Vietnam is often called our only uncensored war, but that only means that the government wasn't vetting the pictures and words.

The U.S. government has in recent years fought what it termed wars against AIDs, drug abuse, poverty, illiteracy and terrorism. Each of those wars has budgets, legislation, offices, officials, letterhead - everything necessary in a bureaucracy to tell you something is real.

First, those images help us understand the general and specific magnitude of disaster caused by the tsunami. The huge outpouring of aid would not have happened without those images.

All governments in all wars have used all the means at their disposal to put their own motives, decisions and actions, and the actions of their military forces, in the best possible light.

America has the longest prison sentences in the West, yet the only condition long sentences demonstrably cure is heterosexuality.