More Civilian Afghan Corpses courtesy Uncle Sam

Today's NY Times reports that a U.S. Army convoy killed five Afghan civilians and seriously wounded up to 18--meaning more causalties could follow--when military personnel opened fire on a passanger bus that, according to the military, approached a checkpoint "at a high rate of speed." This is the latest incident where U.S. military has fired upon and killed civilians. The typical American response consists of cliches: "it's a tragic loss of life"--as though anyone needed that insight--and excuses: young soldiers have to make split-second decisions when facing approaching vehicles at checkpoints. But as one Afghan from the bus asked, "If they're concerned, why not shoot out the tires?" and thus force the bus to stop. According to the Times, over thirty people have been killed and eighty wounded by U.S military, and not a single one of these individuals posed a threat. "It seems they are opening fire on civilians intentionally," says one Afghan. Of course, most Americans couldn't care less about these civilian deaths. Since the whole is greater than the sum of the parts, as sports programming reminds us, it's all for the better that these people died. Life isn't perfect (especially if you're getting killed). And as we've learned from the Iraq, as soon as someone dies, American or not, then it isn't happening anymore, so everything is getting better. Since these five people have already died, they aren't dying right now, which means conditions are improving.

Ogre-oid: update - If You Can't Turst Reuters...

David Schlesinger, the editor in chief of Reuters, declined to run a story by one of his own reporters containing claims that the 2007 killings of two Reuters staffers in Baghdad by U.S. troops may have been war crimes.


Reuters staffers Namir Noor-Eldeen and Saeed Chmagh were killed by U.S. helicopter gunships in Baghdad in 2007. Video of the attack, which shows the journalists standing next to unidentified armed men on a Baghdad street and records the destruction of a van attempting to retrieve a wounded Chmagh, was published this week by Wikileaks.  more

This is very bothersome.  Are any of the major news organizations that can actually afford to have people in the places where news is happening not corrupted by their allegiance to advertisers?

Ogre-oid: (video) U.S. Army Slaughtering Civilians (and Reporters) in Iraq

Not for the weak stomached.