That's the nature of journalism. And it's the nature of combat, ... To criticize the media for covering combat in wartime is like criticizing the sun for coming up.

Media is a word that has come to mean bad journalism

News coverage is one element among a whole solar system of elements that shapes how people react to public events, ... It doesn't take a news organization to tell you that your son or daughter or husband or wife has been deployed. It doesn't take a news organization to tell you that the kid who used to deliver your newspaper is now in the local cemetery.

One of the things I try to do is examine how attitudes regarding that conflict have evolved over time, ... Because it says a lot about how Americans treat those issues that were a part of that even today.

Frankly I think that's unfair, ... ...I think it's possible to take issue with the content of that film. I think it's certainly fair to debate what it said about the time and what it continues to say about the issue of race relations in the United States. But I don't think that that is his whole identity. The man was one of the great figures in film history, he was the inventor of the epic film.

I think to ignore that piece of work is foolish on any number of levels, ... I think it's a tragic mistake for anybody who really wants to think seriously about those issues - about the issues of race relations in the United States - and how we as a society deal with any kind of contentious issue. ...If you're concerned about race relations issues in the United States today to ignore 'Birth of a Nation' is to put aside a tool that can tell you a lot.