This was a very heavy Qntra week with 8 pieces produced. Most notably Trump very nearly made the late Hussein Bahamas relatively competent. There was also the very lulzy leak concerning how little US "Big" anything actually controls their own shit.
The 50 words covering Iran's very successful missile demonstration and the 173 words covering the followup thus far are notable for what didn't make the cut at either piece's press time.
- The number of missiles or what exactly they hit - Who shot the missiles is clear, they claimed it. They did it under their own flag, and when was the last time anything like this happened to the USG? A state actor firing on USG positions is big. While the number of missiles that made it through US air defenses and to their targets after hours of advance warning were given via Iraq's government could be big. How successful the missiles were at hitting their targets could be big too. The evidence seems to suggest Iran's missiles have improved more since their war with Iraq than USG aviation has improved over the same interval. How ever lulzy these other point are, the evidence supporting them at this time isn't strong enough to distract from the lead.1
- Trump/Pompeo/BiBi Love Triangle Drama - I am amazed that Pompeo has a job and that the entire US department of State hasn't been dismissed. My amazement on its own however fails to be news. At some point either something newsy on this front will happen or Trump will die first, which would be news-ish in its own obituary sort of way.
With the mike_c case trinque was pinged on the matter of when deedbot will get back to publishing deeds. Trinque estimated sometime over this weekend.
- This is the opposite of how USG affiliated productions cover things. They will happily dig into all sorts of "stories behind the story" going so far as to banter back and forth on camera while waiting for new "news" to make it past their political officer. In doing so they generate mountains of accessory trivia that can attach to the event for however long their trivia survives scrutiny. That isn't journalism, that is distraction. [↩]