US Raid on ISIS in Syria

A lot of profit, too.

 

Going to be tough to compete with the ISIS channel. Lots more blood.

 

Yeah, but they play that screechy music during beheadings. Kind of disconcerting. And they don't subtitle into English. Need to work on their production value a bit.

 

Then your problem is with anonymous sourcing, in general.

Neither you nor I have any idea who the sources are. But, I do know that vetting of sources is a time-honored journalistic tradition, one that I have personally done too many times to count. And, yes, it worked for us because people trusted us.If they didn't, it wouldn't have.

I'm not trying to be "cute" when I say you don't trust the media. You don't. And, you don't trust the government. Some sourcing, especially anonymous, is never going to be enough for you. And that's OK. But there is a sound process in place when this type of reporting is in the hands of media professionals.

 

Oh please. You know better than this.

Let's not pretend that all of these reporters have "developed" sources deep within the SpecialOps community, and that's where they got their information. (Or, that they all happened to "develop" the same source, who used the same verbiage in each discussion.)

These are approved leaks. They come from top officials and/or spokespersons.

In most cases, they not only aren't they meeting in a subterranean parking lot, they aren't even "exclusive" conversations. These are conference calls, set up by the press department, with trusted journalists. They can even be in person briefings with multiple reporters.

What these aren't are "leaks" by sources who have been "developed" over time. It's the official story. The anonymity is a convenience.

For you -- who knows how the system works -- to pretend otherwise is absurd.

If the media has to grant anonymity in order to tell the story, fine. But be honest about the process, and be honest about the inability to independently confirm what you are reporting.

 

The current pressure to get the news out there in 15 seconds or less makes it tough. Do you report what well-placed sources say (on or off the record, for attribution or not) when you think it may be a bit embellished?

Or do you wait and seem like you are completely out of the loop by the time you report something?

 

I think the Times handled it pretty well.

They reported what they were told, but also told us that they couldn't independently confirm the details.

What they didn't do was breathlessly recount the details as fact.

 

To be honest, my first thoughts on hearing the report were:

Hand-to-hand fighting? How do we know that? Is that just some puffery? And it got that dirty and no U.S. soldier was hurt?

Women and children as shields? Were they deliberately positioning women and kids for that effect? Or did there just happen to be women and children at the compound and it was spun that way by us.

 

Is that really different than running the information attributed to "sources?"

My point still relates in that granting sources anonymity is usually debated based on the credibility of the source.

 

I'd be more worried about the truthfulness of this statement if "innocent" women and children had been killed in the raid. This would've been a great cover story.

 

By the way, just for the record, this story (U.S. Troops Fought ‘Hand to Hand’ in Syria Raid - The Daily Beast) cites three anonymous DoD sources, two anonymous "administration" sources, one named source from the National Security Council, and a named analyst from the "National Defense University." It was last updated Saturday morning.

 

OK. And, in determining the credibility of a source, part of it is determining his/her agenda, right?

What is the agenda of the source in this case, other than to put the best possible spin on the event? It's the official version of events. The source wasn't granted anonymity because the reporter had developed a source within Delta Force, who was not authorized to speak. The source was a pentagon/WH official/spokesperson who demanded anonymity in order to disseminate the official story, and not have to take questions about it, or have their name attached to it. But, the source was clearly authorized, and had an agenda.