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Frustrated by the superficial analysis of recent events, I called my favorite inside contact, Lt. Col. Ananias Ziegler (Ret.), media relations director for the Committee that Really Runs America.
Why are we supposed to use yellow ribbons?
I
asked. Yellow has a major image problem. To be yellow is
to be a coward. Yellow fever is a hideous illness. We talk
about the
true blue. So
why a yellow ribbon?red badge of courage
or being
The subtlety of this symbolism obviously escaped you.
Yellow has nothing to do with our red, white and blue
troops. Yellow is supposed to remind you of the politicians
who sent them there.
Which politicians?
The ones who find it easier to formulate a war plan
than an energy policy. Wars are popular, at least at first.
Telling people they shouldn't drive 100 miles a day just to
get to work and back is a sure route to political
oblivion.
I wanted to ponder that, but he interrupted.
Look, you guys in the news media have really been
suckered.
You mean with the military censorship?
No. That comes with combat. But it's funny. During
Vietnam, the brass was always saying the war would be over
soon, but a few courageous reporters published the truth.
The average American had a better idea of what was really
going on than the CIA did. Now the generals say that a long
struggle is ahead of us. So what's the press do?
I know,
I agreed sadly. <>At every briefing, the
tenor of the questions is General, please tell us the war
will be over next week, so we can crucify you when it
isn't.
Precisely,
Ziegler said. Like some generals,
the press always fights the last war. People get sick of
that, which destroys media credibility.
Is that the only way the media have been hoodwinked
and manipulated?
Ziegler laughed. Of course not. The war dominates
coverage. What happened to drugs, which were the Greatest
Problem Facing America just a few months ago? Isn't it
amazing how a war allows Washington to hide such a
fiasco?
When was the last time you saw Neil Bush, or any
other well-groomed bank robber, on the front page? Notice
how the Keating Five vanished from the national
consciousness? The only homeless person in the news these
days is the Emir of Kuwait. The Gulf oil slick gets much
more attention than the long-term poisoning of our own
homeland. People fret over the environmental effects of
emissions from burning refineries -- they never stop to
think that all that oil was going to be burned, anyway.
American education spends more and produces less
every day. One out of every eight Americans has no medical
insurance. I could go on, but you get the idea.
I did. Get people to wave flags and support the war,
and maybe they won't notice anything else?
Precisely. And at the Committee, believe it or not,
we are concerned about the long-term future of this
country. That's why we came up with the yellow ribbon --
just remember that yellow has nothing to do with soldiers,
and everything to do with cowards who refuse to face
America's real problems.
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