by James Glaser
October 12, 2005

Most Americans look at what we do as a country and think that we are great and that we are a good example for the rest of the world. Our government and our media foster that good image every chance they get.

That "good image' was seen around the globe for a couple of decades after World War II, and many older people the world over still have good feelings about our country. The Vietnam War changed all of that.

Here at home, every night on the evening news, American mothers and fathers were glued to their televisions, watching for their son's unit in the video clips of combat. The rest of the world watched independent media sources showing dead Vietnamese civilians on their sets. Still it was only the developed countries of the west that could watch what was going on.

Today, a third world family, living in a mud hut can watch anything they want with a satellite feed on a disc. Today the American media no longer is the only source for news about our wars. Arabs, in the Middle East, can watch what is going on in Iraq, from Arab broadcasters, in their own language.

People in the rest of the world no longer have to listen to the American media viewpoint. No longer does the world have to live under the censorship that we do. Very seldom do American News Programs show dead American troops or dead Iraqi kids, but you can see them pretty regularly on independent and Arab stations. It makes one ask, what is "Fair and Balanced"?

Now a days, the whole world can see photos of Iraqis tortured by American troops, along with shots of dead Iraqi civilians. On our media, the only time you will see a dead Iraqi, is when they are reported killed by the Iraqi insurgency. I imagine some of those same shots are reported differently on foreign stations.

When there is a firefight between American troops and Iraqi "terrorists," in the American media coverage, all civilians killed or wounded, were the fault of the terrorists. If you watched only our coverage, you would "know" that we never have any innocent blood on our hands.

That is the way we have been reported about for decades. We were always the good guys, but today there is the other side of the story, and we can no longer control what people in the rest of the world watch.

Yes, we do get to see a little bit of the BBC on Public Television, but they are on our side. Never do we get to see what the rest of the world sees. We only see half of the picture. I am not saying that our media distorts the story more than the Arab press does, but we will never know if we do, because we are not allowed to see anything that is presented to the rest of the world. It seems strange to me that we send our media signal all over the world with something like what Radio Free Europe was, and we send our signals in almost every language. So, the rest of the world gets to look at both sides and decide what is true, while we only get one side of the story. It is almost like our government and media can't trust that we would make the right choice about what to believe.

Today, the rest of the world is looking at what our media, independent media groups, and foreign national stations have to say. I am sure that our news programs are more polished, better produced, and sound very good, while the world's media is still learning the ropes of modern media techniques.

The problem for us is that we no longer have the monopoly we once had, and that means that "our story" is not the only one being seen. People the world over know what is what in a war zone. They know that even if we didn't want to, we would be killing hundreds if not thousands of innocent Iraqis in this war. Billions of people the world over have been to war and know what happens, so they look at our news and wonder how the American people can buy the coverage we get.

They can see that our media sanitizes the war, and makes the American side look just wonderful. They also know that both sides in any war make mistakes. Then those people the world over, look at foreign national and independent coverage, and see a totally different picture of what we are doing. They know for sure we are not speaking the truth about what is going on, because they have lived through war. They don't know if the other side is being honest, but they know we are not.

So, the lack of candor about what is going on in Iraq by our media tarnishes our reputation. You and I only get to see our side of the coverage, so we have no choice, but the rest of the world does and I think they are choosing to look at both sides, which means they have doubts about what our side is saying.

The distortions and censorship of our media is hurting our National image.