Reality Sets In

The people around us are really stupid. I heard a woman on the subway platform talking about what the soldiers must have done when they rescued Pfc. Jessica Lynch. First she called Lynch "that poor girl," then emitted a stream of bile about "stupid fucking Iraqi" and "bayonets," punctuating her remarks with stabbing motions. It was quite disgusting. By the way, I'm incensed by the media portrayal of this war. More and more, Iraqis are shown as less than human, and American GIs are as the apostles themselves. Tabloids like the New York Post -- which are taken seriously by many New Yorkers --print stories that sensationalize every positive US military move, as if this sort of thing doesn't happen in war all the time. It's straight up propaganda, and it's terrifying. Like this quote: "America doesn't leave its heroes behind," military spokesman Jim Wilkinson said. "It never has. It never will." Are you telling me that these comments haven't been engineered by publicists? Everything's a sound bite. What's real when everything is manufactured by marketers? The TV news logos for Desert Shield were tasteless, and we knew it then, but I never expected it to go this far. I guess I was naive, but hey, I was only 17.