Playing the Media

From today's Best of the Web Today, check out this information. Have you seen anything about this in the press?

Tim Chavez, a columnist for the (Nashville) Tennessean, offers this horrifying quote from Lt. Col. Jim Rose, a Tennessee Marine fighting in Iraq:

''The Najaf shrine--HUNDREDS of dead women and children were brought out after [Muqtada al] Sadr left,'' Rose wrote. ''They (Sadr's supporters) rounded them up during the battle and brought them in to be executed. Why? Because they anticipated the Americans would eventually enter the shrine and walk into a media ambush. We never went in. The people of Najaf love us right now because of that. They hate Sadr and want him dead.

''Have you heard that one yet (in the media)?''

In the New York Post, Amir Taheri recounts this "recent bizarre phrase from French Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin":

The head of the Figaro press group went to see him about the kidnapping of two French journalists in Iraq; Raffarin assured him they would soon be freed, reportedly saying, "The Iraqi insurgents are our best allies."

This is one of the "allies" John Kerry thinks he would be able to win over to our side.