US Military Death Toll at 4,106, TV News Scaling Back Coverage

After a month that had a decline in military deaths in Iraq, 22 soldiers have been killed in action so far in June. This trend is disturbing in that it reveals that Iraqis, beyond "the insurgency" are growing impatient with the US occupation, as exemplified by an Al-Madaen city council member who opened fire and killed two US soldiers who entered the council building.

In addition, with the US economy and natural disasters situations at home, news organizations are scaling back their coverage in Iraq and Afghanistan.

According to the International Herald Tribune

According to data compiled by Andrew Tyndall, a television consultant who monitors the three network evening newscasts, coverage of Iraq has been "massively scaled back this year." Almost halfway into 2008, the three newscasts have shown 181 weekday minutes of Iraq coverage, compared with 1,157 minutes for all of 2007. The "CBS Evening News" has devoted the fewest minutes to Iraq, 51, versus 55 minutes on ABC's "World News" and 74 minutes on "NBC Nightly News." (The average evening newscast is 22 minutes long.)

CBS News no longer stations a single full-time correspondent in Iraq, where some 150,000 United States troops are deployed.