Stupid AP Tricks
November 26th, 2006 at 11:27 am by SmantixNothing beats a good apples to eggplants comparison:
U.S. involved in Iraq longer than WWIIBy TOM RAUM, Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON – The war in Iraq has now lasted longer than the U.S. involvement in the war that President Bush’s father fought in, World War II. As of Sunday, the conflict in Iraq has raged for three years and just over eight
Only the Vietnam War (eight years, five months), the Revolutionary War (six years, nine months), and the Civil War (four years), have engaged America longer.
In related news, the insurgent AP’s Strawman Rebellion has lasted considerably longer than Nat Turner’s Rebellion.
And now you know.
November 26th, 2006 at 2:48 pm
Sunday Funnies…
image courtesy of faithmouse
Samantha Burns has the moron of the week.
Scrappleface: Nativity Story Trailer Re-Cut For Holiday Relevance
Photo Caption fun at The Dumb Ox
This Blog Is Full Of Crap gets creative with the Thanksgiving leftovers.
Wuzzad…
November 27th, 2006 at 1:49 am
It’s kind of a pet peeve of mine, but I hate it when people cite the Vietnam War as America’s longest war. That distinction belongs to the Plains Indian Wars, which lasted 36 years (source: The Oxford Companion to American Military History, p. 553)
I don’t know who this Tom Raum guy is or where he took US History, but he is way off on the length of the American Revolution too. The amount of time between the Battle of Lexington and Concord, April 19, 1775, and the Paris Peace Treaty, September 3, 1783, is exactly 8 years, 4 months and 16 days.
The Vietnam War is a little harder to date, but if you take the starting point as the date the first Green Berets were sent by JFK, and the end point as the last helicopter leaving the embassy (1961-1975), that’s 14 years. If you move the start date up to the Gulf of Tonkin incident (August 2, 1964) you’re still at 11 years. Even by moving the end date back to April 1, 1973, when most US forces had left, you’re at 8 years 8 months.
Of course, the AP never let a little thing like historical facts get in the way of making a political point.
November 27th, 2006 at 2:03 am
Not to mention that World War 2 had been raging long before the Americans got into the act.
November 28th, 2006 at 9:55 pm
annika’s detailed post is correct as far as newspaper stories should be as accurate as possible; an editor should have corrected the dates.
Smantix’s thread-starting post is way off, though. He/she (sorry, I don’t know which is right and I don’t have an editor here) calls the AP story an “apples to eggplants comparison” and it WOULD HAVE BEEN had the story said the conflict in Iraq has lasted longer than WWII. The report correctly compares American involvement in both wars (America being involved in the entire Iraq action).
What Smantix is upset about is that this unpleasant fact is mentioned at all, not that it is false. But as that famous neo-conservative commentator Stephen Cobert has pointed out, objective journalism is really unbalanced journalism because the facts have a well-known liberal bias.
November 28th, 2006 at 9:59 pm
Ah, I should explain about my name. “The Unnamed Grammar Nazi” was given to me by a reader of another blog. I appropriated (okay, stole) “His Almighty Phallus of Intelligentsia!” just because I liked it.
November 29th, 2006 at 7:30 am
Your like of phalluses notwithstanding, this factually challenged editorializing by the AP was called on it’s merits.
Fake but accurate. The Legend continues! We should all learn our history from the 3 Seasons of Strangers with Candy DVDs.