Why is anyone amazed at media lies? Those who comprise the
media have lied to the American people since before the Vietnam War. It was the
Vietnam war, however, that gave new impetus to media lies.
Media lies about the conflict in Vietnam seemed to skyrocket
during the North Vietnamese Tet Offensive. Before Tet, the North's National
Liberation Front and the North Vietnamese Army spent months infiltrating South
Vietnam. Beginning on January 31, 1968 Communist North Vietnamese soldiers and
infiltrators attacked 100 cities in South Vietnam. The offensive lasted 26 days
with Communist casualties in the multiple thousands and U.S. killed numbering
150. The worst fighting centered on Hue resulting in the death of thousands of
Communist soldiers and civilians. One photograph shocked the American public.
It was a photograph of a captured North Vietnamese infiltrator being brutally
shot on the streets of Saigon. The captured Communist's hands were tied behind
his back.
The American media showed this picture, which won a Pulitzer
prize for photography, with little comment. Never mind that the man, a Viet
Cong infiltrator and since out of uniform considered a spy, summarily faced
immediate execution which is the fate most captured spies face in wartime.
In addition, the American press highlighted civilian deaths
with little concern as to who caused those deaths. It is strange, too, since
the press made little note of the massive civilian deaths in the fire bombing
of Dresden or the atomic destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki during World War
II. The press, because of liberal opposition to the war, reported what it
wanted to report and put a massive spin on the rest.
Listening to the great Walter Conkite on the evening news,
you heard again and again how American forces lost the Tet Offensive, the
greatest media lie of the period. The American media, and a minority of
Americans, opposed the Vietnam War, but the media bears the responsibility for
stirring up opposition to the war.
(One of the best sources to help gain understanding of
American military strategy and an evaluation of American forces in Vietnam is
Victor Dais Hanson, "Carnage and Culture." In this book Hanson notes
through case studies of western battles from the times of Greeks to the present,
that American strength on the battlefield is not simply the result of superior
armaments and technology. American strength relies on that to be sure, but
under girding the technology is America's freedom, entrepreneurial spirit,
resilience, and willingness to consider points of view regardless of rank.)
From Vietnam to the present, the media has adopted whatever
the left wants. They have twisted the truth repeatedly in their lies to the
American people. Over the years from 1968 to the present the lies only got
worse. Now, with few exceptions, the media cannot be trusted to give us
unbiased "facts only" truth.
I know it is difficult to avoid sprinkling personal bias in
the stores reported. When I took a class in reporting at Kansas State
University it became obvious to me how any reporting from the majority of
students tended to move left. I seriously doubt many recognized their
perspective as bias because they had been inundated with such thinking since
grade school.
My point: Listen for the spin and do your best to identify
the bias. By the way, reporting and opinion pundits on Fox aren't innocent of
presenting a biased perspective. Theirs just tends to move more toward the
right. Thus, be careful and seek out facts on your own. And...if you are
Christian, let Romans 13 help you sort out the role of government and apply it
to the political realities of today.
