What we don't see in the news

[PilotOnTheRise]

This is off topic, but I felt a need to post it! This is what we never see in the news. All we see is the bad. This is also proof that the media controls basically how we view the world and it's people!



At Walter Reed Medical Center in
Washington, D.C., recently the Sergeant
Major of the Army (SMA), Jack Tilley, was with a group of people visiting the wounded soldiers.

He saw a Special Forces soldier who had lost his right hand and suffered severe wounds of his face and side of his body.

The SMA wanted to honor him and show him respect without offending, but what can you say or do in such a situation that will encourage and uplift?

How do you shake the right hand of a soldier who has none?

He decided to act as though the hand was not missing and gripped the soldier's wrist while speaking words of comfort and encouragement to him.

But there was another man in that group of visitors who had even brought his wife with him to visit the wounded who knew exactly what to do.

This man reverently took the soldier's stump of a hand in both of his hands, bowed at the bedside and prayed for him. When he finished the prayer, he
stood up, bent over the soldier and kissed him on the head and told him that he loved him.

What a powerful expression of love for one of our wounded heroes!
And what a beautiful Christ-like example!
What kind of a man would do such a thing?
It was the wounded man's Commander-in-Chief, George W. Bush, President of the United States.
This story was told by the SMA at a Soldier's Breakfast held at Red Arsenal, AL
and recorded by Chaplain James Henderson, stationed there.

 

[cherokee]

Amen brother!

 

[enigma]

Thanks for posting the story. I don't always agree with our President, but I find it very easy to respect him. This makes it even easier. Quite a contrast to his predecessor who staged his arrangement of rocks to form a cross on the beach at Normandy.

regards,
enigma

 

[spitfire1940]

Ok guys.

I know everybody on the right side of the political spectrum likes to gripe about the evil media ... and I think what Dubya did was great in this instance , however ....


I've looked into this story and there are a couple objective reasons why you didn't read this story in your local Daily Beacon Gazette blah blah:

1) there were no reporters present when this happened. If someone had been there to see it, it probably WOULD have been in a newspaper somewhere.
2) the story was related days after the fact, second hand, by someone who saw it. Therefore, it doesn't qualify as "breaking news" because the average American editor's crazy perception of time says that what happened a few days ago is ancient history.
3) Even though it didn't "break," it is the kind of heart-touching story that can wind it's way into a magazine story or some other kind of feature if a writer wants to look into it, verify all the facts and then relate it.
4) If there had been a TV camera there, liberal jacka$$es pundits would have probably accused Bush of grandstanding, so maybe it's better this is being passed through the Internet.


As far as Christ-like examples go ... as a Christian, I would be more impressed with Bush if he had supervised his Cabinet members better and made sure they had developed a coherent plan for post-war Iraq before we stuck 150,000 Americans in the country.

Also, I read stories every day in the media about the heroic sacrifices of our military people in Iraq, Afghanistan and a dozen other God-forsaken places around the planet.

On the front page of Thursday's USA Today there was a heart-breaking story about the kid who got shot a couple weeks ago while buying a 7-up at Baghdad University.

My own publication, a small defense newsletter in DC, ran a great story this week (along with a dozen other publications) about the exploits of our A-10 pilots flying Close Air Support for their Army and Marine brethren back during the initial invasion.

Yeah, the majority of journalists are Democrats and many are very liberal and quite a few are total buttheads. But the majority are decent folk trying to be as fair as they can within the constraints of the system they work in.

If you want to see more conservatives in the media, then encourage your kids, nephews, young friends, whoever to go into journalism. The reason there are so many Dems in journalism is because Republicans typically don't go into the business (I've worked at a wire service, a daily paper, newsletters and at CNN, so I have a little authority here).

Not like you'll be doing your young friends any favors: Going to work for a local paper or TV station has about the same pay, work rules and job protection of being an F/0 on a Brasilia. And no union and bulletin boards to commiserate about how bad journalism stinks.

just my three cents.

 

[spitfire1940]

one more thing

most news storys are about negative stuff because that's what interests us as human beings.

Just look at this bulletin board. Do we discuss the thousands of planes that land safely every day? The thousands of pilots who go about their jobs every day? The normal ebb and flow of life?

No. Mainly, what grabs our attention and gets us talking is stuff like "psycho" F/As setting their planes on fire, an RJ making a hard landing somewhere or a B1900 crashing into a hanger and killing everyone on board.

The media is a business and people (you, me, everyone) are not going to buy a newspaper or watch a show (making a profit for the owner: the motive for everything) about happy normal stuff.

also, a lot of what happens in the world just plain sucks. Getting blown out of your truck in Baghdad by an RPG-toting raghead really is a crappy way to leave this planet. But having your countrymen ignore your death because it doesn't make them "feel happy" or doesn't reflect positively on the president probably sucks even more.

 

[spitfire1940]

and one more thing ...

And tell me how this is:

"also proof that the media controls basically how we view the world and it's people!"

I really didn't follow that.

the "media" doesn't control us--it presents stuff and some people allow themselves to be manipulated because they're too lazy, apathetic, stupid or preoccupied to get more (better or worse) information.

You can't blame "the media"--whatever that is--any more than you can blame "airline managment" for the troubles that pilots endure. There's blame to go around. (i mean, if regional pilots, every last one of them, just didn't show up for work tomorrow, that would certainly change the outlook of labor-management negotiations)

Also, in this country (and in other countries), you don't have to rely on the mainstream media--there's radio, there's satellite TV, there's the Internet: we're swamped with information of every conceivable form. We've got more and better info than at any point in human history.

that you even found out about Bush's compassionate act at Walter Reed is proof of that.

 

[jarhead]

"There's blame to go around. (i mean, if regional pilots, every last one of them, just didn't show up for work tomorrow, that would certainly change the outlook of labor-management negotiations)"

Why just "regional" pilots? How about "Major" and "comuter" pilots as well. Heck, how about bus drivers too? Could a possible outcome of this type of short sighted action lead to a couple of real bad things? Llike maybe the payor of the paycheck going completely under water, where there is no one left to negotiate with. Or, the traveling public, who is the ultimate entity giving pilots (or bus drivers) their pay check, just saying "screw it, I'm done putting up with crappy, expensive, unreliable service". That's another outcome.

As they say, "be careful what you wish for, it might come true".

Not flaming here......just adding another perspective. I avoid commercial flight now whenever possible, due to the hassles in the airport. Now add to that, job actions to promote an adjenda, and there will be even less revenue to spread around to employees.

 

[captainv]

the media

first, thanks to spitfire for his pasionate defense of the media, obviously you care about your craft.

i can back up much of what he says, having been a newspaper editor for 4 1/2 years before switching to journalism...

so, why are most journalists democrats? well, with starting pay in the low 20s, working nights (or 14 hour days as a reporter) with tuesday and wednesday nights off, slaving every night to put out a decent paper with no other thanks than "serving the public." in fact, all you ever do hear are the complaints, every grammatical error that slipped through that night, why didn't we cover (insert pet project here). but, if you put in years of hard work, you can double your workload (but not your pay) and maybe get a weekend night off here and there. then again, you'll get called into the office every time something big breaks....

or you can get a business degree and make a pile of money. surprisingly though, the new crop of kids graduating the last 5 years have been much more republican than in years past. it's actually funny what happens - democrats run lots of stories about republicans so they don't appear biased, republicans so the same thing on democrats.

the problem is that the public only notices bad stories about their particular party - they totally ignore the bad stuff we report about the opposition. because in their minds, that's the way things should be reported...

as for the original thread here, bush would've been walloped if this was reported. remember his landing on the Lincoln?? and it's not because he's republican either, it's because he's the president. that's how washington works....

 

[Timebuilder]

Glad to see a few recovering journalists here to keep Bobby and me company!

I always thought that most of us were liberals because of the same, singular reason: both as a journalist and a democrat, I thought that I was smarter and knew what was best for everyone else. The great anchors and editors were like enlightened despots to me, helping me to make the country more progressive. Of course, this was more of a self-serving value judgement than anything else. My distorted view of what the word "progressive" meant lead to all kinds of misdguided conclusions.

Without rehashing the entire process ad nauseum, I began to reexamine my core values, or more accurately, the manner in which I acted upon my core values beginning in the late 80's, as I began to wean myself away from writing ang broadcasting. Thanks to the internet, and flightinfo, I have been writing regularly again, and enjoying the processs far more than I did before. From a political and spiritual standpoint, I began to grasp the notion that there is an set of objective truths, such as the ones the founders said were "self evident", and also grasping the fact that these truths were not transient ideas, subject to the whim of situational ethics. I changed from seeing conservative ideas as old-fashioned and intransigent to foundational and stabilizing, the threads that hold the fabric of our society together. Without them, we become a pile of lint.

And yes, there is litle difference in pay or satisfaction between what I did previously for money and what I did as an FO more recently.

You can't blame "the media"--whatever that is--any more than you can blame "airline managment" for the troubles that pilots endure. There's blame to go around. (i mean, if regional pilots, every last one of them, just didn't show up for work tomorrow, that would certainly change the outlook of labor-management negotiations)

It sure would change things, as someone mentioned. We have to remember the law of unintended consequences. We do know one thing: you could never get that many pilots to agree to give up a day of work, since they all think they are going to get a high paying job at a major airline!

 

[jarhead]

Timebuilder

While I have no impierical data to back up what I am about to say, what I do have is a general observation from my personal expeience. Again, this is a "general" observation, and there certainly are many excetions to it.

I am 63 years old, and my political "slant" over time, has evolved.
When I was in my 20's, I was as liberal as anyone could be. As I progressed in life through my 30's and 40's, I began to see life a bit differently, with the passing years. Now I have a son, and a nephew and niece, all in their 30's. All of them, in their teens and early 20's (particularly while in college) were quite liberal. Then, just as I did, as they put some years and mileage under their belt, and began to live life on their own, rather than just regurgitate what a few tenured, liberal college professors indoctrinated them with, their view started to become more conservative. I have also observed this with the "kids" of other friends of mine. I have found that very few of my aquaintences who now have a conservative outlook on politics, were that way all along. It has been an evolution of their views, as the journey through life pressed on.