clipped from www.mrc.org

After months of improving security in Iraq, the big network morning shows on Friday cited one horrific suicide bombing as proof that "mayhem and misery are back in Baghdad," as CBS correspondent Mark Strassmann put it. But over the last five months, the broadcast networks have consistently reduced their coverage of Iraq, as if the story of American success in Iraq is less worthy of attention than their old mantra of American failure in Iraq.

On all three networks, however, journalists are admitting that the U.S. strategy is yielding success. "As a new year begins, overall violence is falling and hope seems to be rising," fill-in anchor Harry Smith announced on the January 1 CBS Evening News.