Imaging the w

"Lots of people are talking about an L.A. Times piece over the weekend in which they looked into the rather bloodless presentation of the Iraq war in major newspapers," writes Paul. "What few people seem to realize is that this is nothing new...Studies that [Jessica Fishman] has done...of decades' worth of newspapers have come to the following conclusions...:

• The dead bodies of foreigners are OK to show, but the dead bodies of Americans are not OK to show (dead Americans are more likely to be shown as they were when they were alive, like in a wedding photo).
• Foreigners can be shown committing acts of violence, but Americans can not. In fact, American soldiers are more likely to be shown giving out candy or chatting with kids than doing what soldiers are trained to do, which is blow things up and kill people."