I received an email from a dear friend the other day containing a montage of some truly heart-warming photos of GIs from the war zone in Iraq. A couple of the snapshots are on this page.

In addition to the two shown here were pictures depicting some servicemen in a circle of prayer, another with a soldier kissing a letter from home, and yet another with a grinning Top Sergeant giving a high five to a little 5-year-old Iraqi child he'd just met. Neat stuff. The "human touch" which has been displayed by American soldiers as far back as ... well ... as far back as there've been American soldiers. Really touching pictures.

But, here's the rub. Probably unnoticed by my friend who sent the email (she had actually forwarded it to me from someone else) was the caption, "PICTURES YOU WON'T SEE ON THE NEWS...". I'm not sure if this was some backhand slap at the media for war coverage, or just what it was. So to the originator of this idiotically biased headline, I offer the following...

Below each photo was a byline or "slug", identifying the photographer and his or her publication. Names like John Moore/AP ... Romeo Gacao/AFP ... Damir Sagoli/Reuters ... and so on. Real "live" photo-journalists who took the shots, and yes, dear Email Originator, shots that had been published in the news. Small picky point on my part, you say? Hardly. Further consider this...

Since the Iraqi War commenced March 20th, 13 news and photo journalists have been killed doing their job, with another half-dozen mysteriously disappearing and feared dead. In fact, some 274 journalists have been killed "in action", if you will, since the first Gulf War in 1991, including Bosnia, Rwanda, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Chechnya, Kosovo, and yes, Iraq.

We should thank the journalists who go into harms way to bring us both the bad AND the good. It is, after all, WAR, folks. So, please don't denigrate the media, especially the photo guys and gals who can't "phone-it-in", by portraying their work in some self-righteous email as having "never made the news". Shame on you.