John Hardly - If they report finding WMDs, yeah, I'll believe it. And if they report Saddam (or any one of the surviving cloned Saddams:) USING WMDs, I'll believe that too. (& No, I won't conclude that obviously the US planted them or fired them on our own troops to frame the gentle Ba'athists.)

Now, for you guys who are with me in the tiny Mudcat minority that supports this war: if they report that NO such weapons have been found, used, or destroyed---will *you* believe *that*? / I will. (I'm very Gullibobble, apparently.:) Note that the official Rationale is already redistributing its weight over to the Liberation, Freedom & Democracy side of the justification scale. And, that them wily Eye-rackies haven't lobbed in the ol' nerve gas yet. (Hey, if I were them I'd have hurled all my chem/bio shit into Kuwait while the Americans were all massed there in a tiny area; or coming across the berms in that goddamn little funnel they call a border. What the Hell, y'know? Shoot the works.)

But now as to the Embedded Ones, it seems to me that they are, quite predictably, bonding with the soldiers of what become "their" outfits. There they are, in flak jackets & helmets & gas masks, in Harm's Way (someone should rename a street that somewhere, btw) right alongside our fighting men, rollin' down to old Baghdad (me boys) aboard our armored chariots of unfriendly fire. They identify, they are seduced, they get excited, they get gung ho. They come to unabashedly root for the team. Yes, more so (even) than in past less-embedded reportage. I've seen this repeatedly in the broadcasts.

I think the problem isn't so much the conspiratorial military control; it's more the psychological militarization deriving from the embedment. Isn't It Ironic: perhaps this relative Openness, not to say Transparency, is the Pentagon's best strategy for winning the hearts & minds of the media. Much better than stonewalling at press conferences in Washington.

ON THE OTHER HAND: I *would* think that the media's constant close-in presence on the battlefield should act as a considerable deterrent to the commission of War Crimes by their units. And I doubt that even the hyperefficient General Tommy Franks is good enough to be able to pre-assign all the planned Atrocities to the reporter-free divisions.
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Like I said, I support this thing---reluctantly and after much agonizing---but God I hate it, at the same time. It's necessary but it's effing horrific. Shock & Awe, me arse: Boom & Doom. // I hope to Allah that dumbass Bush, or that brilliant Condoleeza Rice, or somebody, is right about the Liberation outcome. They'd better be.

In conclusion (YAAAAY!!): a friend of mine says the whole solution is an independent Kurdistan. This is consistent with my wife's proclamation of 1991: "I think they should give the Kurds their Whey."
There ya go. (But now, I hear 1,000 Turkish troops have crossed the border in the north. They may beg to differ. Bah. Fie upon all Tribes.)