Reporting on the War Against Terror

I’m sure you’ve read that Mustafa Abu al-Yazid, a founding member of al Qaeda is reported to have been killed by a drone aircraft last month. Bill Roggio has confirmed it, so it must be true.

Anyway, I was reading the Washington Times and the Washington Post‘s reporting of the incident and marveled at the subtle way they each support their presidents. You can tell much of the two newspapers’ information came from the Roggio posting.

But guess which newspaper wrote which paragraph;

The death of Yazid would represent one of the most significant blows against al-Qaeda since the CIA began a major escalation in the pace of drone strikes in 2008, which has been accelerated under President Obama.

The United States, in cooperation with Pakistan, stepped up the pace of lethal drone strikes in August 2008 after President Bush signed an executive order giving the commander of Central Command more operational control to order the strikes in ungoverned spaces throughout southeast Asia and the Middle East.

Both paragraphs are true, but it’s the information given or not presented that skews the readers’ opinions. I just thought it was an interesting study of Washington’s competing newspapers and the value of reading everything about a subject.

I’ll stick with Bill Roggio, though.

Category: Media, Terror War