Policy Snack: Withdrawing the Bureaucrats and the Media from Iraq

This week's post for Hudson-NY: Iraq: Withdrawing the Bureaucrats and the Media.

I should acknowledge that there a few good apples in there, but I believe they are helpless in getting much good done when facing the bureaucracies of State and the CIA. The media, well, are plain crap. I can't think of one foreign journalist who's worked in Iraq for the last six months that I can respect. Once upon a time I had high hopes for the Iraqi stringers and fixers working with the major bureaus in Baghdad, and how they'd use those experiences to build a vibrant and free local press in the future, until I realized that those young Iraqis were being trained by the worst crop of ego-driven, activist reporters the profession has produced in a long time. Internships at the National Inquirer would have yielded better results.