Power Line's treatment of the bridge photos is fair and open-minded -- they're asking rather than asserting -- whether something might not be quite right in Tyre. Meanwhile, others are questioning whether the Qana tragedy might have been staged by Hezbollah based on various perceived inconsistencies.
Thus are conspiracy theories born. When the media fail to carefully police their own, others will. And in that dead space between a forged document -- or a faked photograph -- and the `gotcha' reflex among bloggers are lost trust and moral confusion.
How can citizens make honest judgments about events -- whether the war on terror, the war in Iraq or Israel's response to Hezbollah -- if they can't rely on news from the front?
Equally troubling is the fact that these iconic images have the power to sway public opinion and to alter the course of history. After pictures of the Qana children were flashed around the world, for instance, public outrage was directed at Israel, prompting Israeli officials to declare a 48-hour cease-fire. The emotional power of imagery can't be underestimated, nor can its manipulative power be ignored.
In yet another series of photographs being closely reviewed for staging, British blogger Dr. Richard North of EU Referendum has raised questions about Qana based on photos and frames captured from video.
He identifies two men -- ``Mr. White Tee-Shirt'' and ``Mr. Green Helmet'' -- who seem to be calculating their actions -- and their emotions -- for the cameras. Away from cameras, they're dispassionate, even bored-looking bystanders to the rubble and death. Closer to photographers, they seem to emote as if on cue.
It's by no means conclusive that the men's emotions are necessarily manufactured, but as presented by North, they can be viewed as false. Does that make the pictures inaccurate? Unfair? Misleading? North, at least, seems to conclude that the men are more likely Hezbollah apparatchiks than mere civilians wracked by grief.
These few examples remind us that the digital media age is both a curse and a blessing. We have access to more information than imaginable even a decade ago, and yet we seem to have less reliable truth than ever.
The iconic image for these times may well be the humble Underwood typewriter -- symbol of simpler times when a thousand words could paint a good enough picture.