Wake Up, America
From: Phoenix Journals # 119 (unpublished) p. 86
“There is not one of you who dares to write your honest opinions, and if you did, you know beforehand that it would never appear in print. I am paid weekly for keeping my honest opinion out of the paper I am connected with. Others of you are paid similar salaries for similar things, and any of you who would be so foolish as to write honest opinions would be out on the streets looking for another job. If I allowed my honest opinions to appear in one issue of my paper, before twenty-four hours my occupation would be gone. The business of the journalist is to destroy the truth; to lie outright; to pervert; to vilify; to fawn at the feet of mammon, and to sell his country and his race for his daily bread; you know it and I know it so what folly in this toasting an independent press. We are the tools and vassals of rich men behind the scenes. We are the jumping jacks—they pull the strings—we dance. Our talents, our possibilities and our lives are all the property of others...WE ARE INTELLECTUAL PROSTITUTES.”
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