Actually, the print media played a huge role in politics throughout the latter half of the eighteenth century and on through the nineteenth. Political careers were made and destroyed in newspapers, though not as prolifically as now:P For example, in the 1760s a press war forced the Earl of Bute (the PM at the time) into the political wilderness and helped secure fame and power for one of his main critics, the radical politician John Wilkes. What gives the incident a seriously modern flavour though, is Bute's attempts to influence the public mood by rigging press coverage, hiring a gang of journalists to sing his administrations praises......the modern age didn't invent spin doctors:P Government secret service accounts from the eighteenth century show that thousands of pounds were spent during the early part of the 1780s in an attempt to use the growing medium of popular politics. But....the press and the public have always been difficult to control and it really wasn't any clearer back then, than it is now, who was wagging who :)

As to the tabloids.....if you have time or inclination check out the tabloid press of the nineteenth century, very Murdoch!....then take a quick peek at the middle-class fayre and you'll see a direct equivalent to today's Daily Mail nastiness and fear mongering (lots of stuff about the general degeneration of morals and health of the working classes the so called 'efficiency debate' and the loosening of society's control over girls and women).

It is well known that the VA sucks. It would only seem reasonable that the premiere facility of the VA/Armed forces would suck with a certain kind of panache.

hahah well that's one way of looking at it ;)

Previously posted and apparently ignored in Bob Woodruff's recovery images: Soldiers lying on mattresses without sheets - lying in pools of their own urine. Why no sheets? Money shortages - or what happens when pallets of $hundred bills are deliverd to Iraq and distributed without any accounting - to finance the insurgency that put that soldier into a pool of his own urine.

Even Rumsfled's wife saw what was happening and Rumsfeld did nothing.

That would be the VA, not Walter Reed. I worked there for three years. The inpatient care is top knotch, same at Bethesda. The problem was with the patients in Med Hold, the transition care between discharge and civilian life after an injury. Just to keep things straight...

You have it completely backwards. That is Walter Reed. And when did you work there? Before Rumsfeld was 'fixing' the military? These articles are quite blunt about it. That was Walter Reed - it is that bad. VA hospitals are only now just getting scrutiny because things there are typically even worse. Remember Saddam had WMD even though facts said otherwise and reality was then perverted by anti-Americans. Anyone blowing the whistle in this George Jr era gets massacred - including the better generals who were 'ordered' to be ignored. Even Walter Reed is now that bad because 85% of all problems are directly traceable to top management. Those who tried to change things were 'transfered'.

I will be the most dispictable poster you have ever meet if it means choosing between being nice verses being honest. I have long been accurate about this administration’s contempt for the American soldier. Even Walter Reed is now that bad.

The reports that I have read in the mainstream press talk about the VA, specifically on NPR. If you have sources please site them and I will read them. I am brutally honest. The care at Walter Reed is very good. The people that were in building 18 were in a MED HOLD status. I am sure that you know what that is and what it means to be stuck there. I will not make excuses for the failures, they are across the board in many facets of the system, they have been there for years. Funny how suddenly everyone is all interested in fixing what people have said has been broken since its inception. Outpatient care has been and is deplorable. Inpatient care is very good.

I stand corrected. There is one report being reposted all over the thread and on all the blogs.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...022801954.html

Anybody here work in a hospital?

WTF?
 

Yea, I know the place. I worked there a long time ago. Building 18 was a crap hole then. I believe the pic above is the General's house on post.

The stories I provided are Walter Reed. Yes - it is also in the VA Hospitals. They are probably worse because the reality about Walter Reed is not what you have posted. The contempt buy George Jr extremists for the American soldier is so bad that even Rumsfeld's wife could not affect change. Rumsfeld personally knew how bad things are in Walter Reed because she told him. And nothing changed. This adminstration's contempt for the American soldier it that egregious.

From the Washington Post of 5 Mar 2007: How long ago were these original Anne Hull and Dana Priest stories and you still don't know that Walter Reed would even leave a soldier on a mattress, without sheets, in pools of his own urine. There is no way any good American did not know of these stories last week.

There is a major legacy cost to George Jr's "Mission Accomplished". These resulting legacy costs are estimated at about $2 Trillion. What does an MBA do - and George Jr is both educated as and reacts as an MBA? He cuts costs. Welcome to a soldier lying unattended in pools of his own urine in Walter Reed Army Hospital in Washington DC.

Do you think I am criticizing George Jr? Not as much as I am criticizing Cellar dwellers who did not know this story last week.

How long ago was the contempt for American soldiers in Walter Reed known? Well long after the story broke, we have this report on 2 Mar 2007: That pathetic care for soldiers even in Walter Reed - which is supposed to be the best of the best - was that bad - and ignored by how many here?

Remember - 85% of all problems are directly traceable to top management. Even Rumsfeld's wife had personal testimony - and he did nothing. This is not an accident - just like the USS Bataan sat off New Orleans unable to offer Katrina assistance because this administration would not authorize it. Walter Reed is not an accident. How big is the iceberg. How much contempt does Pres Cheney have for the troops and for Americans? Did you also read how much more spying on Americans is conducted by an administration with Urbane Guerrilla definitions for 'what is democracy'?

For the record - Wolf works in a hospital (I think - a mental care unit anyway), Brianna was a nurse for many years and althougj I am office based I have a lot of contact with hospitals and spend a reasonable amount of time there (work for the National Health Service).

I work at a hospital, but I'm a computer guy.

Sorry chick - another addition to the Flintfile