Middle East

In an article that, frankly, surprised me, the Los Angeles Times's Tim Rutten comes down hard on fellow journalists for failing to take the Reutersgate scandal seriously enough. Here, Rutten dismisses Reuters' explanations for why the altered photos were used:There are, however, two problems here, and they're the reason this controversy shouldn't be allowed to sputter to its inglorious…

It is hard to overstate the importance of what Little Green Footballs' site operator Charles Johnson learned from a clearly knowledgeable person in the news business, and revealed in a post yesterday morning. Anyone who attempts to understand events in the Middle East but is unaware of what Johnson has exposed is being shortchanged, and very likely misled. It was only a week ago that Johnson…

It doesn't take much to offend liberals' exquisite sensitivities. The latest? Referring to Islamofascists as . . . Islamofascists. Chris Matthews got the ball rolling on this evening's Hardball. But Charlie Rangel upped the ante to the max, managing to impugn Christians and Jews in the bargain. Fortunately, GOP Congressman Dan Lungren had the guts to call Rangel on it.Matthews got things started…

"Okay, for this next shot, we're going to need you over here." "Good use of ketchup on that corpse."

It's important to remember that photographs don't necessarily have to be modified to be propaganda. Consider this one, sent out by the Associated Press from their coverage of the London protests. Notice how the photograph was taken from a low angle? The photographer clearly intended to present a "David vs. Goliath" scenario, with the United States predictably being shoe-horned into Goliath's…

Putting aside more conspiratorially-minded critics of the mainstream media, genuine practical concerns and mounting evidence suggest Western media has been co-opted by Hezbollah in Lebanon to a significant agree. So much so, in fact, that it may be unable to paint an accurate picture of the current conflict. The two year old image at right is from a Reuters video of Palestinian terrorists…

Quick Take: Reuters' initial reaction to the UK airliner bomb plot arrests was to tie it to Tony Blair and Israel's actions in Lebanon. A later story, perhaps in response to blog criticism of the original, added the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan as "reasons." Nowhere is the idea that Islamic Jihadism, independent of day-to-day events in the Middle East, is involved. More important, and worse --…

That truth is the first casualty of war has been borne home by the proliferating 'fauxtography' scandal of photographs of the current Middle East crisis doctored or staged so as to portray Israel in the worst possible light. At this point, can we look at any image from the area without a good dose of doubt?Take this morning's report on the Today show. NBC's Richard Engel, in Tyre, Lebanon,…