snapped shot

UPDATE: Reuters has responded again. Has this issue touched a nerve with the GBU Editor? I'm pleased to see them release all the evidence at their disposal, though.

It is important to understand that accuracy and impartiality are central to our reporting, and to everything Reuters represents. We distribute approximately 1,500 pictures per day, and these pass through rigorous editorial evaluation and selection to make it onto our wire. We stand behind the authenticity and accuracy of both the original photo, and the additional images supplied.

I hate to say it, but I'm almost with Reuters on this one: The additional photographs do show quite a bit of undamaged room, in addition to piles of charred wood which, presumably, came from the roof of the house. The ball is back in ASRL's court, though—I'd love to see what their fire experts say about this additional information.



Reuters has been challenged about that pristine doll we were discussing a while back, and is fighting back with a vengeance... of sorts:

The photo is fine. We have examined the whole sequence of pictures that included this one, and there are a number of things in the house - a doorknob here, a picture frame there, etc. - that appear clean despite the serious fire damage around them: GBU Editor

Thanks to Rhonda Shearer from the Art Science Research Laboratory for bringing this to my attention, and for giving me the chance to hit the fauxtography tag once again. I definitely look forward to hearing what becomes of this investigation!



Update: Déjà vu. Reuters really loves standing behind their controversies, don't they?

Update: Here is one of the other images Rhonda referenced. Very nicely composed, too:



Also note that a personal friend of Mario Anzuoni swears that Mario would never stage a photograph—Which is duly noted, Chris. Is it possible that this was merely a very unlikely coincidence? My bet's on "no," but hey, I'm always open to suggestions.

On a related note to that last one, it would seem that Reuters really does have "occupation" on the brain: Notice that Israeli troops were withdrawn from the West Bank city of Jenin—which, incidentally, is known colloquially as "the city of suicide bombers," according to Aaron Klein's excellent book—in the year 2002:



Perhaps Reuters needs to update its stylebook to reflect these "recent" changes? (Many thanks to soccer dad for this excellent catch!)

I think the photo editor manning the AP Middle East desk might be getting just a teensy bit overzealous with that dastardly quote key:



I've seen every possible level of doubt put on the story of the Anbar Awakening, but I don't know that it's really worth disputing whether these are "citizens," and whether or not they are really "concerned."

(NOTE: The above image has been retracted, and is no longer available on the Yahoo! copy of the photo wires. According to GettyImages, the caption has been corrected to read: CORRECTS BULLETS TO UNSPENT An elderly Iraqi woman holds up two unspent bullets at her house following an early coalition forces raid in the predominantly Shiite Baghdad suburb of Sadr City, 14 August 2007. US and Iraqi troops carried out massive assaults against Shiite militants, killing four in Baghdad's volatile slum of Sadr City, and arresting several more across Iraq, the military said today.)

I saw this picture early yesterday afternoon, but got sidetracked before I got a chance to post anything about it. Of course, this may be the same woman that we covered here this past July:



Same photographer, same circumstances. Possibly even the same woman. (Hint: Check out the cheekbones, and the scar on the right cheek..)

What do you suppose the odds are that Wissam is trying to drum something up to try and make the Coalition troops look bad?

See-Also:

Blackfive, Anti-Protester, American Pundit, Hot Air, A Blog for All, Blue Crab Boulevard, The Jawa Report, Ace of Spades, Confederate Yankee, IMAO, Gateway Pundit

It would appear that the esteemed Agence France-Presse does not have any wire editors to spare. They seem to be mixing up the various terrorist factions who inhabit (nay, infest) the Palestinian terror-tories.



Of course, as we covered earlier, the body being carried belongs to a militant from an offshoot of Al-Aqsa Martyr's Brigades, which is itself a "violent" offshoot of the violent Fatah faction. Who, by the way, hate Hamas with a passion:

Residents say it’s enough to wear a beard, associated with Islamist Hamas, to be taken as a target by fighters from secular Fatah. A black and white keffieh, the headscarf symbolic of Fatah, is enough to earn a bullet from Hamas.

A mistake like this could happen to anyone, right?

Y'all can send me a check for the correction whenever you'd like, AFP.

Apparently, fauxtography isn't limited to events in the Middle East. Allan Detrich, a photographer most famous for his storm coverage, has been terminated by the Toledo Blade after, Holy Toledo!, being caught Photoshopping a front-page photograph of a baseball team.

Of course, upon further investigation, the Blade has discovered that he's been at it for a while.

Oops.

... of Unintended Consequences will never fail us. It seems that, predictably, another environmentalist sham is going to be causing us some grief, and, as always, nothing comes for free.

Remember all that talk about how "Ethanol" fuels would change the face of the industry? Corn-gas would allow us to grow our own fuel, and let us be independent of the Oil Monopoly, we were told. Of course, when the numbers started coming in, we came to learn that the fuel efficiency of this Magical Mystery Material just didn't stack up to Plain-Ol' Petrol, which means that the laws of physics still remain in effect. (I like the "Bush Administration" angle in that last link, especially considering where the Ethanol push originated... and hint to you libtards: It Ain't Bush!)

Fortunately for all of humanity, we now discover that the laws of economics still rule as well:

Ethanol plants and foreign buyers are gobbling the nation's corn supplies, pushing prices as high as $3.40 a bushel, the Agriculture Department said Friday.

Farmers haven't seen prices this high for more than a decade. The monthly crop report forecast even better prices than in December, raising the estimate 10 cents to $3 to $3.40 a bushel.

The good news? This may encourage small farmers to once again grow corn, which could help save quite a few of them from certain bankruptcy. After all, I seem to recall a few other cash crops that've done wonders for my fair Commonwealth's economy sometime in the past.

In any case, my point remains the same: Liberals breed environmentalism, Environmentalism breeds pain, therefore Liberals breed pain. When they're not jet-setting around the nation in their 200-gallons-per-mile private jets.

The Democratic Party: Truly the voice of the little people.