by Suzanne Marsh

Created on: May 19, 2009   Last Updated: May 28, 2009

It is not the media's responsibility, to go beyond what's happening today in order to predict conflicts. The media has gone beyond responsible reporting, for example: the war in Iraq. The media reported on the invasion of Iraq; there was no secrecy maintained and there should have been. When the media reported that the United States was gearing up to enter Iraq, that undoubtedly gave Saddam Hussein a large advantage; there is very little doubt that he removed his weapons of mass destruction, but the media decided that there were no weapons of mass destruction. That it was just an excuse to start a war. Saddam Hussein had plutonium, which he received from France. The question is where did the plutonium go? No one has yet answered that question.

Predicting conflicts is not the job description for media correspondents; they may be able to make an educated guess, but that is all that it is, a guess. When the media gets on the band wagon so to speak about things such as torturing terrorists to get information, why broadcast that? What possible sense did that make? Torture is as old as the history of mankind, but all of a sudden it is not humanitarian, what about what those terrorists did to our soldiers, they were tortured but the media did not bother to point that out.

When George W. Bush was president, he told the media to stop information that would benefit the Iraqis and the terrorists but that only earned Mr. Bush a black eye from the media. Instead of backing Mr. Bush and his decisions, the media blasted him for mistakes that were made. The problem with blasting Mr. Bush was it made the media and the citizens of the United States look ridiculous, it gave the propaganda machine for the terrorists a great deal of fodder. This is not responsible reporting nor did it help with the Iraqi War, no one can predict what will happen in Iraq or Iran or for that matter anywhere else.

Today or tomorrow the media can not predict conflicts, they can hazard an educated guess but there is no accuracy. The reporters sometimes do not get their facts straight but no one ever says anything until the damage is already done, for instance a CIA agent was exposed, that ended several careers, if that CIA agent had stayed in place she might have done some good toward protecting the United States not hindering her.

Freedom of the press is granted in the Constitution, but the question remains: Is the media acting responsibly toward the American public or are they trying to second guess which conflict will take place next. Is war with Iran next? If the media is to be believed, it could very well be. The fact that we are in Iraq does not mean that the United States is planning on going to war in Iran, it merely means that we are in Iraq; we are fighting terrorists; we are protecting ourselves.

The media needs to be more responsible in their reporting and their predicting of future conflicts, since the lives of all Americans depend on it.

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