More on Fallujah and the Media

Bono's New Casualty: 'Private Ryan': "As the crunch comes, we'll learn whether media companies will continue to test such Iraq war stories against 'reality-based' reportage, or whether they'll kowtow to an emboldened administration, spurred on by its self-proclaimed mandate and its hard-right auxiliary groups, that can reward or punish them at will. For now the most dominant Falluja image has been that of the 'Marlboro Man', the Los Angeles Times photo of the brave American marine James Blake Miller, his face bloodied and soiled by combat, his expression resolute. It is, as Mr. Rumsfeld might say, a slice of truth. But other slices, like the airlifting of hundreds of American troops to Germany to be treated for the traumatic fallout of Falluja's graphic violence are, like 'Saving Private Ryan' on Veteran's Day, missing from too many Americans' screens."

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