ninme

Glenn:

PERHAPS IF HOLLYWOOD HAD MORE PEOPLE who had been in the military, it would be able to make military stuff that doesn’t suck. But judging from various and sundry negative reviews for the new FX show Over There, they’re not pulling that off at the moment.

Maybe they should try just reading more blogs from Iraq. Might produce some better story ideas.

See, this made me think of this month’s Wired article “The Blogs of War” by John Hockenberry (a paraplegic, apparently). Now, I’m not a milblogger (nor am I in the military, nor do I know anyone actively in the military (unless you count a friend of my cousin’s I met once whom I’m not even sure is still there)), but, after a skim, I didn’t recognize a single name, and given that the byline for the article is:

On the 21st-century battlefield, the campfire glow comes from a laptop. It’s a real-time window on life behind the lines - and suddenly the Pentagon is on the defensive.

And that the first line of the article is:

THE SNAPSHOTS OF IRAQI PRISONERS being abused at Abu Ghraib were taken by soldiers and shared in the digital military netherworld of Iraq.

I have a feeling that the people making those TV shows might just read quite a few milblogs.

Btw those reviews Glenn linked to are hah-larious.