Clark County Conservative

Sometimes, a headline is published that just makes the reader go “DUH!” Something so blatantly obvious you just have to wonder how long the rocket scientist who wrote took to figure out a simple and obvious truth.

Such is the case in a recent Stars & Stripes headline, Panetta to Warn That Bad Press Hurts War Effort.

Those of us who served in Vietnam, recalling how our service and effort over there was distorted, misreported, blown out of proportion and sometimes outright fabricated can look at such a headline and say, “ya think?”

Since the attacks of September 11, 2001 and the launch of the War on Terror in both Afghanistan and Iraq, we have repeatedly witnessed the lamestream media once again picking and choosing how they report our Troops efforts and service.

After the 9/11 Terrorist attacks, we invaded Afghanistan on October 7, 2001 to deny Al Qaeda a safe haven and seek capture of Osama bin Laden. October 30, 2001 saw the New York Times run A Military Quagmire Remembered: Afghanistan as Vietnam, already distorting our Troops actions.

Quagmire became a familiar description applied both to Iraq and Afghanistan while Democrats in the House and Senate joined in labeling the war “lost,”, a “quagmire,” “mismanaged” and even to the point of identifying our Troops as “cold blooded murderers,” as did now deceased Pennsylvania Democrat Representative Jack Murtha in 2006.