Take the mass graves being uncovered in Iraq. According to Tony Blair, over 400,000 bodies had been found in 270 sites. In reality, only 55 of these sites had been searched and only 5000 bodies had been found. That does not stop the US and UK states and journalists stating the far higher estimates as facts. Yes, Saddam was a monster (Human Rights groups estimate that 290,000 people are "missing" during the decades he was in power) but the job of the media is, in theory at least, not to propagate government lies.
Compare this to the way the media covered the Lancet paper on the number of Iraqis who have died as a result of the war. Taking its lead from the governments responsible for the deaths, this report was mentioned in passing and dismissed as inaccurate. Thus a statistically sound survey is essentially ignored or, at best, treated with scepticism while estimates of government officials are respectfully repeated as if they had been proven true beyond reasonable doubt (how could even the most honest politician know how many people are buried in a site before it is investigated?). This is unsurprising, as the Lancet paper suggests that the US/UK are responsible for one-third as many deaths in a year as Saddam clocked up in two decades.
Clearly, journalistic standards in reporting Saddam's atrocities are more lenient than those employed in reporting ours. This is not an isolated case, of course. It is merely one example of a consistent pattern and a striking confirmation of Chomsky and Herman's "Propaganda Model" of the media (as discussed in their classic work, "Manufacturing Consent"). Showing the reality of power is not on the cards simply because that is not how the media operates. Hence the disparity between how Saddam's crimes are reported and how US/UK ones are.
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