What is Digg?65 Comments
- PATSCRU, on 10/10/2007, -3/+78It's disgusting...
I was watching CNN yesterday as they were covering this op-ed piece, and they kept asking the question "are our troops the best source for war reporting?". I wasn't bothered by the question being asked, but i was bothered that the anchor phrased the question so as to portray troop reporters in a negative light.
Dear Tucker and any other reporter covering this story: Of course troops are one of the best sources for war reporting *****, they are out there with bullets flying over their heads, they can feel shockwaves from car bombs, they get pelted by the Iraqi heat and sand, and you're in your air conditioned studio with a smirk on your face questioning the credibility of the viewpoints of a soldier on the ground. ***** You. - totorototoro, on 10/10/2007, -3/+29I kinda feel sorry for Tucker Carlson ever since Jon Stewart embarrassed him completely on his own show, forcing it into cancellation.
http://www.ifilm.com/video/2652831
He never really recovered from that on-air asskicking. - AmitoRIT, on 10/10/2007, -2/+20Not correct. He initially supported the war and then changed his position.
- fredricko, on 10/10/2007, -2/+17I think the real news here is that Tucker Carlson has a show...
- g30ff, on 10/10/2007, -4/+18He's a bit of a weasel and I disagree with him on almost everything, but this isn't really much of an 'attack' on the op ed (and certainly not the authors). His feelings towards the article are clearly ambivalent. He's skeptical about one of their claims in particular, but as he pointed out that same skepticism should be applied to the president when he makes similar claims to the opposite effect. Throughout the entirety of the clip his tone and language was respectful. I'm not suggesting anyone should necessarily be swayed by what he's said but, like pornography, I know an attack when I see it, and this ain't it. In the grand scheme of things I find these soldiers much more credible than Bush but that doesn't mean I shouldn't view their claims uncritically.
- goldfenix, on 10/10/2007, -3/+16"How old are you?"
"Thirty-five."
"And you wear a bow-tie."
That ought to explain everything. - Pile, on 10/10/2007, -0/+11here's info on Tucker Carleson's asskicking by Jon Stewart, with video and torrent links:
http://bsalert.com/news/254/Jon_Stewart_on_Crossfire_You_guys_are_partisian_hacks.html - yunus, on 10/10/2007, -1/+10Enlisted soldiers for the most part would never do this. That a group of them not just a single soldier supports this viewpoint demonstrates how important they must feel it is. What I will take away from their op-ed is that they feel the White House, the media, and the Congress have failed to tell the truth to the American people. That is very sad.
- TalkingBanana, on 10/10/2007, -0/+6Did that one dude say "Little midget retards like me"? Cuz thats what it sounded like.
- moonbats, on 10/10/2007, -8/+14Tucker Carlson is a dick with ears, irrespective of his opinions or views.
http://mediamatters.org/items/200406170002?offset=20&show=1 - chowdah, on 10/10/2007, -1/+7Tucker Carlson was part of some of the best TV I've ever seen. I'll never forget the night John Stewart shamed him and his dumbass Red voting bowtie right off the air for good in front of a live studio audience. Tucker Carlson was completely owned. Classic...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aFQFB5YpDZE
Thank you John Stewart! - D3koy, on 10/10/2007, -0/+6You can't blame him, he's had to go through 35 years of what must be a miserable life with the name "Tucker Carlson"
- hawkeye17, on 10/10/2007, -6/+12You do realize that Tucker cares more about getting ratings than he does about our troops? And that people can see Carlson's argument for what it is....total *****?? To even think that the troops know less about what is going on in Iraq than the media or the politicians is absurd on its face. You can disagree, but you can also be ripped when your argument is full of holes like Tucker's is here.
- mattatarms1507, on 10/10/2007, -1/+7I don't trust anyone who wears a bowtie
- GorfTron, on 10/10/2007, -1/+6Why is it bad to hear from the soldiers? Historically, troops do the bidding of their commanders - good or bad. I say lets change this policy. Lets hear the soldiers.
***** you. tucker. ***** your bow tie, too. - 30thElement, on 10/10/2007, -0/+5Thanks for reminding me how awesome that clip was. I gotta find it on youtube now.
- satanatnmtedu, on 10/10/2007, -2/+7Yes, Tucker has the right, just like everyone else, to attack the ideas rather than the people. And, I think he tried to attack the ideas.
- Ajajadude, on 10/10/2007, -1/+6I noticed that, too. When did that little toolbag stop with the bowtie? Did his mommy finally decide to go clothes shopping for him?
I'm sorry, but I just don't like this guy. He seems to have some sort of small-man syndrome going on and he's one of the reasons why I straight up never watch the news. - ScionAltera, on 10/10/2007, -0/+5Agreed. It was a difficult argument he was making. I watched the video all prepared to be outraged like I usually am from stuff on thinkprogress, but in a tremendously unusual move, he said something I am forced to agree with. Out of everybody you could ask about the war, I think the guys who wrote that editorial are probably the most qualified to answer questions like "what's it like on the ground?" and "do the Iraqis want us to stay?" However, I agree with Tucker in that I am instantly skeptical of phrases such as "the vast majority of" coming from ANY source. That doesn't mean the piece has no value. It could simply mean they should have chosen a better phrase and this argument is purely based in semantics. Unfortunately, it could also mean they're making a broad, baseless generalization without any facts to back it up... regardless of who they are, where they've been, and what they've been doing.
The bottom line: it always pays to figure out why you should or shouldn't trust information from any source, no matter how credible they seem. - pig13, on 10/10/2007, -1/+6I don't feel sorry for the guy, I love that clip. Notice how he no longer wears a bow tie?
- physphd, on 10/10/2007, -1/+6Thanks for the link - always good to see that clip. That is the most thorough thrashing I've seen on TV in recent memory. Critical thinking, humility, and public speaking skills are a fearsome combination.
- ScionAltera, on 10/10/2007, -2/+7Wrong. Thinkprogress is unabashedly partisan. Tucker's show tries to pass itself off as neutral journalism when in fact it is idiotic partisan drivel.
- luther70, on 10/10/2007, -7/+11Well Tucker is generally a tool but I don't think he said anything that was wrong here. He said that hes uncomfortable with active duty military making political comments and he distrust of blanket statements like the "vast majority of the...." This is true if the message is pro-war or antiwar.
- Qyasogk, on 10/10/2007, -0/+4did you guys notice???? apparently he took Jon Stewart's advice to heart and has stopped wearing the bow tie!
- monsterofNone, on 10/10/2007, -0/+4tucker isn't eben courageous enough to keep wearing that friggin bowtie.
- geekee, on 10/10/2007, -1/+4Why did this story make the front-page, while the original story did not?
This site is owned by blog spammers.
Digg up the original story
http://digg.com/world_news/The_War_As_We_Saw_It - ArthurSucks, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3At least he lost the bow tie.
- pig13, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3I think that's the point Stewart was trying to make in that clip, he can be partisan, he's a comedian. He's not in the business of reporting the news, he doesn't have the responsibility that anchors and pundits should have.
- lowryba, on 10/10/2007, -1/+4As an enlisted US Marine with 2 tours in Iraq, my jaw dropped as I heard him imply that solders on the ground can't form a reasonable opinion on the majority of Iraqis. This is utter *****! My last deployment I spent 7 months going from house to house looking for insurgents and talking to the locals. I have stood post with the Iraqi police and have tried my best to help them. We got nowhere and 6 of my very close friends are dead because of this war. And this ***** says that my opinion is not worth a damn compared to some retired general who didnt even pick up a gun in this war?
I have one thing to say... ***** YOU! - nomadxx7, on 10/10/2007, -1/+3I think I'd trust the people on the ground who have served a 15 month deployment in Iraq than the politicians and spinsters that where business suits and fly private jets at my expense. Information cannot be silenced (as the retired general pointed out) since we have the Internet and other forms of communication. I have a problem how the White House spins things like the Tillman case (that they knew and still spread him for war propoganda), that infrastructure we have paid billions of dollars to build are lying over in Iraq breaking down and being left deserted, that Halliburton is making billions off our taxes to give inferior service to our servicemen and women. You may say that Tucker was more moderate in his wording but he's still a snake in the grass. I don't give credit to people over here when the soldiers are telling us a different story. The only argument I can make in Tucker's defense is that maybe the 82nd Airborne has become hardened in Iraq and has a negative outlook as it is. No swaying their opinion. But on the other hand with all that is going wrong with this country I would have to believe their statements about Iraq more than people sitting in offices telling me what they really meant.
Oh and to the ones skeptic of the "vast majority" scenario, I'll say this.... The VAST MAJORITY of Americans disapprove of Bush's leadership. If you look at the polls they show this as true. Would you be skeptical of what I said because I used those words? Is the Iraq statement similar? Maybe. Look at the sources sending out these polls, see if they have any political affiliation and if they are truly neutral on the matter take their word more than a group trying to spread propoganda for or against the war. - JigoroKano, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2To his credit, he did flip flop rather quickly and didn't seem to suffer the cognitive dissonance most of the right did.
- fugazi, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2After watching about five minutes of it I do not see where you are coming from. Enlisted men usually do not comment publically on anything political. It has always been that way and never before did I hear about a group of soldiers sharing how they feel on a war to the media. Not in any major US war at least.
- bharbhar, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2PATSCRU: They would be a great source as you describe. And they will get great footage too. Except their bosses won't let the American people see half of it.
- CDoug03, on 10/10/2007, -1/+3Tucker makes one very good point, that by supporting active participation by the military is politics, you are moving our military away from its role of being civilian controlled. We do not need a bunch of Generals or for this matter, foot soldiers, petitioning the public for what wars we need to be fighting or how we fight them. Condoning this behavior by soldiers only fosters the development a military state.
People should not be so quick to support ideas like this without exploring the consequences first. Just because the soldier's view supports their anti-war view, does not mean you should lemmingly support what they are doing.
We don't need to sell the family cow to end this war, it is not that bad, yet... - ScionAltera, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2I'm pretty sure it was "little midget colonels".
- g30ff, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2Huh? I'm a leftist. I'm not attacking him. Well, not on this particular issue at least. To be fair, there are some leftists that attack him personally, but it is hardly a feature unique to the left. Ad hominem attacks are used no less (and arguably more) by the political right. As for the issue of why people are so irritated by him they feel it fair to attack him personally, I suspect it has a lot to do with his own conduct. He hasn't exactly refrained from making personal attacks himself.
- miatch, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2I am not really sure what a Leftist is. Who is attaching Tucker, anyways? But you are clearly implying that the Right attacks people for their viewpoints, and I'm wondering when the last time I saw a right wing commenter attack either Clinton, Obama, or Edwards for their ideas. I can think of them discussing Clinton's BJ, Obama "black enoughness" and Edwards haircuts.
- g30ff, on 10/10/2007, -1/+3If the only evidence I had was your say so, yes I'd view your claim with a critical eye. As it stands you are only repeating what I already know from credible sources so I have no reason to disbelieve. I don't have great information on public opinion in Iraq. Most of the sources for such information have clear biases and motives so I view all with some degree of skepticism.
Keep in mind what I said in my final sentence "In the grand scheme of things I find these soldiers much more credible than Bush...". I find them more credible because, unlike Bush, I have no evidence that they are liars and I generally like give people the benefit of doubt. Their weakness as a source of information is that their own experiences are limited to certain areas where they have been deployed. The president, on the other hand, should be recieving reports from all over and have a better idea of public opinion in Iraq as a whole. Unfortunately, this particular president is such a lying ***** he couldn't be trusted to tell anyone the truth. In fact, he seeems to be so disconnected with reality that it's not entirely clear he's even willing to admit the truth to himself. So I don't disagree with you as to who is the more credible source. - nick111, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2Well... no, not exactly.
Tucker Carlson is that bad because he participates in the farcical circus that passes for "news" in the US today. The 4th estate has a duty to democracy to provide voters with the information they need to make informed and educated descisions on who to elect - and to publicly hold our elected representatives to account once they're in power.
As opposed to partisan hackery - which is what we get instead. - soulonice, on 10/10/2007, -1/+2tucker carlson is a twit. get this guy off the air.
- ericthegreat, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1Tucker Carlson is a bowtied republican bitch!
- GREEDOnvrFIRED, on 10/10/2007, -1/+2I HIGHLY respect your opinion. I really do BUT. The population of Iraq 27,499,638 (July 2007 est.) So the "majority of Iraqi people" is around 14,000,000. How many would you say you spoke to? Listen I don't doubt for a instant that the 82nd Airborne Soldiers are on the money with their assessment. I would just like to point out that Carlson (whom I dislike and distrust) is neither attacking nor making disparaging comments about them.
- Klydethegreater, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1Did you expect anything else?
- ichbinladen, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1Forget it, man. They are just too far gone to get it.
- lowryba, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1So you are saying enlisted infantry can't write good?
I am enlisted infantry and maybe if maybe you got out of your office you would realize that your solders under your command have some unique talents, and are not as stupid as you might think. - junk, on 10/10/2007, -1/+1I watch this guy all the time just because he is so absurd. I am continually amazed that he has a show at all. The ***** that comes out of his mouth is so unintentionally hilarious. A week or so ago he was talking about health care and, out of the blue, asks one of his guests what they would do if Hillary Clinton attacked them in the neck with a giant hypodermic needle. The person he asked the question too said "You mean hypothetically?" and he replies "Probably, yeah." Haha such a WTF moment. I don't take him seriously at all. The guy is a kook, a tool and totally deranged, but such a train wreck I can't help but watch him make an ass out of himself over and over.
- happytron, on 10/10/2007, -1/+1I don't get why there's so much hate for Tucker. For the most part he breaks the mold of republican pundit and is more aligned with libertarian ideology than the mainstream republican platform. He's in favor of gay marriage, ending the drug war and is sympathetic with calls for an immediate withdrawal from Iraq. He even voted for Ron Paul before it was fashionable to do so.
I saw this piece when it originally aired and my impression wasn't that he was attacking the credibility of the soldiers so much as criticizing the use of anecdotal evidence and subjective claims compared to more objective statistics. While it is obviously true that, taken as a whole, those serving in Iraq have the best picture of what is happening, we must still be very critical of the opinions of any individual, as they can at best see a microcosm tainted by individual experience. - happytron, on 10/10/2007, -0/+0"write good"? Seems almost too ironic to be taken seriously, although this is the internet, so who knows?
- digbird, on 10/10/2007, -0/+0No, I don't think infantry soldiers are stupid. I just don't think that most of them can write --or would be interested in writing-- a complex editorial for the New York Times. Normally, I don't critique other people's comments on Digg but since you identify yourself as an enlisted soldier, I think your comments pretty much illustrate my point. Here's how I would have taken what you have written and tidied it up:
1. put a comma after "So"
2. substitute "well" for "good"
3. add "an" after "am."
4. broken the single, run-on sentence into at least two or maybe three sentences
5. put a comma after "office"
6. deleted either the "your" in front of "soldiers" or "your command" since using both is repetitive
My point is that enlisted infantry soldiers are good at a lot of things that I was not when I was in the Army (taking care of weapons, small unit tactics, etc.). But writing complex articles that get published by a major newspaper is not one of them. - airforceteacher, on 10/10/2007, -0/+0Digbird's comment was evenhanded and fair - he addressed the group as a whole, he said likely instead of definitely, and gave possible counterarguments to his statement.
I am a prior-enlisted officer, and what he speaks is true - in general. It's not unheard of for an enlisted person to have good writing skills - I did when I was enlisted - but it's the exception.
Now, if he had said - we can't have that guy do it, he's enlisted, his writing must be bad, then he would be wrong. Generalizations are great for populations, sucky for individuals. -
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