Here’s a good op-ed in the Scotsman on Western media’s relentless negativity about the Iraq War, and “hotel journalism:” A blinkered view from the Baghdad Hilton. (Hat tip: Mike D.)

Hotel journalism has come into its own in Iraq. On 17 January, In Counterpunch, an American political newsletter, the Independent’s Robert Fisk made the rather dubious claim that Baghdad and the Iraqi National Guard were being taken over by insurgents, and described how impossible it was for reporters to get about. He explained that, although they never tell their audience, they get much of their information by telephone from US military sources.

These sources, so Fisk contended, barricaded into their heavily fortified Green Zone, are even more isolated from “real” Iraq than the questioning journalists, and their information is partial. Unsurprisingly, given his political stance, in Fisk’s opinion, this kind of reporting hugely benefits the Americans.

However Bartle Bull, who has actually been living in Sadr City, has a different opinion. Far from promoting the Americans, he believes hotel journalism is inaccurate because of “wilful” bad reporting, which is “weirdly personal” and based on the notion that Iraq must fail.

I’m with Bull on this one, as there is no evidence, at least in the British media, of pro-American bias. Rather the opposite. It was not until BBC’s Newsnight revealed late last week, through clenched teeth, that independent Iraqi television had taken off since Saddam’s downfall, that any reporting about Iraq had been remotely positive.

However, even Kirsty Wark had to smile at the new Iraqi soap opera, Modern Day Pashas, a pantomime romp, and the proliferation of new reality TV shows about everything from reconstruction to wedding days.

The former was a little strange, as the Iraqi presenter assured a weeping widow that “everything would be as before”, a claim which made the poor widow cry, but the latter was as normal as reality TV shows ever are. Much to the disappointment of western journalists, it seems that, under the country’s new thick rash of satellite dishes, Iraqis are actually enjoying themselves.