"News is what people are talking about," the television news director, who happened to be my boss, told me. 

It was a rather circular description of 'News.'  People talk about what they see on the news.  If you don't know it, how can you talk about it? 

But that is what passes for news judgement in the local TV stations where future network reporters, producers and anchors cut their teeth. 

As it pertains to Iraq, the disappearance of coverage is based on the more tried and true definition of news:  News is the opposite of what 'should be.' 

(The Governor of New York should not be hiring prostitutes.  He should not be hiring prostitutes after he prosecuted a prostitution ring.) 

In the context of a war like Iraq or the greater struggle against the Mohammedan Jihadists, the question of what 'should be' is much more difficult to nail down.  Compounding the problem is the people who decide what 'should be' as in this modern era most reporters go into the business to affect some form of change in the world or to make the world a better place according to their vision.

In this regard, reporters are motivated in the same vein that Whittake Chambers said communists are motivated. 

"The revolutionary heart of Communism is not the theatrical appeal...It is a simple statement of Karl Marx, further simplified for handy use:  'Philosophers have explained the world; it is necessary to change the world.' ... The tie that binds them...is a simple conviction:  It is necessary to change the world ." 

(Makes a certain candidate's mantra sound a little less benign.) 

Further simplified--things are not as they should be and need to be changed. 

In the news decision, what the situation in Iraq 'should be' is probably given little rigorous thought and if the 'should be' is wholly unrealistic; i.e., Baghdad should be as peaceful and livable as Scottsdale, Arizona, then Baghdad will fail the test. 

Given that Iraq has disappeared from the news, evidently it is getting closer to the judgments of editors of what 'should be.' 

But, there is still the disconnect between the reality of war, the armed competition between two forces to impose the way things 'should be,' and what the media thinks war 'should be.' 

If the media's selection of stories is the guide to their decisions of what 'should be' then wars should not involve killing, death, destruction, violence or all the other things historically involved in war. 

In the conduct of war, the media has only established a 'should be' standard on one side. 

Only the motivations of the coalition are suspected to run afowl of the determined 'should.'  The motivations of the Mohammedan Jihadists are never analyzed or questioned. 

The behaviour of coalition forces is tested against the standard of what should be, but the Mohammedan Jihadist's conduct is never questioned. 

The success of coalition actions, tactics and strategies are constantly compared to a standard, but the absolute failure of the Mohammedan Jihadists is never noted. 

(I keep waiting for the reporter who will take Al Qaida to task for their repeated failures to overrun OP Omar .)

The news media has formed a collective opinion of what 'should be' and uses that standard to judge the behaviour of the U.S., the Bush administration and the coalition. 

That the enemy, be it Jaish al Mahdi, Al Qaida or various armed criminal enterprises escapes a standard is telling.  It means that eithier the enemy is living up to the standard the media expects of them or, that in the eyes of the media, only the U.S. is worthy of scrutiny. 

The standard of what 'should be' as established by the media is arbitrary.  An arbitrary standard, is a biased standard. 

When I produced news casts, I used a different form of news judgement without a 'should be' standard.  Being a conservative, I do not think the world needs to be changed or have illusions of a grand 'should be.' 

I prioritized things by importance--how does this news item affect a person's life, why is it important for people to know this item? 

The ultimate importance of news is that people use it to make decisions--often important decisions. 

Many people will cast their ballot for President based on their views and knowledge of Iraq.  Given that so few people have direct or  in-depth of knowledge about the war, it is imperative that they be given the facts and those facts analyzed without an arbitrary standard determined by reporters and editors. 

That Iraq has disapperared from the news--save the stories of suicide bombings that, because the way they are the opposite of the way things 'should be,' are judged to be news--is a dangerous trend. 

Tens of thousands of stories of violence and carnage have accumulated, the stale Gross Ratings Points have accumulated and unless current information is delivered, those impressions are what people will use to make decisions.

Ed Morrissey of Hotair, in analyzing the amazing disappearing war , has a straight-forward opinion on the Associated Press' fatigue excuse for lack of Iraq coverage: 

The media, which like the Democrats mostly bid on failure, seems churlishly determined not to report on the success for reasons other than "fatigue".

""Like every other institution, the Washington and political press corps operate with a good number of biases and predilections . They include, but are not limited to, a near-universal shared sense that liberal political positions on social issues like gun control, homosexuality, abortion, and religion are the default, while more conservative positions are 'conservative positions.'..."

Halperin's default position being the way things 'should be' as the standard to judge newsworthiness. And with Halperin's standard, the media as agent of change wins every time, because people only talk about what they know and what they know about Iraq comes from the news.

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