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                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, April 2, 1993                   TAG: 9304020450
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A-10   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Short

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ATROCITIES

ACCURACY In Media, or AIM, is a right-wing group that seeks to act as a watchdog on the media, particularly the national TV networks and big daily newspapers such as The New York Times and The Washington Post.

By our rough estimate, its critiques are on target maybe 15 percent of the time, belabor the obvious maybe another 15 percent, and are essentially statements or expositions of conservative viewpoints, rather than media criticism, maybe 50 percent of the time.

That leaves - hmm, let's get the arithmetic right - 20 percent of the time for bilge. Into which category we'd assign the following:

"The My Lai Massacre Syndrome is a disorder that afflicts the American news media that was first noted during the Vietnam War. . . . [It] is the strong tendency of the media to treat misdeeds by American troops or the troops of countries that we support as far bigger news than comparable or worse misdeeds committed by our enemies."

But American misdeeds are far bigger news than enemy misdeeds. This is true partly because the U.S. public has a responsibility for the behavior of its own and its allies' troops that it does not have for the enemy's behavior.

But it is true also because our side is supposed to be the good guys; enemy forces, the bad guys. What's newsworthy is what's out of the ordinary. The day when American atrocities are as commonplace as enemy atrocities is the day when America is in deep, deep trouble.

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