Ya know…if the media would spend a half, a quarter, a scintilla of the amount of time reporting on soldiers, marines, airman and sailors wounded in the line of duty as they have on Bob Woodruff, I may have more respect for them.
It’s like all of a sudden there’s an IED problem in Iraq. Really? Gosh, thanks kids, never noticed it before. What would we have done without Bob Woodruff’s experience opening our eyes? (/end dripping sarcasm)
When I am done worrying about troops I will worry about these guys.
Until then, I do not wish them ill and hope their families visit them in hospital so they will not be lonely.
Beyond that, I feel indifference.
Comment by Michael — 20060131 @ 0926
The Boston Globe today ran a sidebar to the Woodruff story, detailing all the levels of medical care provided by the military. Started with medics providing first aid, up through the big military hospital in Germany.
There are probably Globe readers today saying, “I never knew the news media was so organized.”
Comment by Bob Hawkins — 20060131 @ 1448
On my refrigerator, held down with a couple of magnets is a “Non Sequitur” comic strip from a couple of years ago, showing a couple with their dog watching TV: The caption is “Your Place in the Media’s Grand Scheme of Things…”, and the television newscaster is saying
“Fortunatly, none of the fatalities were celebrities, so lets go to sports…”
Gads, the cartoonist was amazingly prescient, wasn’t he?
Comment by Sgt. Mom — 20060131 @ 1839
I tell you, if they would just report, in detail, on something as non-controversial as the marvelous medical system we’ve introduced to the battlefield…
A wounded soldier, as late as WWII, could be pretty sure that they were more likely than not to bleed out before they got definitive trauma response.
In today’s American military, an injured serviceperson “on the front” has a better chance of getting rapid, professional, comprehensive care than many suffering equivalent trauma as a result of a sports injury, or industrial accident, here at home.
Woodruff, Vogt, and their families should be eternally thankful for that system. And we should all take great pride in it.
Comment by Kevin Connors — 20060131 @ 1925
I just love the word “prescient.”
One of my favorites.
Comment by Timmer — 20060131 @ 2007
I think y’all are out of line.
You know, most of the reportage we get from Iraq is filed from the hotel bar and comes secondhand from the guys who were the reporters’ handlers during the Hussein Regime.
Woodruff actually went out there instead of editorializing, like most reporters (and to be honest, like me… I’m just sitting here running my mouth). He got injured as a result.
We need to encourage more of that. (The risk-taking, not the resulting injuries).
Comment by Phil Fraering — 20060201 @ 1031
One of my best friends son is a lawyer. She claims he is a good one and and honest one.
Perhaps.
But he is still a lawyer.
Comment by Michael — 20060202 @ 1001
Ya darn right, Timmer! Let’s have reports on the good things our troops are doing in Iraq, in mortal danger all the time that they’re trying to rebuild a country that has known so little of the freedoms that we’re trying to help them establish.
Then, when it’s all over and the last of our troops have come home, we can talk about the media’s role in helping Iraq. Not that it’s all bad, but it could be better.
Comment by Joe Comer — 20060204 @ 0145