Thursday, March 27, 2008

Chris Hedges: Iraq & the Meaning of War



Another little break from my self-imposed “hiatus”… (And yes, I’m quite hopelessly, tragically addicted to blogging. No need to point that out, thank you.)

My admiration for Hedges grows the more I see him interviewed at length. It seems almost funny now (in deeply sad way) that he was actually booed off a stage back in 2003 for casting doubts on the red-blooded, “patriotic” virtues of going war with Iraq back when blind cheerleading and full metal hysteria was prevalent in the corporate mainstream media. This interview with the Houston PBS program “The Connection” about his book “War is a Force that Gives Us Meaning” offers some very insightful observations about war in general based on his experiences as a correspondent and, more specifically, the complicity of the media in the run-up to the present situation in the Middle East.

4000 Mosaic

The above picture (click on it or here for the large version) also deserves some recognition. I don’t want to be excessive in lauding the obviously meticulous and painstaking effort that went into its construction lest that diminish in some way the sacrifice of the subjects involved, but it really is quite astounding. Still, it would be better if it had no reason to exist at all.