Is the media a weapon?

Retired major-general Lewis MacKenzie was having a natter during his keynote at the University of Waterloo in Canada when I got onto the subject of war reporting. It’s all just too darned quick these days,

MacKenzie, known for leading peacekeeping troops in the former Yugoslavia… commanded soldiers in the Gaza Strip, Cyprus, Vietnam and shot into the limelight in 1992, when he took command of the Sarajevo sector during the Balkans conflict.
In his UW lecture, MacKenzie tried to answer the question: Is the media a weapon?
And during a talk that drew on MacKenzie’s personal experiences, the audience listened in rapt attention. While appreciating TV’s role in war reporting, MacKenzie looked back with appreciation at a time when news was sent back home, carefully read and understood before experts were brought in for discussion.
“Now, it’s all about live reporting,” MacKenzie said.
“It’s painful that people make decisions on what is being reported from one place even though hundreds of other things may be going on simultaneously.” link