There's Something Rotten at the New York Times

This picture was taken by New York Times photographer, Joao Silva. It purports to be a member of Muqtada "Mookie" al Sadr's "Mahdi Army" firing on US troops. That's right, folks, a NYT puotographer was right there in the room watching Iraqi militiamen trying to kill American troops and recorded the experience for us to see.

What the...?

And now the Times features the photo in its "Memorable Photographs" slideshow [here] and accompanies it with a comment by Michele McNally, "Right there with the Mahdi army. Incredible courage."

What is more, Mr. Silva has a book out, titled "In The Company of God" [here] in which he chroncles his adventures living and traveling with people who kill Americans. It is, he says "a narrative about faith, sacrifice, war and martyrdom" -- theirs, not ours. The pictures were taken while he was "on assignment" for the NYT. This is not "know your enemy" kind of stuff; it is a sympathetic, even adulatory, portrait of this nation's enemies, subsidized, praised. and promoted by our "paper of record."

I don't fault Mr. Silva. He is not an American. Born in Portugal he now lives in South Africa. For all I know he might consider himself to be a "citizen of the world." But I am aghast at the idea that the New York Times -- the leading element in our journalistic establishment -- should subsidize, publicize, and honor his activities.

Little Green Footballs, where I found the photo, sees this as evidence that "the media are the enemy." I'm not so sure about that. It speaks more to the disaffection of America's elite culture, it's internationalist pretensions, and the incredible insensitivity and shallow professionalism of our journalistic establishment. They are not so much our enemies as members of a parochial little world unto themselves. They are not so much anti-American as determinedly and professionally un-American.

Check out the entire "memorable photographs" slideshow here. The photos are all high-quality images, and the anti-administration and anti-war bias are unmistakable. Warning: the first photo in the collection shows a crowd in Fallujah celebrating the burning of Americans, whose charred corpses hang in the background.