Are Western media telling the truth about China?

Image from WikipediaChristine Lu kicked off at Seesmic.com what is going to be a weekly question on China. This week, she asked whether the Wetern media are misinformed about China and I took the liberty of putting it a bit sharper by asking whether Western media lie about China. I'm not sure whether my video contribution made it, although the technology is really simple, but perhaps not simple enough for me.
I know that people in many countries got upset when they saw how foreign media were describing their own country; in the past the Chinese authorities often ignored what they considered to be mistakes in the foreign media and much of the citizenry had not access to foreign media. Thanks to the internet that is changing and no wonder people do get upset now and then.
Let's first stress the difference between Chinese media and foreign media. China's media - with the exception of the internet - are state-owned media with a pretty strong tradition of censorship, both internally and by a network of government organizations. So, Chinese media are often not in the position to tell the truth and I imagine that Chinese do get upset when foreign media - who in theory could tell the truth - are still messing things up, whether by accident or for malicious reasons.
What foreign media have to do is simplify the message for their audiences back home. This is a very important process to understand. That does not mean foreign media have to lie, but there is a thin line between simplifying a message and lying, and it might some be hard to distinguish the difference.
What I found very amusing is the way how the better US media would often report about the leadership struggle in China - a lot of other media would not even bother to write about this highly complicated issue. Mostly, the struggle concentrates on the two top candidates, one slightly conservative, the other one slightly liberal, who are fighting each other for the presidency. That is a simplification of the highly complicated truth with many more candidates and many issues at stake. Is it also lying? Some may say yes, but it is perhaps the only way to make the election of Chinese leaders digestible for even a highly educated US audience.
When journalists make their decisions in leaving parts of the truth out, a whole range of mechanisms might be involved, varying from plain stupidness up to malicious intend, although in most cases it would hover between those extremes.
Tibet is another case, where the reality is brought back to a simple power struggle between the central government and the Dalai Lama, while the whole truth is of course much more complicated.
I think it is important that China's citizens monitor the process, now they can, and raise the alarm when they believe something is seriously wrong. But, I do think it is good to know how the journalistic selection process is working and leaving out part of the truth is always needed.