The sad state of todays media outlets

is made obvious by the protest at a Tampa Florida area TV station. The protest was an effort to get the news department to actually report the news.

"Did you get the memo?" read the fliers.

"Air the truth!" said a poster held by retired Air Force Lt. Col. Joseph F. Bohren, outside the WTVT-Ch. 13 studios with about 10 others.

They were there because of what has become known as the "Downing Street Memo," minutes from a meeting between Prime Minister Tony Blair and his top advisers on July 23, 2002, at No. 10 Downing St., published May 1 by the Sunday Times of London . The minutes indicate that the United States and Britain had agreed to invade Iraq by the summer of 2002 - months before President George W. Bush asked Congress for permission to engage in military action.

The minutes, written by Matthew Rycroft, aide to British Foreign Policy Adviser David Manning, also suggest that U.S. officials deliberately manipulated intelligence to justify the war.

"If what's in these minutes is accurate, and we have been given no reason to doubt that, then it would appear that the president has committed high crimes, specifically lying to the American public and Congress and engaging in a conspiracy with his administration," said David Dawson, a Washington organizer for the Web site AfterDowningStreet.org, which has reproduced the memo.

And the Progressive Democrats of America are pitching in to help our local media outlets. Since so many of the media outlets now have to be led to the news to report it, they tell us how to remind them about the Downing Street Memo , and what it could mean.