Transterrestrial Musings

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Here's the entire caption:

An elderly Iraqi woman shows two bullets which she says hit her house following an early coalition forces raid in the predominantly Shiite Baghdad suburb of Sadr City. At least 175 people were slaughtered on Tuesday and more than 200 wounded when four suicide truck bombs targeted people from an ancient religious sect in northern Iraq, officials said.(AFP/Wissam al-Okaili)

I see there are several victim: the lady, 175 slaughtered, 200 wounded, and an ancient religious sect. However, I see only identified agressor: coalition forces. Absent no other context but the caption, the truck bombs are either autonomous vehicles or controlled by coalition forces during the raid.

Posted by Leland at August 15, 2007 01:22 PM

The bullet is the projectile at the tip.

The whole assembly is the cartridge and the big piece that contains the primer, powder and the projectile located at the tip is referred to as the casing or commonly as the 'brass', even when it might be made from steel.

OT: I always thought the Shuttle was like a reloaded cartridge casing. No one considers a round of ammunition reusable just because the brass can be reloaded.

Posted by Mike Puckett at August 15, 2007 02:11 PM

Okay, so 250 people were killed in attacks, nine American soldiers died, and your concern is over the inaccurate caption on an Agence France Press article?

Is it possible that your perspective is a little off?

Posted by David Kovalchik at August 15, 2007 02:29 PM

Well, we now know one thing. Facts and the truth are not important to David Kovalchik.

Ya think if they get the little things wrong they might get the bigger things wrong too?

In logic, we call that a 'clue'.

Posted by Mike Puckett at August 15, 2007 02:34 PM

Is it possible that your perspective is a little off?

Anything is possible. But I think that the fact that the people who are supposed to be reporting the news about Iraq to us are totally clueless is an important issue. Your mileage may vary.

Particularly since their cluelessness and anti-American propaganda seems to be congruent with your own.

Posted by Rand Simberg at August 15, 2007 02:42 PM

Leland,
the autonomous vehicles could have been rogue SUV's. It's SUV's that are causing the most pollution, SUV's that are using the most gasoline, SUV's that take up two parking places at Wal-Mart, etc.

Maybe the SUV's have gone beyond just ruining the environment and have taken sides in Iraq too.

I bet Karl Rove controls the whole Iraqi SUV thing. Until the end of the month anyway.

Posted by Steve at August 15, 2007 03:18 PM

Is it possible that your perspective is a little off?

Details matter.

If one part of a caption is 'wrong' then others might be as well.

David, you have a job. You get a report from another department, some of which pertains to your job or department. Large chunks - bits that you are familiar with personally - are wrong. Production numbers, actions taken, whatever.

Can you trust the rest of the report?

Posted by Brian at August 15, 2007 03:29 PM

The details do indeed matter, for in this case they illuminate the underlying agenda of the 'journalist' (i.e. that this is all the fault of those big, bad coalition babykillers)

Posted by Scott at August 15, 2007 03:34 PM

Is it possible that your perspective is a little off?

No, my perspective is fine. I didn't need the caption to know that those rounds were never fired, and I knew from other sources that the trucks were actually oil tanker trucks driven by terrorist with no affiliation to the "coalition". Then again, coalition is not capitalized, or otherwise defined, so one could say that Al Qaeda is a coalition of radical muslims intent on restoring the Kalifah, but that perspective is likely over your head, David.

The importance here is that the photo and caption paint a picture that suggests US and its allied forces are shooting at civilians and slaughtering hundreds of them. This may be excused as a simple error, but we have Presidential candidates making claims that US forces are intentionally air raiding villages and killing civilians. That is a pretty screwed up perspective, and it is probably because the moron got his information from reporters like Wissam al-Okaili.

Posted by Leland at August 15, 2007 03:58 PM

but we have Presidential candidates making claims that US forces are intentionally air raiding villages and killing civilians

Give us the full quote in context without your spin, Leland. Let's see whether this candidate actually said what you claim.

Posted by Toast_n_Tea at August 15, 2007 04:06 PM

"Give us the full quote in context without your spin, Leland. Let's see whether this candidate actually said what you claim."

You mean like Rush Limbaugh never saying what you claimed?

Posted by Mike Puckett at August 15, 2007 04:43 PM

Er, Mike, since you bring it up, I never said Limbaugh said anything . I just said that he played a certain song, which says more than even his own words. As I said the way to check if I'm right is to sing the song for your black friends.

A little sensitive about this to bring it up in a different thread aren't you? Like him, eh? That must explain the alternate universe you sometimes quote from ;-).

Posted by Toast_n_Tea at August 15, 2007 06:08 PM

I guess form your perspective, the real unierse appears as the alternate one.

Rush plays it for his black friends all the time.

His black call screener, Bo Snerdley and the black Editor of his newsletter. Not to mention his black NFL linebacker buddies.

The problem is unless you listen to the show, the context is lost on you. And to those of us who do listen, your protestaions are amusing and trite.

Posted by Mike Puckett at August 15, 2007 07:11 PM

Describing this as being an "incorrect caption" is understating the situation in the extreme. This is a fake news story with a completely phony photo. Trying to shoehorn such a massive example of journalistic and editorial incompetence and/or malfeasance into the typo category is more than a little ridiculous.

Posted by Robin Goodfellow at August 16, 2007 04:06 AM

Sure TnT:
Washington Post:

Asked whether he [Obama] would move U.S. troops out of Iraq to better fight terrorism elsewhere, he brought up Afghanistan and said, "We've got to get the job done there and that requires us to have enough troops so that we're not just air-raiding villages and killing civilians, which is causing enormous pressure over there."

Posted by Leland at August 16, 2007 04:57 AM

Except, Leland, that Obama did not use the word "intentionally". One reading of what he said is that the US is intentionally air-raiding villages and unintentionally killing civilians in the process. That is both true and politically significant to Afghans.

Posted by at August 16, 2007 09:31 AM

Except, Leland, that Obama did not use the word "intentionally".

yes, his press secretary cleared that up by using the word "only". But if you feel better:

The importance here is that the photo and caption paint a picture that suggests US and its allied forces are shooting at civilians and slaughtering hundreds of them. This may be excused as a simple error, but we have Presidential candidates making claims that US forces are only air raiding villages and killing civilians. That is a pretty screwed up perspective, and it is probably because the moron got his information from reporters like Wissam al-Okaili.

My point still holds, but I'll accept the correction of the press secretary.

Posted by Leland at August 16, 2007 10:42 AM

First, "only" does not mean the same thing as "intentionally". Second, you haven't even given Obama's press secretary, Tony Vieto, the courtesy of quoting a complete sentence. Instead of harping on ambiguities in sound bites and even just single words, you could graduate to analyzing entire paragraphs.

Posted by at August 16, 2007 11:11 AM

coward: "Instead of harping on ambiguities in sound bites and even just single words, you could graduate to analyzing entire paragraphs."

And if YOU would do the same maybe you could better analyze what the President and Vice President actually have said about Iraq with respect to involvement in 9/11.

But I am not going to hold my breath.

Posted by Cecil Trotter at August 16, 2007 11:25 AM

you could graduate to analyzing entire paragraphs.

But that's not how the spin-masters on the Right, well trained in their arts work, is it? Out of context word or sentence grabs amplified on talk radio, Fox News and blogs create the aura that Obama is naive or weak on defense or whatever. The funny thing is that after this kind of hatchet job is done, the MSM then carries the same crap with the same questions, such as is Obama naive? (so much for the MSM bias, which if anything is a bias towards stupidity). And that's the end of a serious discussion and a decent candidate with many positive things to offer is overcome by somone as miserable as Clinton who sticks closely to a cloying script. It's the same thing that happened with Obama's attack Pakistan comment. Sometimes, though far more rarely, the left does this too, shame on them.

Now wonder we wind up with such crappy leaders.

Posted by Toast_n_Tea at August 16, 2007 11:30 AM

Sometimes, though far more rarely, the left does this too, shame on them.

I have to say, that made me literally laugh out loud. Did you type it with a straight face?

Posted by Rand Simberg at August 16, 2007 11:35 AM

Rand laughed, I shook my head in disbelief. Where do you people get this BS? The left has developed "out of context" into an ART FORM.

Posted by Cecil Trotter at August 16, 2007 12:21 PM

Ye gods.

Please remember: Post-modernism is NOT an invention of the right wing. It is very much an invention of the left-wing.

What does post-modernism (and its derivatives) mean?

Facts don't exist independently. They are social constructs, which can be rebuilt by whoever dominates the narrative forming processes.

The listener interprets what the communicator says. Therefore, the listener can draw conclusions from what the communicator does NOT say. Those conclusions can even contradict what the communicator explicitly states.

Furthermore, since words don't have authoritative meanings, and can be reinterpreted by the user, the listener can take what someone DOES explicitly say, and interpret it to mean its exact opposite.

So, pray thee, " ", what right wing philosophers generated these post-modern constructs of thought.

Left wingers have long torn at the fabric of logic, evidence and rational thought in order to force their fantasies onto others.

Declaring that RIGHT wingers are the vanguard of that is just too, too much.

Posted by MG at August 16, 2007 12:57 PM

Rand laughed, I shook my head in disbelief. Where do you people get this BS? The left has developed "out of context" into an ART FORM.

The funny part is I intentionally left out the full quote to mimic TnT and anonymous moron. They are so predictable.

Moron:
First, "only" does not mean the same thing as "intentionally".

yeah, so. Wasn't your logic that simply suggesting "Iraq" and "9/11" in the same press interview meant the administration linked Iraq to involvement in 9/11. By your logic, I could have written that Obama was saying we were air-raiding villages and killing civilians in Iraq.

Second, you haven't even given Obama's press secretary, Tony Vieto, the courtesy of quoting a complete sentence.

Neither have you, moron. You're the one trying to stick up for Obama. Give it a try.

Posted by Leland at August 16, 2007 01:17 PM

First, "only" does not mean the same thing as "intentionally"

Ayup. "Only" can ALSO mean "solely" or "to the exclusion of other [means]".

If the press secretary means this, what does it suggest about intent?

Posted by MG at August 16, 2007 02:25 PM

I have to confess more than a little amusement at the degree to which Obama's defenders will tie themselves in logical knots to justify his statements.

Posted by Rand Simberg at August 16, 2007 02:31 PM

It matters what "is" is.

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