permit reporters to report on the return of coffins from Iraq:
KING: We're back with our panel. Powell, Ohio, hello.
CALLER: Hello, my question is for the panel this evening. The first thing I want to say is I want to commend President Bush and all of the United States military on all of the hard work and success that we've had with the war against terrorism in Iraq.
And my question is, why are the civilian reporters given more media attention than the American soldiers who are the everyday heroes that are wounded on a daily basis?
KING: You mean the media person who's wounded more attention than the soldier who's wounded? Is that what you mean?
CALLER: That's correct. It seems to me that the civilian media reporters are given more attention than the average, everyday American soldier.
KING: I'll have everybody answer it.
Bob Schieffer, what do you think?
SCHIEFFER: Well, I think, first of all, Bob Woodruff is someone that most Americans know. And when someone is known, they're going to get more publicity. But I think the caller makes a very good point, and this should be a reminder to all of us that every day there are military families who are going through just what Bob Woodruff's wife and his family are going through right now.
This is not something that just happens once or twice. This is something that's happening every single day of our lives. And it just underscores the terrible things that are happening in this war.
And so by focusing attention on one person, perhaps the caller would be reassured to know that it is causing other people to think about what is happening to these military families.
KING: Christiane?
AMANPOUR: Well, I think it's an incredibly good question. The caller is absolutely right. And, as Bob Schieffer has just said, of course we focus on very well known people and members of our own community.
But the reason that the deaths and injuries of the American soldiers don't get as much publicity is because we are by and large banned from seeing it.
The United States government has made a decision that we are not allowed to see the coffins, that we're not allowed to see the burials, that we're generally not allowed to go to any of the areas where there are wounded, U.S. military hospitals.
Perhaps you can see a little bit more in Landstuhl in Germany. Perhaps when we go to the hospitals in the United States. But it's very, very difficult to get close to that kind of real tragedy that the American servicemen and women are going through as well.
KING: Why, Lara, can't you see them?
LOGAN: Well, I just want to say that Christiane is absolutely right, and on top of that there's a real irony in that caller's question. Because it's the military themselves that pressure us not to keep reporting the deaths of soldiers, not to focus on the deaths of soldiers and Iraqis ever single day in this conflict.
They tell us you don't tell the good news, you don't show the schools that are opening, you don't do this, you don't do that, why are you always focusing on the death?
And you try and say to them, it's because as a reporter I just feel like every time somebody else dies, I have a responsibility to make sure that death wasn't in vain. That somehow, in some way, it's acknowledged.
God knows, there's nothing else to report on in Iraq... from the bar in the Green Zone hotel. Right, Ms. Amanpour? DoD is smart to filter this information from lazy leftist reporters, because there would be no other type of reporting from Iraq. But it's apparent that leftists want to see dead bodies and coffins. So as a service to my former leftist friends, here are a few images of the dead:
From Bali:
From Madrid:
And a few Americans coming home...from Kenya and Tanzania:
