Rape rooms, death rooms and Newsrooms

In the run up to the war much was made by the Washington war machine flacks about the Saddam Hussein's sons raping Iraqi woman that they saw on the street. Yesterday, a second U.S. soldier pleaded guilty in raping a young Iraqi woman and then murdering her and members of her family. So much for the United States having the moral high ground in this war.
What struck me in the coverage of this story was how two different media outlets covered the story of the rape and murder. Here is how the Washington Post/AP described the soldiers testimony about the rape and murders:

"I lifted up her skirt and took off her stockings while Barker held her hands with his knees," he said before admitting that he raped the teenager as she screamed. "After I was done, myself and Barker switched spots."

Now here is the Reuters report on the testimony:

"While we were playing cards Barker and Green started talking about having sex with an Iraqi female. Barker and Green had already known..." Cortez said before breaking down. He bowed his head and remained silent, sniffling occasionally, for a full minute before continuing.
"Barker and Green had already known what, um, house they wanted to go to ... knew only one male was in the house, and knew it would be an easy target," Cortez said.
Once at the house, Green, the suspected ringleader, took the girl's mother, father and little sister into a bedroom, Cortez said, while he and Barker took the teenager, Abeer Qassim al-Janabi, to the living room.
"She kept squirming and trying to keep her legs closed and saying stuff in Arabic," Cortez said.
During the time me and Barker were raping Abeer, I heard five or six gunshots that came from the bedroom. After Barker was done, Green came out of the bedroom and said that he had killed them all, that all of them were dead," Cortez said.
"Green then placed himself between Abeer's legs to rape her," Cortez said, sniffing audibly. When Green was finished, he "stood up and shot Abeer in the head two or three times." The entire crime took about five minutes to carry out, he added.
Cortez said the girl knew her parents and sister had been shot while she was being raped. He said she screamed and cried throughout the assault."

If the American public only reads stories from the Associated Press and other mainstream U.S. news organizations who reported this story they may never fully understand why there is such hostility to the United States. The Reuters report shows the brutality and horror of the actions of these U.S. soldiers. A brutality and indifference that matches that of Saddam Hussein and his sons. This hypocrisy of horror is not lost in the Arab world. In the American news media the horror of what happened to this young Iraqi girl and her family is buried under news stories about Anna Nicole Smith. When will the American public wake up that we are not always looked upon as a shining light anymore in many parts of the world.