7th Graders Skype with Pedro

Last night I had the extreme pleasure of doing a 30 min Q&A with a 7th grade class from Brooklyn, NY. My good buddy Matt (aka DJ Lippy - see blog link below) and his wife Amanda are teachers at a school there. Matt and I had been Skyping a little and thought it would be fun to do it with some of his students. I was very impressed with the insight expressed in some of their questions. It scares me to think that DJ Lippy is in such close proximity to all those young impressionable minds but obviously he is doing a good job. One question asked by a young girl was, "Does it seem strange to be in Iraq and watch American news reporting on Iraq." This is something I have thought about a lot because IT IS very strange. There has been a fair amount of coverage on Mosul lately but I see a big disconnect between what is happening here and what I read/view on the news. I am not sure if this is the media's intention but I guess sensationalism is the new journalism. In depth stories about real progress, an expose on the local culture, pieces highlighting various ethnicities, specifics on the different religions or anything else that would deepen our collective understanding of the situation here seems few and far between. I wonder, is it all deemed too boring and confusing for the average American news consumer. Getting news is like going to McDonald's. We are being spoon fed garbage......empty calories!

Further thanks to Matt and Amanda for my Mexican Wrestling Mask. I will be the envy of all my fellow soldiers. I might be able to fashion a holloween costume out of this and I also plan to wear this mask in the Operating room. Can you imagine the fear (besides the general baseline fear) I will instill in my patients (US soldiers and enemy combatants alike) if I come into the room wearing this?
Probably would be a good way to get myself on the news! I can imagine the headlines on CNN now........something like "Abu Gharib in Mosul" or, "Army Doctor Abuses Patients." I bet that would sell some papers.