Longing For Peter Arnett

The art of covering war

“Whoever controls the media, controls the mind.”

— Jim Morrison

Once upon a time, wars were not packaged like they are now. They were packaged but you got mostly the dangerous work of journalists within limits of the ethics of reporting. Reporters were heroic (they still are) covering war; they did tough work.

They gave us mostly facts. As a kid I remember Walter Cronkite and the Vietnam War every single night. He just told us how many had died. Dan Rather in Vietnam risking his life. Neil Sheehan. So many good reporters.

But come 1991, the stage belonged to Peter Arnett, a reporter for CNN. Bernie Shaw, who eventually became CNN’s lead anchor, was there as well but Arnett is who I most remember. Arnett gave us the war in Iraq to take back Kuwait in the moment.

It is a time to savor now considering the media’s coverage of almost anything these days is clouded by intentional distortion and bias. I can’t watch it.

Arnett’s moment in 1991 was a moment of transition. The world was beginning its shift to today information overload highway and this period of war reporting would…