If a Picture is Worth 1000 Words...

If a picture is worth 1000 words how much is a phonied up picture worth?

The developing controversy over faked Reuters photos and staged Reuters and AP photos begs the question.

The old saying regarding a picture's worth was coined to describe the phenomenal effect of presumably accurate photos on the human mind. Few of us have the gifts to enable us to compellingly describe even the most mundane of events.

Try describing the beauty of your child, the smile of your wife, the horrendous aftermath of a car accident or the horrendous aftermath of a wartime bombing. Most of us are simply unable to bring these scenes to life in a reader's mind no matter how many words we use.

Iraqi bad guys, Palestinians and Hezbollah have managed to geometrically expand the value added of a photo. Staging scenes of bombings and attacks that may or may not have taken place, doctoring photos to make the carnage of war appear a) to have happened at all and/or b) to be much worse than the actual events have become a common tactic. http://powerlineblog.com/archives/014951.php

The tactic would be considerably less effective if the Western Media was not so guilt ridden that it has rendered itself credulous. It appears that any photo showing carnage perpetrated by Israel and/or the USA is fit to print regardless of its provenance and with no consideration whatsoever of its technical integrity.

It appears that when the photo editors of Reuters, AP and the NY Times et al see a photo that conforms to their anti-Israel and anti-US bias it is automatically fit to print.

On Sunday and Monday Reuters had to "Kill" two photos demonstrated to have been altered and then removed the entire body of work of the photographer from their catalog. The NYTimes, having published another of this photographer's works on its front page on Saturday, reported Wednesday on the Reuters scandal in their business section. The photo published by The NYTimes has created some controversy but the Times apparently didn't think that most of its readers ought to be informed.

The Western Mainstream Media appears to have been completely compromised in their determination to support their anti-Israel and anti-American views with whatever lies, distortions and half-truths come across their wires. Their work product more and more resembles the government controlled media of the Arab world. In this case it is not the government controlling the output. It is the insidious and pervasive anti-Israel and anti-American publishers, editors and journalists who have surrendered their outlets as propoganda outlets for the enemies of freedom.