Davids Medienkritik

Trump is Back! Der Spiegel Goes Full MAGA

Der Spiegel is celebrating the return of Donald Trump by bringing back it's own special flavor of German MAGA: Making Anti-Americanism Great Again

We knew an atrocity of a cover was on it's way from our favorite publication as soon as the American election results were in...and drumroll...here it is:

Above: "The infernal duo: The sinister plans of Donald Trump and Elon Musk"

So a couple observations. We love that there are feet-on-the-table, blood, and symbols of Gordon Gekko-style capitalism (cash and Diet Coke). Even the almost complete sunset and the half-tipped-over US flag in the background are not-so-subtle metaphors for an America irrevocably in decline (according to Der Spiegel and most elitist Euro-Snob German media). 

While these are all outstanding, tried-and-true anti-American stereotypes sure to appeal to Spiegel readers and sell more magazines - we at Davids Medienkritik are quite disappointed in the overall lack of effort and would grade this a C- at best. 

We don't have any guns, cowboy hats, fast food, obesity or images of blood-thirsty American soldiers. (There isn't even a reference to the end of the world.)

After all - how hard would it have been to paint in a spilled McDonalds fry box with ketchup (not mayo) on the desk? That is a clear missed opportunity...to name an obvious example.

Just a reminder to Der Spiegel editors - you need to bring back that lovin-feeling from Trump's first term and really fire up those anti-American engines. So to help, we put together the Trump First-Term Covers Collage to remind you of your great journalistic tradition:

Objective, unbiased captions above include:

• "The True Face of Donald Trump" (Trump shown wearing a KKK hood)
• "The End of the World"
• "Five Minutes to Trump"
• "Insanity" 
• "The Fire Devil: An American President Sets His Country on Fire"

Our new collage provides first-hand evidence as to why Germans love America and Trump so much after years of sensible, sober, unbiased, enlightened, lucid and objective media coverage by Der Spiegel. 

But wait - there's more: Time to bring back an even bigger classic! This is how things really looked when Der Spiegel was at the top of its anti-American game. Our classic house remix from the Bush-era (for those of you missing the once-incessant Guantanamo, cowboy, oil and gun references...): 

And let's not forget this oldie-but-goody that brilliantly combines the gun violence trope with America's founding father:

Now that's the Der Spiegel we know and cherish! 

And word-up to award-winning Spiegel journalists Claas Relotius and Mark Pitzke - historically Spiegel's two greatest "Amerika Experten." They know how to keep it spicy and ensure Der Spiegel goes all-out MAGA: Germany-style.

Don't you just love Germany's obviously superior brand of journalism?

UPDATE: We haven't even started to cover Stern's Trump-era cover beauties...there are more treasures of objective German journalism yet to uncover...

 

SPIEGEL: Do you still stand by the statements you made about (Russian President Vladimir) Putin being a "flawless democrat?"

Just wanted to return briefly to remind the world of this 2006 Gerhard Schroeder interview where he re-affirmed that he saw Vladimir Putin as "a flawless democrat" - and that doing so didn't make him "anti-American."

Let's remember that this man was the last SPD Chancellor before Olaf Scholz folks - and that he almost immediately went to work for Gazprom after leaving office when Merkel replaced him.

Schroeder even concluded the interview by stating that the Nordstream pipeline is not only in Germany's interest - but that he deserved praise for his work on it! 

We will file this one under interviews that did not age well...

Our analysis - on the other hand - was spot on. 

UPDATE DEUX: Ukraine lets Gerhard Schroeder pal, SPD compatriot and current German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier know that he and his party have been on the wrong side of history for the better part of the last decade by hinting that he's not at the top of their guest list at the moment. They know a spineless, double-dealing politician when they see one. They can see that Olaf Scholz and his party of Ostpolitiker stooges are holding up badly needed military aid while talking out of the other side of their mouths about how they now support Ukraine.

UPDATE: Schroder still works for his buddy Putin's oil and gas interests - and his silence has already led some staff members to abandon him...

DER SPIEGEL After the Shootings – The Heart of Bias

What a surprise! DER SPIEGEL has it all figured out again. The shootings in the United States have a name and a face: Donald Trump. That’s right – according to Der SPIEGEL’s latest authoritative feature article on the shootings in America – Trump has created a “climate of hate” that has led to a new “White Terror” and “racial extremism”.

(Above image from Der Spiegel's feature article promo): "White Terror: USA The El Paso massacre is the consequence of a new racist extremism in the United States. Donald Trump must unite the country as President, but he created a climate of hate that he now can barely bring under control.”

Well - aside from the fact that SPIEGEL is swallowing the American Left’s portrayal of Trump as racist and the NRA as a mysterious all-powerful cabal of proto-white-supremacists – what is most notable is that they almost totally ignore the Dayton shooter. Why?  Because apparently, he was a fan of Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren – and that does not compute with the pre-set SPIEGEL narrative of the United States in which the Social Justice Warriors of the Left are the noble underdog saviors being held down by the reactionary, gun-toting forces of darkness.

As a result - SPIEGEL has no appetite for any examination of the Dayton shooters’ admiration of prominent Democrats. In fact, in a prolific feature article consisting of over 40 paragraphs and 3,000 words - in which the El Paso shooter is mentioned by name 24 times in 16 paragraphs - the Dayton shooter is mentioned by name only twice in a single paragraph. And here it is strictly to downplay the influence that Democrats had on him (our translation of original German text):

“Additionally the perpetrator of Dayton, according to Trump on Wednesday, was unlike the El Paso shooter, a “fan of Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders. In other words, a Leftist. While it is true that he composed corresponding tweets, he seems to have, according to the FBI, sympathized with numerous violent ideologies, and furthermore investigators are still checking whether he had connections to the so-called Incels – radical woman-haters. And unlike the El Paso shooter – he did not base his actions on politics and his motive is still unclear – his sister is among the nine victims.”

So big shocker: While SPIEGEL spends thousands of words and dozens of paragraphs attempting to insinuate that Trump is directly or indirectly responsible for El Paso – NOBODY at SPIEGEL (corporate-media-to-the core dedicated to profiting from anti-Americanism since time immemorial) dares to obsess about (or even examine in the most cursory manner) the Dayton shooters’ potential political motivations and how they may have been shaped by the general climate of hostility and hatred whipped up by far-left politicians, members of academia, media networks like MSNBC or violent extremist movements like Antifa. (Do we need to mention a previous nutjob who shot up Republican Members of Congress?) 

The Heart of Bias

Let’s be honest – most adults recognize that the Dayton and El Paso shooters were and are deranged maniacs who went around shooting innocent victims who bore zero responsibility for what they believed (in their warped under-developed minds) was plaguing society or worth killing for – and no politician (whatever you may think of Trump, Sanders or Warren) can be held remotely responsible for their insane criminal actions. One shooter was a right-wing nutcase and one was a left-wing nutcase – and because SPIEGEL’s readers are far-Left and hate Trump – they choose to focus on one nutcase’s deranged motivations and tie them in any way possible to Trump - while completely downplaying and dismissing the other side.

By contrast: Whenever members of ISIS massacre innocent people at a hotel, concert or shopping center as an act of intentional, organized and pre-meditated murder – they are somehow characterized as misunderstood revolutionaries spurred on by the injustice and sins of the West. This is the insane biased thinking of the SPIEGEL Eurosnob elite where the default is to blame the forces defending (what is left of) Western civilization.

Simply put: This article is yet another example of The Heart of Bias at Der Spiegel.

Der SPIEGEL Editor to Loyal Unthinking Troops: “I love the smell of Bias in the Morning. It smells like P-R-O-F-I-T-S…”

(Endnote: The translations in quotes are ours, and we intentionally choose to omit the names of the shooters.)

UPDATE: Is Der Spiegel going to report that the rhetoric of the Angry Left has now led to the targeting of members of U.S. Law enforcement? Shots were fired at an ICE office in San Antonio - and these shots could have killed anyone inside. Looking forward to extensive coverage Der Spiegel - including a long research article on the causes and background of these increasing attacks - since we all know you are a reputable unbiased news organization.

Davids Medienkritik Precisely Described and Diagnosed the Culture that Created Relotius...Years Ago

We don't want to say "we told you so" - but just read this article we posted in 2011. We precisely described and satirized the culture and conditions in German media that created the Relotius train wreck years before it happened.

Direct quote:

It is important to remember - however - that the group of people calling the shots in the German media in 2002 and 2003 are essentially still running the show today. Given the right political conditions and the media's tendency to follow larger political patterns, they would gladly return to the high-pitched anti-American hysteria that flooded German media only a few years ago.

Further - the fictional correspondent we describe - were he in fact to surrender wholeheartedly to the insatiable demands of the editors (described by Andrei Markovits) - would be Relotius personified. Relotius simply went further than his colleagues - departing from the subtle lies of bias and omission - and fully embracing the heart of darkness... 

The Horror: Relotius is the dark and inevitable consequence of a dogmatic culture gone wrong...

Not surprisingly, no one at Spiegel was listening to us back then...

Der Spiegel Scandal: Relotius' Inventions Simply Reflect The Anti-American Boogeyman His Editors Have Demanded for Decades

Perhaps the most fascinating aspect of the entire Spiegel-Relotius scandal is that the lies and fabrications that he fed to his editors back in Germany were not random in the least. They followed a precisely constructed blueprint of stereotypes nourished for decades by the anti-American editors and media and political elites in Germany.

Der Spiegel's Enemy Has Many Faces and One Name: "Amerika"

In a nutshell, the Relotius lies and fabrications reflected exactly the American boogeyman that has been sold to Germans for years now. We even put together a list of these stereotypes in 2008 - THIS IS NOTHING NEW - and they are still current today if you simply replace the word "Bush" with Trump".

Stereotypes most favored by Spiegel staff include:

• Americans are overbearing war-mongers bent on global domination who falsely claim they are spreading democracy when they are just spreading McDonalds and trying to control more oil fields
• Americans are heartless purveyors of capitalism, neglect the poor, and reject social safety nets
• Americans are trying to spread their superficial bubble gum, Disney, Hollywood culture worldwide to the detriment of all indigenous peoples - including even the Germans
• Americans are xenophobic racists 
• Americans are blindly patriotic, flag waving, USA-chanting, mind-numbed robots 
• Americans are militaristic gun nuts - everyone outside New York and Washington is packing machine guns
• Americans are obese fast-food gluttons
• Americans are hyper-religious Bible-thumping zealots who reject European humanism
• Americans don't care about the rest of the world or the environment (if only they could be environmental champions like the Germans!)
• Every current and recent military conflict involving the United States = Vietnam = quagmire = defeat
• The death penalty - did we mention the death penalty?
• Guantanamo - can we still talk about Guantanamo???

In fact, the reason that Mr. Relotius was not caught sooner is because his absurd contortion of reality was NOT absurd to his editors - it was a precise reflection of the "ugly America" that they have constructed and come to demand in an effort to maximize profit and keep readers supplied with their regular fix of resentment.  

In a recently published article on Z-Man blog (via American Thinker), the author correctly notes that:

That's always the thing with these scandals.  The media big shots always come off as if they have been insulted about their shenanigans being revealed.  In this case, the other major media outfits are rallying to defend Der Spiegel.  In the dreaded private sector, competitors are always quick to take advantage of the mistakes of a competitor.  In the main stream media, the opposite is always true.  They circle the wagons and begin lecturing the hoi polloi about the dangers of questioning the media.

That is the real cause of these scandals.  For a long time, the mass media in the West has been a mono-culture.  You can't have a career in the media if you don't hold all the right opinions.  To call the media an echo chamber for the left is to understate the problem.  The better analogy is a school of fish.  Each individual just reacts to those around him, giving the effect of the school having agency as a whole.  What looks like collusion is just the result of a uniformity of mind, experience and social class.

Now allow us to remind our readers of past Spiegel articles (view our complete archive here) - all of which should be investigated for inaccuracies and fabrications as well...

From 2010:

Der Spiegel Commentary: Obama Failing because of "Hate-Mongers, Gun Freaks and Tea Party Demagogues"

A wonderful and unbiased analysis by master Amerika Experte and Spiegel author Klaus Brinkbäumer as to why Barack Obama is no longer as popular as he once was - (complete with a photo gallery compiled to feed the deeply ingrained stereotypes and Feindbilder of the German left.) 

Or 2008:

Der Spiegel Cover: "The Price of Arrogance: An Economic Crisis Changes the World" (Demeaning the Statue of Liberty has obviously become a favorite cover motif at DER SPIEGEL)

Case in point: When SPIEGEL attempted to exploit the current economic crisis with another decidedly anti-American cover and feature article with all the usual anti-American clichés designed to pander to the magazine's predominantly anti-American German readership, English-language readers spoke out. The headline quickly changed from "America's arrogance" to "Is America Arrogant?" 

And let's not forget our 2005 write-up on the somewhat similar SPIEGEL "expose" on Kannapolis, North Carolina.

And now just finishing our tour of the tip-of-the-iceberg - let's not forget SPIEGEL's admission to Jeff Gedmin in 2004 that the anti-American stereotypes are editors "just trying to please our million readers." Gedmin's 2004 work "Mad About Us" is just as relevant now as at any time. 

The examples go on and on and on. 

Some things just never change...sad but true... 

A wonderful and unbiased analysis by master Amerika Experte and Spiegel author Klaus Brinkbäumer as to why Barack Obama is no longer as popular as he once was - (complete with a photo gallery compiled to feed the deeply ingrained stereotypes and Feindbilder of the German left.) 

Or 2008:

Der Spiegel Cover: "The Price of Arrogance: An Economic Crisis Changes the World" (Demeaning the Statue of Liberty has obviously become a favorite cover motif at DER SPIEGEL)

Case in point: When SPIEGEL attempted to exploit the current economic crisis with another decidedly anti-American cover and feature article with all the usual anti-American clichés designed to pander to the magazine's predominantly anti-American German readership, English-language readers spoke out. The headline quickly changed from "America's arrogance" to "Is America Arrogant?" 

And let's not forget our 2005 write-up on the somewhat similar SPIEGEL "expose" on Kannapolis, North Carolina.

And now just finishing our tour of the tip-of-the-iceberg - let's not forget SPIEGEL's admission to Jeff Gedmin in 2004 that the anti-American stereotypes are editors "just trying to please our million readers." Gedmin's 2004 work "Mad About Us" is just as relevant now as at any time. 

The examples go on and on and on. 

Some things just never change...sad but true... 

An Open Letter to Ambassador Richard Grenell and the World: We Are Back

Davids Medienkritik is back.

Like Godzilla awakening from his volcanic slumber - we have re-emerged to global relevance to continue our rampage against bias in German media. From 2003 to 2008 - we went all-out to expose fake news in German media before the term even existed. Now we are posting again - and no less than Instapundit and the U.S. Ambassador to Germany - the Honorable Richard Grenell - have recognized the continuing relevance of our work.

"DER SPIEGEL harbors no institutional bias against the United States." -Dirk Kurbjuweit, deputy editor-in-chief, DER SPIEGEL

Just a couple days ago, after we posted our first item in years, the Ambassador tweeted out a collage we put together to demonstrate the incessant anti-Americanism-for-profit that Der Spiegel has employed for decades now. We are both honored that he would highlight our work - and grateful that he has taken up the mantle that we carried for years. Finally - a person in a position of power is highlighting the ugly truth - and confronting the so-called "Amerika Experten" who have been committing journalistic malpractice for years. It is as if our long-held wish is finally coming true.

And Mr. Ambassador - we further find it quite interesting that the "professional" ranks of editors and journalists at Spiegel did not catch Mr. Relotius' obvious fabrications even though some commenters on SPIEGEL ONLINE were pointing it out well before the scandal exploded - only to have many of their observations posted as comments deleted. It will be interesting to see if this is ever acknowledged by the Spiegel staff and leadership. 

The Editorial "Safeguards" at Der Spiegel Apparently Comparable to those of the Ford Pinto

So Mr. Ambassador - we will say this: You and our colleagues at Instapundit and around the blogosphere have inspired us by championing our cause. You have inspired us to renew our mission - to renew our work - and to once again join the fray. We hope that you - and others in positions of influence in Germany and the United States continue to publicly point-out and call-out the blatant bias that we have seen for so long at Der Spiegel (and many other media outlets) - and point out the corrosive impact it has had and continues to have on German-American relations. If there is anything we can do to contribute - don't hesitate to ask and don't hesitate to continue to highlight our work.  What amazed and frustrated us in our earlier years is that no one did what you are now doing - so thank you.

Davids Medienkritik is Back to Ruin Spiegel's Day

At the end of the day - it still comes back to this fundamental point: When supposedly "well-informed" Germans who read media like Der Spiegel live in a world clouded by lies of omission - and emphasis on the negative - is it any wonder that they have a poor and incomplete opinion of the United States and that transatlantic relations suffer as a result?

SPIEGEL Reporter Fired for Inventing Stories - Some with Anti-American Tilt

Well - that paragon of high journalism and integrity - Der Spiegel - beacon of honest, objective, and above-all "expert" reporting on the United States apparently has a problem. One of its reporters has been fired for inventing facts - and actually getting caught doing so. According to BBC News:

"German news magazine Der Spiegel has sacked an award-winning staff writer after accusing him of inventing details and quotes in numerous stories.

Claas Relotius "falsified articles on a grand scale and even invented characters", Der Spiegel said.

Among the articles in question are major features that had been nominated for or won awards, the magazine added. (...)

An investigation into a story by Mr Relotius about immigration and the US-Mexican border revealed that he had fabricated information about seeing a hand-painted sign in a town in Minnesota that read: "Mexicans Keep Out."

Fraudulent information appeared in other stories including one about inmates at the US military prison at Guantanamo Bay and another about the US NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick."

Now wouldn't that have been quite fitting for the Amis to have an Auslaender Raus equivalent? Nothing would be more satisfying to the leftist-German psyche than to bring the cowboys right down to German standards - mitigating some pent-up xenophobia-guilt.

And on another front, Marc Pitzke - Amerika-Experte extraordinaire - has joined the rest of the Angry Left media in making nice with and even lauding the McCain/Bush "good Republicans" who they once bashed to no end so long as they threatened to exercise any real power. Now that they stand at odds with Trump, however, they are newfound heroes and lovable old foils. 

Mr. Relotius is perhaps just the most overt of Spiegel liars, caught and sacked for being too brazen in his journalistic malpractice. But make no mistake: The lies of omission, spin and bias that have tainted Der Spiegel and Spiegel Online for decades continue unabated on an industrial scale. Some things never change...  

Be Careful Dear Sandra...

Positive reporting like this will soon land you on the street at SPIEGEL ONLINE Frau Sperber:

Marc Pitzke hasn't made a career as Amerika-Korrespondent by being Mr. Niceguy or respecting the truth. How about you just stick to guns, fast food, racism, NSA and obesity next time? You just need to take your cute little camera phone to a gun show or a KKK meeting to get the footage we really want for SPIEGEL readers. There are plenty of worthy topics to report on when it comes to the USA without upsetting Mr. Augstein with this excessive exposure to reality.

Ex-Chancellor Schroeder: Partying with "Spotless Democrat" Vladimir Putin as Ukraine Burns

Gazprom Gerd truly has no shame - partying with "spotless democrat" pal Vladimir Putin as Russia occupies Ukraine (remember Gerd's principled objection to Iraq?) and systematically stamps out dissent with a tidal wave of paranoid state propaganda. Even SPIEGEL ONLINE can't support Gerd this time. Maybe Kim Jong Un will be available for Gerd's 80th?

SPIEGEL Disses Obama Again: "Europe Must Protect Itself from America"

Being President isn't easy. Dropping approval ratings at home - and now this from SPIEGEL? The afterglow from the 2008 Berlin speech has clearly faded with the German media elite...Et tu Brutus?

Here's what's interesting about this article: The small headline below the article summary reads "The German Prism: Berlin Wants to Spy Too." If America's activities constitute spying - than the German government not only "wants to spy" - it has been "spying" for decades now. In many instances, Germany and other European governments have acted more aggressively than the United States.

Even Augstein tacitly acknowledges that his criticism of the United States could equally be a criticism of European governments. This is the pot calling the kettle black while simultaneously criticizing it. Put another way, Augstein's commentary is both inconsistent and incoherent.

It boils down to this: Every society must grapple with the eternal conflict between privacy and security - and in many cases - European countries come down more heavily on the side of security. America - after all - does not have a national ID card or Anmeldungspflicht.

But Augstein's work has little to do with some noble crusade to protect the privacy of European citizens. Instead, he is doing what SPIEGEL has always done: Scratching for some pretext to attack the "imperialist other" - the American boogeyman - while attempting to stoke Transatlantic conflict. This was and remains a time-tested formula for moving copy and cashing in with SPIEGEL readers. 

Celebrating Obama has outlived its usefullness. Anti-Americanism has a much longer shelf-life...

SPIEGEL's Marc Pitzke Declares GHW Bush Dead - But Hold the Phone!

Spiegel's crack Amerika-Korrespondent Marc Pitzke strikes again! Apparently - SPIEGEL Online has gotten an extra early scoop on the death of GHW Bush! 

Or perhaps its a bit of wishful thinking on the part of Marc Pitzke - who has already prepared a masterpiece of false praise, which is, in fact, a poorly disguised litany of attacks against the elder Bush's son George W. 

Pitzke gets the usual low blows in: The mandatory griping about endless war, torture and how terrible a place America has become since the first Bush governed in a more innocent time. Ah the good old days!

But most importantly - SPIEGEL gets it wrong - again. This isn't the first - but perhaps one of the most dramatic examples of the magazine's total bias and lack of professionalism. Pitzke's next story: Elvis still lives - in New York - in the studio next to mine!

SPIEGEL's Article on Disillusionment with Obama Predicted by Davids Medienkritik in 2008

We hate to say we told you so - but we did. This was entirely predictable. According to SPIEGEL - Germans are increasingly "disillusioned" with President Obama:

In a new global survey released on Wednesday, approval of President Barack Obama's policies has declined significantly since he first took office. Overall confidence in Obama and attitudes towards the US have slipped modestly as a consequence. By several measures some of the greatest slippage has occurred in Germany, especially with regard to America's image and Obama's foreign policies. After more than three years in office, Germans are disappointed in the US president's unilateralism; his use of force, particularly drone strikes; his inaction with regard to the Israeli-Palestinian situation and his lack of effort in curbing climate change.

And here is the top scenario Davids Medienkritik predicted in 2008 for an Obama presidency:

Analysis: The initial euphoria of an Obama victory and Republican defeat will lead some to predict a bold new era of happiness in transatlantic relations. These predictions will gradually be worn to a cool realism/cynicism by geopolitical realities which will inevitably manifest themselves through differences over trade, the use of force in Pakistan, Afghanistan and the Middle East, the unwillingness of even the Democrats to go along with Kyoto, etc. Obama may remain quite popular as a personality in the German media. The Republicans - despite their reduced role - will continue to act as foils and receive blame for all that goes wrong. The refrain that what Bush has broken will take time to fix may well grow to become a reflexive defense for some time to come among those who insist on clinging to their own initial euphoria.

But at least Obama is convincing Germans that he is making progress in transforming the American economy into a more socially-just copy of the German economy. According to the SPIEGEL piece: 

"Germans also don't see America as an economic superpower. In 2008, only 30 percent of Germans named China as the world's leading economic player. Now 62 percent do, while only 13 percent say the U.S. plays that role. No other Europeans judge American economic prowess so harshly."

But it's really too bad that Germans still don't love America now that Bush is gone - we thought that his departure would end all anti-American feeling. All there is left to say is... 

SPIEGEL ONLINE's Final Biased Iraq War Gallery

You guessed it - SPIEGEL ONLINE's post marking the withdrawal of US troops from Iraq contains a fifteen-slide photo gallery with nothing but pictures of evil American invaders, death and destruction and Iraqi suffering.

It contains no photos of Iraqi voters with ink-dipped fingers. No photos reminding us of Saddam's mass murder and destruction of his enemies. No reminders of the successful surge that Bush backed despite Reid saying the war was lost. No pictures of American troops and diplomats helping millions of Iraqis building roads, schools, power plants, providing medical care, jobs and stability. No pictures of the Sunni Awakening and the defeat of Al-Qaeda in Anbar province. In short - no pictures telling the whole story or providing any real balance.

Just pictures fitting the SPIEGEL ONLINE anti-American far-left narrative: The American military is evil. The war was all bad. The Iraqis only suffered at the hands of the terrible invaders.

With the Iraq war's apparent conclusion, one can only say of SPIEGEL ONLINE that - for a publication and readership that styles itself as so utterly nuanced and intelligent - the coverage has - in fact - been utterly one-sided and hyper-simplified propaganda - with very few exceptions. The magazine's coverage was designed to sell magazines to and please an anti-American audience from beginning to end, and the German readership will never have more than a very narrow and self-satisfying view of the conflict that in no way reflects reality.

Oh - and here's a shocker - the article and gallery are not featured on SPIEGEL ONLINE's English site homepage. Wonder why? Perhaps the English-speaking audience demands at least a fig-leaf of intellectual honesty - apparently the German audience does not...

Now back to Afghanistan...is it Vietnam yet?

So Who are the Real Victims?

An interesting lead article on SPIEGEL ONLINE's homepage today:

 

Headline above: "US Drone War in Afghanistan: Photos Show the Real Victims of the Silent Killers"

"Remotely controlled drones are seen as the wonder weapon in the anti-terror fight. For years, Washington has used the high-tech weapons in west Pakistan, but the suffering of the civilians is mostly hidden. Now a photographer's pictures show the entire extent of the horror. By Hasnain Kasim, Islamabad."

As it reads - the headline seems to imply the following: The real victims (and therefore the real targets) of drone strikes are innocent civilians, not the violent jihadists hell-bent on murdering anyone who does not share their worldview.

If there is any doubt amongst our German journalist friends about the kind of people the US is targeting - watch them brutally murdering sixteen Pakistani policemen here. The good, morally-superior journalists at SPIEGEL ONLINE who go to bed peacefully each night protected by American troops should have no doubt that they and their loved ones would end the same way should those the US is really targeting have the chance to effect their agenda.

This latest lead article displays the same sort of muddled logic that allowed SPIEGEL ONLINE and other like-minded media to imply earlier that the inmates at Guantanamo (for the most part) were just innocent Afghani vegetable gardeners or foreign honor students (not determined Islamic Fascists out to create a global caliphate) who happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

In addition - this story is essentially taking the Pakistani photographer's word for it that his photos are all actual depictions of civilian casualties. That's not to say that there have not been civilian casualties - but how many civilians have been victimized because militants chose to use them as human shields or their villages as bases of operations? Do they not at least share in the responsibility for the consequences?

And what about the victims of the Islamic militants? Perhaps SPIEGEL ONLINE would be so balanced as to run a front page post on photos of those victims. Perhaps that would be a bit too messy and not properly directed at the world's true enemy - the United States...

Oh by the way...is it Vietnam yet?

Hey SPIEGEL - Is it Vietnam Yet???

Bring on Marc Pitzke and Peter Scholl-Latour and tell me how the US is doomed to fail now.