How Accurate is the NY Times Reporting?

In its news blog "The Lede," the New York Times discusses some factions of the left in Iraq. Citing an Iraqi blogger named Iraq Slogger, the Times writes:

A previously-unknown group is using Che's image in leaflets announcing a "movement of Iraqi Communists and Marxists experienced in armed struggle, leftist Iraqi nationalists, and their supporters," according to Iraq Slogger.

The Iraqi Armed Revolutionary Resistance, a hardly striking name to add to an already crowded list, called out a long list of enemies, including the "puppet government, the so-called Council of Representatives, terrorist Salafis, militias, the Interior Ministry, Iraqi traitors who came on American tanks, the American and British mercenaries, contractors, and their servants from the South Lebanese Army."

The group seems unlikely to inspire Iraqis who would most strongly identify with their political beliefs.

Then, without transition, the Times' post turns to a discussion of the Iraqi Communist Party (ICP), stating, correctly, that the ICP holds the leading position on the left in Iraq.

Quoting ICP spokesperson Salam Ali:

"The Communist Party appeals to people because it is not tainted with corruption and does not have blood on its hands from sectarian killings. People are seeing the party as hope, as a potential alternative, something different," Salam Ali told Political Affairs, which specializes in Marxist news.

The post seems to conclude that the Iraqi Communist Party is little more than parading, smiling, but irrelevant types.

But the Times falls flat with its reporting. If it did its homework, it would learn that the Iraqi Communist Party is a leading force among a broad political spectrum of secular and democratic forces, not just a "party faithful."

Readers can find out more about the ICP's role in Iraq's emergent labor movement, its youth and student movements, as well as Iraq's women's equality movement and the struggle for democracy, peace and sovereignty in Iraq at PoliticalAffiars.net.

Indeed, those are the forces, the ICP says, that will be needed to take a lead in ending sectarian violence and full-scale civil war overseen and provoked by Bush's surging surge.

What do you expect from the Times after all?