Patterico is investigating an incident in Iraq that the LA Times allegedly misreported, but he’s not getting much help from the CENTCOM press desk:
The final e-mail I received began this way:
Sir –
Thank you for your support for the troops; we appreciate your attempts to set the record straight on your blog; which by the way is very impressive and does have quite a following. However, this forum is reserved for credentialed media outlets. If we stop to answer every blogger in world who has a question we will be inundated. Our first priority is getting the credentialed media the correct information as quickly as possible so that they can present a balanced story. That in itself is quite a challenge, as you can imagine, in the fog of war and with intricacies of this mission. I hope that you will not take offense and understand, but please refrain from contacting the Press Desk unless you can provide media credentials.Translation: “Let me say this politely. You are just a blogger and we have real media to deal with.”
It’s like the military press officers have battered woman syndrome.