Though I am as sickened by this sudden flood of imagery as the next person, I am somewhat fascinated by what it all means from a sociological perspective. This dissemination and multiplication of imagery being force fed to the world through "illegitimate" channels, created through outright refusal to obey the dictates of the powers that be, represents a genuine rebellion not just against this war, but against our very notions of reality. Baudrillard once argued that the first Gulf War wasn't "real" because the video representation we were all fed over the TV was carefully controlled and monitored, parcelled out in tidy little sound bytes. The "real" war was replaced with a simulation provided courtesy of the Pentagon - cold, bloodless, full of victory and no death. That's how this war began and how it was supposed to play out. That's what we all expected. Now, the inept simulacra created by the Bush regime is being chipped away at, not by the media, but by rebels on all sides. Members of the "allied" military are breaking the rules, Iraqi rebels are breaking the rules, the third world media is breaking the rules. The effect - complete chaos. Now, the real battle is between the American media/military/industrial complex and their version of the "real" war and the sudden flood of images sneaking in from around the sides which represent something completely different! Whose "real" will ultimately prevail? What will that mean for our sense of the human condition? How can we citizens of the first world passively surrender to the pre-packaged flow of information that was created especially for us by folks at FOX News and the Defense Department when suddenly something grusome and reeking of death is threatening to burst through that facade and shock us out of complacency? Things are falling apart! The center cannot hold! I'm falling, rolling down a hill, hitting my head against the marble blocks of Amurrican moral superiority. Aaaaagh! Splat!