Iran and other countries I can't visit on my U.S. passport

Here's a byline I didn't anticipate seeing at the Tehran Times: Fidel Castro.
The newspaper prints Castro's resignation statement as though he were an opinion columnist, and never identifies him as the dictator/president/head cheese in Cuba. It is interesting to see how keenly Iran follows political movements of other countries they see as being anti American, keeping close tabs on these future potential allies?

Oil is to blame for... Anchorage

Found this Anchorage Daily News headline scanning Google for news about oil: Wednesday's oil, gas, gold and zinc prices. I think its a nice example of how local regional news can be. Elsewhere, most people only read about oil prices - especially now with the price hovering around $100/bbl. But in Anchorage, you can read about the price of oil in relation to the other resources in the state. These prices are noted daily, that's how vital they are to the interests of the citizenry.
In the story of Big Oil, we don't frequently hear about the blue collar mechanics at the bottom of the industry. This series of Alaskan articles touches on how tightly they are connected to the market.

A lot of writing on the chalkboard

Today we wrote on the chalkboard and I realized that I have horrible cramped handwriting.

We also learned about the push-pull effect - the "everyone already knows this, and no one cares" reasoning behind not reporting on certain aspects of foreign policy. Overall, "everyone in the process is guilty".

I am wondering a little bit about questioning the motives of the media, foreign policy officials, the government, etc. Yes, the media has an agenda. Many agendas - competing agendas, even. But everyone has an agenda. I feel that a better day-to-day standard of information screening is to assume that all information is biased and tainted, regardless of its source. Instead of trying to navigate all the twists and turns on the LA Freeway (following all the advantages, agendas, frames, disincentives, etc), why not just heap grains of salt and consume it all? Possible outcomes include (1) a more critical approach to news, (2) overwhelming cynicism (3) heart attack - sodium is bad for you.

Iran low priority at the Washington Post

Just a few numbers I culled over this past week (M-F):
Articles mentioning Iran: 600
Articles mentioning Iraq: 1,542
Articles specifically about Iran: 22
Articles written by Washington Post: 2 (9%)
Articles specifically about Iraq: 37
Articles written by Washington Post: 12 (32%)

The huge volume of articles about Iraq is largely caused by its prominence in domestic politics. Almost 50% of the articles mentioning Iraq were found in the "politics" or "nation" section. Regardless, over the same period, Washington Post staff writers penned 37 articles about Iraq and 2 about Iran.
There is a saying that the army always prepares to fight the last war, meaning that senior leaders are preoccupied with the lessons of the most immediately previous conflict and do not innovate quickly enough. Journalism, at least in this instance, seems to also have a "previous conflict" mentality. Yes, there is a war going on in Iraq and not Iran. However, future security concerns are more likely to arise in Iran, or North Korea (only 190 mentions), or some other country even lower on the national radar. And when we're all blindsided by the new factor, we will be furious that we didn't see it coming. With coverage like this, should we be surprised?
The media is bound to print what the public wants to read, not what the public should read. Granted, I am not eager to suggest that newspaper editors are the ideal gatekeepers of public education, but media saturation of one concern at the expense of all the others is dangerous.

Oil is to Blame for... 9/11

From the Tehran Times, my favorite source of trustworthy information:
The Bush administration’s purpose in planning and orchestrating 9/11 was to create an atmosphere of fear in this country so that the military/industrial/oil/private central banking complex could start their fake war on terror which included attacking Afghanistan and Iraq.

The article, which was the most viewed for Thursday, February 14th, goes on to implicate the mainstream media and Congress as complicit in the events of 9/11. The reason? Oil.

Vice President Cheney met with the heads of the various oil companies right after Bush took office...They were talking about attacking Iraq in order to gain control of their oil fields. They were talking about attacking Afghanistan to take over the construction of a gas pipeline through Afghanistan.

What is interesting, of course, is that this view of America and 9/11 does not appear to be widely challenged in certain parts of the world. Tehran Times is one of the most widely read dailies in Iran, and they reported this story as truth, perpetuating the schema of Big Oil as a super villain.

Cavea Sic Draconis

Misreading the Public, overall, found that there are severe communication lapses between the government and the public. For example, government correctly thought that the public did not want to increase foreign aid spending, however the public truly was ignorant as to how much money was actually spent on foreign aid. Another area of misreading is casualty avoidance - government thinks that Americans have very low tolerance for loss of life in combat. This may or may not be related to the French-Algerian war, when Paris lost the will to fight but the generals on the ground did not and protested mightily when forced to withdraw.
Quote of the day: "Governments tend to bumper sticker complex ideas"
Questions:
1.) In an age of instant gratification and rapid communications, do we really want a government that is perfectly responsive to the demands and whims of the people?
2.) In regards to foreign aid, is that really a decision best made by the public?
Okay, so maybe both my questions get at a metaquestion - is "government" a dog on a leash, taken for walks by the people? Perhaps the wording is unfair, but I think my point is this: when the Ambassador (whose name I did not capture in my notes) bemoaned the invention of the telegram, which would make diplomacy all the more difficult for the speed, I do not think he was being completely irrational. Some things take time. Perhaps the delay in both time and perception between people and the government is not actually bad. Perhaps we ought to elect officials to make decisions, not obey the ones we make.
But this is neither here nor there. Speculation. I don't know.

Military Intervention for Iran?

In a speech covered apparently only by the Tehran Times, Iranian Army Commander Major General Ataollah Salehi asserted that Iran would not respond to military or economic pressure, and that the Islamic Republic is safe from any threat the West could possibly bring.
Meanwhile, the Washington Post picks up a Reuters story discussing Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's desire to discuss intervention in Iran. Olmert said last month Israel would not be reconciled to a nuclear Iran and "all options are on the table."
In other words, Iran is posturing, but no one is paying attention. For a country that already struggles with feeling ignored and unimportant, Western media snubs cannot be pleasant.
Also, based only on the last few weeks of observation, it seems that most of the Post's stories on Iran come from Reuters...