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Public Enemy No. 1 Â The Media!
Ted Lang
"The media is the enemy!" This is the title of the introductory narrative of American Free Press.net. AFP offers: "In the old Soviet Union, the government controlled the media. Not a word of substance could be published without prior approval from the Bolshevik commissars. Today, in the United States, the situation is starkly similar. But most Americans don't even know it.
In the United States today, it is a select handful of super-rich families and tightly-knit financial interests-a plutocratic elite-who own the Big Media and who control the government through their ownership of that media. . . . Every single one of the major media outlets is controlled by this powerful interlocking combine."
Now if this isn't a revelation, I don't know what is. It is well known that today's media is subservient to the Bush administration, having consistently covered up the staggering number of Bush violations of both domestic and international law and treaties. So there is nothing at all revealing about such observed and proven fact. Let's digress for a moment and review the long and growing list of totally spiked vital news issues and those that have been severely delayed or underplayed to dilute their newsworthy significance.
We can start with the spiriting out of the country by the FBI, immediately following 9-11, of about two dozen relatives of Osama bin Laden. Although briefly aired, the mainstream media quickly dismissed this blockbuster issue and never revisited it in terms of commentary and analysis. No one in America was allowed such rapid, secret and taxpayer-funded expatriation, presumably for their own safety. And remember as well the connection between 9-11 Commissioner Tom Kean, the former governor of New Jersey, and his Amerada Hess oil business association with Khalid bin Mahfouz, Osama's brother-in-law. Do you recall either reading or seeing this blockbuster revelation air in "our" mainstream media [MSM]?
What about the "Weehawken Five?" Remember when the MSM first exposed the eyewitness account leading to the arrest of the "five celebrating Arabs?" Was there any follow-up? Was there any emphasis in reporting that the five were not only Israeli nationals, but were employed at the time of their arrest as agents of the MOSSAD?! Recall the blockbuster headlines revealing traces of explosives in their van, and box cutters, and over $4,000 in cash? Recall the blockbuster headlines when Chertoff and "our" Department of "Justice" quietly released them and allowed them to return to Israel? And what of the four-part FOXNews Carl Cameron series about the 140 "art students," all of whom were Mossad agents? Why has that archived story disappeared?
Then we have the spiking of the Downing Street Memo, the confused reporting and media bumbling related to the Plame-CIA scandal, and the virtual total spike of the AIPAC/Larry Franklin spy affair. And although some news developments were appropriately aired initially, the Abu Ghraib and the Sibel Edmonds exposés come to mind, there was no real investigative follow-up and analysis on either. It was the Internet that blew the lid off these government criminal activities.
These spikes, downplays and failed follow-ups are easily verified by FAIR [Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting], the media watchdog group founded by Jeff Cohen. The organization went totally ballistic when The New York Times continuously refused to air the Downing Street Memo. A review of the P. U. Awards on their site will list even more despicable journalistic practices.
That all having been once again established, let's return to what precisely constitutes the astonishing revelation offered by American Free Press. It is AFP's position that it is not the government that dominates the media, but just the other way around! After laundry listing the big media newspapers and national TV networks, AFP goes on: "And these media powerhouses control dozens-actually thousands-of other daily and weekly newspapers, magazines, and radio and television outlets across America (and around the globe)."
AFP continues: "To consolidate their influence, the Masters of the Media and their international corporate allies reward obedient journalists with membership in the Council on Foreign Relations or the Trilateral Commission where they rub shoulders with others in the international policy-making networks. A handful get promoted to the higher ranks of the secret Bilderberg Group."
It has long been pointed out by Dr. Henry A, Makow, that the Rothschild-Rockefeller satanic cult of international bankers, identified as the "Illuminati," conveys their presence, influence and control through these very same established, legitimized and powerful international organizations. Bill Clinton was supported by the Trilateral Commission, while just in the past presidential elections, Democrat John Edwards was picked by the Bilderbergs as the vice presidential candidate after impressing them with his public speaking capabilities.
It was Rush Limbaugh who so vituperatively and correctly pointed to "liberal media bias," but only because the regime then in power was the Clinton administration. A truckload of anti-media books hit the conservative publication circuits, eventually led by media veteran Bernard Goldberg. This episode of MSM bashing was what started their demise. Comparing their favoritism for Clinton then, to their kowtowing for Bush now, their dedication to any American regime that implements their policy negates the validity of the existence of a "liberal" media. All that needs doing to verify the falsehood of a "liberal" media is to read the angry editorials launched by liberal Jeff Cohen at the "liberal" New York Times for not airing the Downing Street Memo.
The next dark void of political sophistry an inquiring mind must traverse is that of the false journalistic posturing that offers that the press is always mindful of the stresses of those in power in Washington, especially during a time of war. This stance excuses journalists and the press from asking the "hard" questions. But what is so biased about questions such as those inquiring as to our military's body counts, or battle maps, or communicating information in terms of front line combat film and videos as was the practice in World War II, Korea and Vietnam? How about advancing this simple question: Where's the "front?" Why virtually no combat videos or photos from any MSM entity? Without even a rudimentary front line, it is clear we are fighting armed civilians, armed civilians who are not "insurgents," but in reality freedom fighters, constituting an armed resistance against Bush's illegal and immoral invasion.
The nose-diving popularity of both Bush and his war tell the story of an American public that is becoming increasingly informed, in spite of news event and information manipulation by the "American" press. Limbaugh brought it into focus, even if by way of inaccurate analogy; but now it's here to stay! On an ever-increasing basis, Americans are beginning to distrust the mainstream media Limbaugh first isolated via his "bias" label.
An article carried on DRUDGE and originated on Breitbart.com and entitled "A future of empty doorsteps? Dark days for US newspapers," once again laments the decreasing popularity and declining circulation numbers of America's newspapers. Understandably, Matt Drudge, obviously enjoying these glum statistics citing the continuing decline of the American MSM, which they themselves admit to, relishes their misery as it serves to alleviate any frustration whatsoever that he may have experienced for their having banished him from their exclusive and elitist circles. His override of the decision by the Washington Post, exacerbated by Michael Isikoff's flight over the intended spike by the Post of the Clinton-Lewinsky affair and his joining Newsweek, gave Drudge the break he needed to run with the story on the Internet. The Lewinsky blockbuster was to the Internet what the Nixon-Kennedy televised debates and Watergate were to network TV news.
The November 13th
Breitbart article basically follows on to the dismal reports first announced this year back in May, as offered by the media's mainstream internal journal, Editor & Publisher. As presented by Kevin Craver on Rathergate.com, in his "Opening thread declining newspaper circulation," Craver writes, "The newspaper industry is calling May 2 'Black Monday.' Editor & Publisher crunched the latest circulation numbers, and hoo-boy, are they bad.
How bad, do you ask? The Baltimore Sun's circulation dropped 11.5 percent in daily circulation and 8.4 percent in Sunday circulation. In one year, the paper lost 10 percent of its readers.
As for other big losers, the Chicago Tribune was down 6.6 percent daily (as was the Rocky Mountain News) and 4.6 percent Sunday. The Denver Post lost 6.3 percent for daily circ. The Los Angeles Times dropped 6.4 percent daily and 7.9 percent on Sunday. The Cleveland Plain Dealer lost 5.2 percent daily, and the San Francisco Chronicle slid by 6 percent daily and 7.7 percent on Sundays.
Nationwide the hurt was still significant. The Miami Herald was down 3.7 percent daily and 3.9 percent Sunday. The Houston Chronicle slipped by 3.9 percent daily, and the Washington Post was down 2.6 percent for daily and 2.4 percent for Sunday."
As newspaper circulation continues to tank, viewership of network TV news is also declining. I combined this observation, as well as that of newspapers in a piece I wrote earlier challenging the myopic views of one Evan Cornog, whom I introduced in that effort as being the publisher of the Columbia Journalism Review, and who also serves as an associate dean of the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism. I then pointed out, as I am doing once again, that it is his prestigious institution of higher learning that awards the Pulitzer Prize for Journalism, and is, therefore indeed, a bastion of journalistic professionalism in America. I reflected upon how Cornog sounded off in New Jersey's largest newspaper, The Star-Ledger, complaining about the plight of the poor underdog "free and independent press." He whined about the government bullying of the press.
Apologizing for my redundancy in focusing on this highly-credentialed superior elitist educator and enabler of the American press, it is obvious that Cornog must keep tabs on the pulse and activities of all the journalistic endeavors performed by the MSM, and evaluate and tailor journalistic education to adequately prepare new and emerging journalistic professionals for a successful career. As such, his adulation of the suffering of Judith Miller was totally out of place, as confirmed by her and The New York Times' parting of ways. It was only weeks after Cornog's myopic and incorrect observations whereupon Miller departed the Times.
Confirming my earlier argument, the Miller debacle now joins the Jason Blair debacle at The New York Times, the latter disgrace resurrecting the 1932 Pulitzer Prize scandal of William Duranty. It was Cornog's Columbia Graduate School that awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Duranty's cover-up of the starvation murders of approximately eight million Ukrainians and his shilling for Communist Dictator Josef Stalin. And to avoid redundancy, I will point to only Cornog's title and subtitle in his Columbia Journalism Review essay of January/February 2005: "Lets Blame the Reader Is it possible to do great journalism if the public does not care?" The titles alone tell the story Mr. Cornog is totally out of touch with reality.
Cornog's complaints are not only removed from reality; they're twice removed! First, it is clear that Cornog would never subscribe to the Limbaugh-originated charge of either a biased or "liberal" press. And secondly, he would never entertain the idea of a small group of power brokers using the press as an instrument to control government. Let's look at both these aspects of the MSM.
Realistically, and starting with newspapers and/or "news" pamphlets, the latter identified even by Cornog as having informed, educated and then motivated a large number of American colonists to initiate the Revolutionary War against England and King George III, it is unrealistic to cite political objectivity in any journalistic endeavor. No matter how much effort is expended to display an aura of objectivity delineating fact from opinion, there really is no such thing. As offered by Doug Thompson, long-time journalist and editor-publisher of Capitol Hill Blue, "Journalism is best served by those who follow the story wherever it leads and don't let political or philosophical bias sway their course. That's something that those who write from a partisan point of view, and too many of those who teach journalism, can't possibly comprehend but those of us who actually practice the craft understand. I've been doing it that way for more than 40 years and I expect to be doing it for 40 more."
Thompson offered that statement in a combative piece entitled, "Partisans can't be journalists," published in Capital Hill Blue in his column "The Rant." Thompson wrote the article in anger, anger directed at a fellow pundit and sometimes "liberal journalist," William Rivers Pitt. Permit me once again, to digress for a bit. I am not now, nor have I ever been, a journalist. But the rapid and astonishing demise of the political institutions of our nation, in terms of our loss of domestic freedoms and our international war crimes against all humanity, forces me to express my disdain for ALL politics, thereby, in all likelihood, nullifying my baccalaureate diploma in Political Science. I try to avoid name-calling or specific references to either Internet websites or other writers, including the "libertarian" moron who set me off on this effort.
But as Columbia's associate dean Cornog points out, newspapers didn't take off in the Colonies until they aligned themselves politically one way or another either for or against the English king. Regrettably, that journalistic fact of life, establishing that there was indeed a partisan bias on the part of the American press even back then, is now used to protect both American politicians and the MSM today. There is NO BIAS in the MSM they now ALL speak with one tongue. The growing irrelevance of newspapers and the entire MSM is so precisely because they are now seen by the American public as being a centralized, monolithic and totally homogenized political support entity.
Journalistic bias in the MSM was never the problem! The problem is lack of competition between journalistic sources that can build support from the reading and news-consuming public. Competition is the key, and not a monolithic press joined together by the one voice of the Masters of the Media! Bush is being protected by these wealthy globalists! Serving the military-industrial complex and Israel, both of which serve the globalists and their New World Order agenda, is what motivates them in ensuring Bush and the GOP's success! And as there is no "product differentiation" between MSM entities, there is also no difference between Republicans and Democrats.
At first, I was repulsed by the partisanship that has now infected the new "alternative media," the Internet. Here's Doug Thompson's assessment: "Normally, I don't pay much attention to the patter on Internet bulletin boards particularly extreme partisan boards like Free Republic on the right or Democratic Underground on the left." There is no question, that the larger and more successful and highly trafficked websites can be codified as either "Republican" or "Democrat." This has, in the past, extremely depressed me; but no longer. It may take time, but eventually, the freedom of the Internet, allowing the news-consuming public to make choices, will serve to inform the public of the truth much faster than a homogenized, monolithic MSM controlled by eight plutocratic families.
Ideally, journalistic professionalism and objectivity would be best, but this is increasingly recognized, at least by me, as becoming an unattainable quest. Although Thompson seems well anchored in professionalism, the mainstream sites in today's alternative media [AM] on the Internet are evidencing the same start-up partisanship characteristic of our founding loyalist versus radically-oriented American press. I subscribe fully to Thompson's quest for the truth: "I don't like liars. I don't like elected leaders who deceive the country they have sworn to serve. I've found in more than 40 years of journalism that most elected officials are dishonest and put their own political interests above what is best for the nation. It doesn't matter if they are Democrat or Republican, conservative or liberal, left-wing or right-wing."
Thompson reinforces his posture offering further: "And I don't care much for partisans who claim to be journalists while publishing under a political party banner. Truth is non-partisan. It doesn't' subscribe to a particular political philosophy. And truth is not served by an alternative media that looks at things from a partisan political slant. A Robert Novak who writes that all things Democratic are bad is no different from a William Rivers Pitt who claims the same things about Republicans." Perfectly said, and in fact, a repeat of my own quote in my newsletter founding my own citizen's action group: Truth is non-partisan.
Once this simple concept is grasped, the propaganda rants of Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Bill O'Reilly, as well as those of Michael Moore, Al Franken, and William Rivers Pitt, fall by the wayside. Their opinions and statements are totally irrelevant. They support what is only the most evil and immoral aspect of American life: politics.
Politics will not fix a flat tire. Politics will not feed and clothe a hungry child. Politics doesn't protect human life it usually serves to do just the opposite. Politics and its government institutions offer absolutely nothing useful to the sustenance of human life it only takes away from God's precious gift. The only value MSM political and statist whores focus on is the speechmaking and speaking capabilities of politicians. They never take lying politicians to task requiring them to follow through on either their promises or oaths of office. Political campaigns are just another way of separating hardworking Americans from their wealth and the fruits of their labors by transferring tax dollars into campaign payoffs to the MSM's Masters; the latter grow rich via the lies, falsehoods, criminal activities and mass murders orchestrated by our criminal political ruling class and their evil destructive governments.
It is the corporate establishment mainstream media that makes political crimes either acceptable or allows them to go completely unnoticed. It is the MSM that is destroying America. And if the Masters of the Media start to recognize that they are losing the ability to bullshit the American people en masse, you can readily assume that these eight gangsters will do whatever is necessary to bring the alternative media in line with their globalists New World Order agenda. Control of the Internet is definitely on their radar screen. Look at what the Internet has already done to retard and obstruct the Bush/GOP agenda to sell America out to the New World Order.
But if the Masters of the Media destroy the Internet, computer-based publishers and other non-professional journalists will again start printing and handing out newsletters and pamphlets think of Tom Paine and Benjamin Franklin. Our nation was launched by a pamphlet I see it being saved by secretly distributed and circulated pamphlets and newsletters. The truth has always been more powerful then any tyrant and his blue, brown or black-shirted goons and thugs and their badges, uniforms, arm bands and guns. Every dictatorship in human history has been brought down, either non-violently or via the brute force of the people. Considering the terror-based people control that Democrat and Republican partisans both are increasingly subscribing to, there will indeed be a forceful overthrow of our criminal and tyrannical despotic American political State. And I am hoping it will happen in my lifetime!
Theodore E. Lang
THEODORE E. LANG 11/30/05 All rights reserved
Ted Lang is a political analyst and freelance writer.
www.rense.com/general69/PUB.HTM
Written Dec. 1, 2005 !
FW 2/9/11