This is precisely the reason why the US needs to immediately set up newspapers and tv-radio communication. The Iraqis need to know what's going on in their own country now and what they can expect from the Americans in the future.

Yup - we need to get our story out about Iraq's future. Those mullahs are filling the information vacuum with rhetorical napalm.

It sure will be an uphill sell. We'll be trying to communicate to a region (from Morocco to Pakistan) where people believe that Jews drink blood and the U.S. faked Neil Armstrong walking on the moon.

A start has been made, some news is on the Iraqi TV and radio frequencies and it is no longer a problem to have a satellite dish: with electricity slowly coming back on-line (among other problems it needs oil) and presses too, things will hopefully be more open.

I'd like to add that if al-Jazeera had been around at the time it would have covered the story, it is the type of thing that keeps getting them denounced by government-controlled media (and the governments themselves, of course) in the area - not just our Mr. Rumsfeld.

Better to start at U.S. first, then Iraq. Do you really think you know whats going on even in U.S.? By CNN? Or Fox? huh...

Free them from Iraqi propaganda; and make them prisons of American Propaganda.

It really, really hurts, doesn't it Aslan.

Yep, Asian!!!! I'm strongly iin favor of subjecting the Iraqis to American propaganda for the next 6 months or so and limiting the local broadcasts to those controlled by Americans. It won't counteract years of Sadaam's propaganda but the stark contrast may lead at least some to question whether we Americans are really that bad.

Yes Aslan, the west is pure evil, only the peace loving muslims who slaughter millions apon millions over the last 1400 years are angels.....Try convice those from India, for example, who have lost over 80 million people over those years at the hands of the muslims just how peacefull they are.

Aslan is little better than a troll. Don't feed him. But is he slightly more evolved or slightly less? It's hard to say...

He doesn't ever bother to provide any evidence for anything he says. Just saying so makes it so, in what passes for his mind...

I can't say I'm terrifically fond of Don, but Don is no troll and he nearly always gives you something on which to tack an argument. Don is always thinking how best to answer his critics, and I do think he is honestly trying to persuade.

Unlike this dipshit Aslan. And I'm pissed that I will inevitably think of him when rereading a classic I loved as a child, thanks to his username.

Aslan, no I do not trust any single source to tell the whole truth, or even be capable of it whether biased or not. That is why I am grateful for a free press - I am not limited to a single view, and certainly not to only government-approved news and opinion. And with the Internet, I can now compare and contrast even more coverage, and find things I never knew before. For example, did you know that the UK still has debtor;s prisons, and they are being expanded even as police in London and some other places hav been told not to answer nurglar alarms or 999 calls? And of course, the resulting fall in burglary arrests is spun by the government as a great success in lowering the crime rate? Or that the Observer (part of the Guardian) admits that poll results shows two-thirds of Brits want the death penalty back? OK, these examples are not the US: how about the Santorum flap? Cheney-Halliburton male-bovine-excrement? And a lot of other stuff.

Drop "the press is conservatively biased and controlled" stance, it is even less compelling than "the press is all controlled by lefties".

Wow!! I see everyone is so pissed off here! What I said does not have to do anything with America/Americans being evil or anything like that; that was not the point. Whoever that has given themselves the chance to look for news -rather than waiting to be given the news-, knows that most of the American media are way far from reporting fair. That does not mean Arab media, like Al-Jazeera and others, are fair at all !! Aljazeera is worst than CNN, in the opposite direction. I simply don't believe in CNN, FOX, CBS, and most of the other ones since time after time It has been proved that they are not fair and they tell us the news that we need to hear and the news they want us to know. Fortunately we live in a time that we have access to thousands of sources and we see what really goes on around the world, at least to some point; however, I don't think that is going to happen in Iraq, at least in near future. The way I see it, Iraq will still have a one-voice media; and as far as I am concerned that is not fair, whether it’s American or Iraqi or anyone else's voice. Just as the bastard, Saddam, brain-washed them, any other one-voice media will do too in they way it wants.

By the way Gabriel;
Aslan is my name; I am sorry if that pisses you off.

"Fortunately we live in a time that we have access to thousands of sources and we see what really goes on around the world, at least to some point; however, I don't think that is going to happen in Iraq, at least in near future. The way I see it, Iraq will still have a one-voice media;"

Well, the part about we have many news sources is what I said in my reply above. I also mentioned that Iraqis now have freer access to this than most of the area, because we will not have laws against them having satellite dishes, Internet access, etc. - and I don't think they will necessarily muzzle themselves later.

Yeah, they are more likely to try to get al-Jazeera than CNN, but they will have the choice - and the further choice of watching both.

"The way I see it, Iraq will still have a one-voice media..."

Only for a very little while, if t all. Yes, right now the official Iraq TV and radio is being run by us - but that will change, and we aren't about to block other access.

<bad pun>Don't believe all of Aslan's Turk, he's Lion.</bad pun>

Actually, he has a point, though John Anderson's reply is apt.

What Iraq needs is the UK Sun newspaper. Raw news, lots of pics.

I read that there were going to be numerous news organizations broadcasting, and that they would be in arabic. These along with AJZ will be an interesting, shall we say, mix of voices and I for one look forward to seeing what develops from it.

Back to the point: I think one of the most devastating things done to Iraqis --in addition to the horrors we now can read about in many different sources--was the way they were lied to; and the foreign fighters who ran to their deaths can be put in the same category. So the news media in the US is biased? HELLO -- there is no such thing as absolute objectivity, but when people have not even heard of the gassings of Kurds and are hardpressed to believe it now, one wonders what objection Aslan has to a free press version of the facts being beamed into Iraq to prevent further ignorance.

You see, the Kurds did get gassed by a hideous tyrant. We know that. Many Iraqis had not. Can you spot the difference, and offer a reason why this is so, Aslan? Or do we need Chomsky to interpret for you?

Just to note , I agree that the Arab press buried this. But the American press buried the story of many more Turkish Kurd civilians being killed with weapons we provided.