Our minds on media.

The Future of the Book blog has just posted this article about how the web is continuing to allow people to route around the media machine. Ask yourself this question, if the Bush administration and American military officials are so sure that the Mahdi Army is the major obstacle to peace in Iraq, then how come we’ve never seen an interview with Moqtada al-Sadr or heard any discussion of his policies? As usual, the fourth estate is busy chasing ratings instead of informing the public debate. Thankfully the public is getting better at informing that public debate by itself. Of course, after reading this translation of an Italian newspaper’s Moqtada al-Sadr interview I’m not at all impressed with him. But at least I can feel justified now in thinking that.