It it possible...

...that the mass media of so many western nations, at the mercy of the 24-hour news cycle, has completely forgotten what investigative journalism is?

...that they are incapable of distinguishing lies from truth, and in the interest of being "fair and balanced," simply let representatives of warring factions dictate what is happening?

...that they are capable of distinguishing lies from truth, but are simply unwilling to do the legwork to do so?

...that they are willing to do the legwork, but have let radical terrorists intimidate them into submission?

It's a doozy, to be sure. Woodward and Bernstein may have brought down a president, but they were fairly (not 100%) certain that they were unlikely to come to any real harm in the course of their investigations. That's the difference between the USA and Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, and Lebanon. No reporter wants to be the next Daniel Pearl.

So while journalists have relatively free reign in Haifa, Netanya, and the rest of bombarded northern Israel, the ones in Beirut and southern Lebanon have minders and spinners, and are given carefully orchestrated "tours" of the areas bombed by Israelis.

It makes me wonder why supposed "news" organizations would even bother going to report from Lebanon. I suppose they rationalize that some news is better than no news, but broadcasting what amounts to propaganda is more irresponsible than broadcasting nothing at all. Especially when they could go across the border into Israel and walk around wherever they please. I suppose it all comes down to advertising revenue, which sickens me.

I say to all news agencies of the western world: get all of your useless, terrified, browbeaten, propaganda-delivering "journalists" the hell out of Lebanon, and tell Hezbollah that they're not coming back until they are allowed to report the news. If the world only gets the Israeli side of the story, so be it. At least they'll be hearing unvarnished truth. Maybe that'll finally bring some clarity to this mud.