The AP sent out a story with this despicable headline, which some headline writer presumably thought was a clever turn of phrase:
Iraq: Surge Of Suicide Blasts Kills 27
Get it? U.S. surge of troops, terrorist surge of suicide bombings. Get it? Are you laughing yet? Catch the irony?
Me neither.
And then there’s the lede:
(AP) A suicide bomber who penetrated layers of security blew himself up in the busy lobby of a leading Baghdad hotel on Monday, killing at least 12 people, including a U.S.-allied tribal sheik, police reported.
The attack, in which 21 others were wounded, was just one in a surge of five suicide and other bombings Monday that killed at least 32 people across Iraq.
The story has since been updated with a different headline and angle:
Iraq Bomber Strikes U.S.-Allied Sheiks
But the “surge” comparison remains in the lede, in the third paragraph—where it will stay firmly within the average daily newspaper’s “International” section, which prints only the first three to five paragraphs of a story.
BAGHDAD (AP) – A suicide bomber apparently targeting a meeting of U.S.-allied Sunni sheiks penetrated layers of security and blew himself up in a hotel lobby on Monday, killing four tribal leaders and at least eight others, police reported.
The sheiks were associated with the Anbar Salvation Council, which had taken up arms to help drive extremists of al-Qaida in Iraq from the western province of Anbar.
The attack was among a surge of five suicide and other bombings Monday that killed at least 45 people across Iraq. In an unrelated incident, the U.S. command reported a U.S. soldier shot to death Monday in south Baghdad or its outskirts.
Just to be clear, this is a deliberate attempt by the AP to use the imagery of the U.S. Army fighting terrorists—to save civilians from bombing attacks—when describing those same terrorists responding to the Army’s attempt to stop them.
Despicable.
I know I headlined this post a “surge” in AP bias, but frankly, it is not. It’s simply the status quo.