Posted by sam at May 31st, 2004

“The once-chained people whose leaders at last lose their grip on information flow will soon burst with freedom and vitality, but the free nation gradually constricting its grip on public discourse has begun its rapid slide into despotism. Beware of he who would deny you access to information, for in his heart he dreams himself your master.” — Commissioner Pravin Lal, Sid Meier

    It’s amazing to me that now, more than ever, a war has become so highly information driven. 

    Think about it, if you were on the top, and you wanted to wage a war, how would you do it?  The world has seen an information revolution in recent years and it has changed everything.  Information is the most important resource we have.  It shapes our views, and ultimately our actions. 

    The first thing you learn in a college english class is how to write persuasively.  In other words, you learn a bunch of tricks to make you seem more credible, and your opinions correct.  This is a focus of english and journalism classes throughout college.

    What the media reports is infinitely important to the battles that are being fought in our current war situation.  By reporting in a way that promotes the war (read: not promotes war, but promotes THE war) American lives are saved, and I will tell you why in a moment.  By reporting in a way that makes us hate the war, lives are lost.

    Let’s look at our supreme example of being united in cause for war.  World War II, now I know you hippies out there are thinking; “Let’s not live in the past man, the future is here”.  They don’t like history lessons because it shows people like them being wrong time after time, and people like me being right again and again.  So take a lesson, hippie - the Romans were a bunch of hippies and they got their ass kicked by fate.

    Back to World War II.  We were united as a country because we had been attacked on our own soil.  A clear enemy had come out of nowhere and hit us where it hurt, destroying a MAJOR part of our navy.  This is the equivalent of throwing rocks at a beehive, and then throwing the beehive at an angry bear, and then throwing the bear into an even angrier bear.  The point is, it’s bad news for you.

    I won’t get into all the semantics of “Well, the US was counting on the attack to enter the war” - because thats not what happened in the eyes of the US people.  Again, this is why information is so important - the government realized it back then, and they should try to get a handle on it now. 

    So everyone was behind the war effort. People were on food rations, women started working in the factories, and the men got shipped overseas to kick some jap/nazi-ass.   We were in it full force, baby, and we were going to  finish this thing.  This we did, we finished it with our confidence and willingness to sacrifice.

    I imagine a much different world war II had the US not been behind it’s own cause.  We would have been a weak, and unsure enemy to the Nazi’s.  They would attack us with information first to make us doubt ourselves, and then attack us physically, to make us wet ourselves.  We saw a cancer growing in Europe, and we knew we had to put a stop to it before all of Europe was conquered - then it would be a real headache.

    Let us come up to our current times now.  I can’t stop hearing about these prison photos and scandals that have taken place over in Iraq.  Granted, these are some very bad things.  But because of improper handling, more American’s died.  Nicholas Berg (or whats his name?  Haven’t heard  it on the news at all…) was one of them.  Enraged Muslim towelheads already have an idea of us as a pretty wicked, sex-driven nation, and this only reinforced their views.  They felt more justified in cutting off some heads and torturing some innocent contractors. 

    A weak, self-doubting enemy is easy to beat.  Attack at their heart first, and then attack their assets.  EVEN IF a war is unjustified - it is important that we pull through it because it’s our men and women out there getting killed to defend our vision of liberty.  Call it what you want, our sense of oil or greed or whatever.  The fact is we’re in a mess right now, and poking an proding at it don’t help, they only make it worse.  We punched the tar baby, but the media stuck our head right in.

    This is why everyone in the left wing anti-war media should be immediately executed for treason.  They are fighting against us with information, our most important asset.  An American contractor was kidnapped by Iraqi soldiers, and when they brought him in the car, the australian media was there rolling cameras.  They knew the ambush was going to happen, but did nothing to stop it.  I’ve heard of the nature-film code of never interfering but these are people we are talking about.  This is torture and murder!

    The media wants to show how fair and balanced they are by showing both sides of the story.  What the fail to realize is the only side they’re showing is the wrong side.  Don’t’ show American soldiers screwing up in a time of war, we have plenty of time to go over that stuff later.  Right now we need to get our job done and get out of there.  This is war, and everyone wants us to fight nice.  They want us to follow the geneva convention, follow the rules, don’t kill a single civilian - yet they afford us no such privileges.  We never hear the end of it when we screw up.

    Recently we were accused of bombing a wedding.  A read an article that was so ridiculous on foxnews; something like “Children romped in the autumn sun and women laughed as the pigdog Americans ripped through the woods and mowed them all down, raping their skulls, and burning their churches.  No men were present, only women and children were slaughtered.”   Well, if no men were present, then Iraq must have beat us to the whole lesbian marriage thing.  Why don’t all you Osama-Bin liberals move over there.  Nobody will be crying when we bomb you.

    These people are the kind of crazy nuts who will hijack planes and fly them into buildings full of innocent people, trying to make a living for their families.  And they go nuts on us because we bomb a “wedding” full of militant rebels?  It boggles the mind how they want us to fight clean day in and day out, and they’re still up to their dirty tricks.  The American people who can’t handle a war shouldn’t be the ones whose opinions are heard.  They are useless to us.

    I am proud to be an American right now, under the leadership of George Bush.  I think people will realize it when they hit the polls, too.  Are you really going to feel safe under peacenik hippie- carrey?  No your not, and thats why your not going to vote for him, because as much as you hate Bush, you want to be able to sleep at night.  You still want your children to be safe from all the bad people out there.  If not, go ahead and vote for Carrey, you deserve what will happen to you.  I’ll be shaking my head from the grave.