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President Bush made his final trip to Iraq over the weekend and at a news conference was confronted by an Iraqi journalist who threw his shoes at the president, calling it a farewell kiss. He then said, "This is from the widows, the orphans and those who were killed in Iraq!" The 28 year old Iraqi journalist, Muntader al-Zaidi, was a correspondent for Al Baghdadia, an independent Iraqi television station. It is useful to contrast his act of protest with the U.S. media, which acquiesced in the Bush administration's march to war refusing to raise questions about Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction. What have we learned since then? 

After his ill fated press conference Bush traveled by helicopter to Camp Victory where he told hundreds of soldiers that the surge was, "one of the greatest successes in the history of the United States military." During the presidential election that same line was repeated over and over by talking heads and experts on morning talk shows and the evening news. But the reality is quite different. The war in Iraq is far from over. Neighborhoods have been ethnically cleansed. And the country is far from secure.  

Today on GRITtv we consider the media's role in trumpeting the U.S. war effort and the many milestones that have been reached from Mission Accomplished to the Surge with Nation contributor Christian Parenti, Rick Rowley and Jacquie Soohen of Big Noise Films, and Norman Solomon, the author of War Made Easy.