NYT Late to the Party



Instapundit points out a New York Times article that reports on turnaround of Sunnis against Al Qaeda in Anbar Province.
RAMADI, Iraq — Anbar Province, long the lawless heartland of the tenacious Sunni Arab resistance, is undergoing a surprising transformation. Violence is ebbing in many areas, shops and schools are reopening, police forces are growing and the insurgency appears to be in retreat.

[...]

Many Sunni tribal leaders, once openly hostile to the American presence, have formed a united front with American and Iraqi government forces against Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia

But before the NYT starts patting itself on the back for printing a good piece of journalism, it ought to be asking itself "What took so long?"



Bloggers, Bill Roggio in particular, have been all over this story for a while now. Take this quote from Roggio:
The establishment of the Anbar Salvation Council, a group of tribal leaders who have vowed to hunt al-Qaeda, the beginnings of a political process in the region, and the latest recruiting drive that brought in 1,115 police recruits throughout Anbar could not take place without a U.S. military presence. While the Iraqi Army is making strides towards tactical independence, it still relies on the U.S. in this dangerous province. The tribal sheikhs and politicians understand this.

That quote almost looks like it could have come from the NYT story…..except for the fact that it was written in December of 2006. In fact, Roggio has been reporting on these developments since March of 2006.



I know, it is easy to bash the NYT for taking several months to put 2,500 words to paper. But the point here should be the triumph of the new media over the old. While we should give reporter Kirk Semple kudos for actually traveling to Anbar to get the story, several bloggers have been on the ground consistently over the last year, and producing major stories to rival the quality of the NYT.

The words “Anbar Salvation Council” appear in several NYT articles in recent months, but most appear to be daily news summaries based heavily on “IRAQI EMPLOYEES OF THE NEW YORK TIMES”, and not in quality pieces like that delivered by Semple.

One of the main criticisms of the press coverage of this war has been that it is easy to criticize the war from the Foreign Desk in NYC, but that much needed perspective is lost in the process. Articles like Semple’s, which represent traditional on-the-scene reporting, as well as the examples of blogo-journalism are what the Main Stream Media need to produce in greater quantity and timeliness if they want people to respect them again.


Posted: Sun - April 29, 2007 at 10:16 PM          

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