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Why Government Censorship of US Media is Unnecessary
In this week's New Yorker, Peter Maass -- who was in Iraq covering the war at the time -- examines the iconic, manufactured toppling of the Saddam statue in Baghdad's Firdos Square, an event the American media relentlessly exploited in April, 2003, to propagandize citizens into believing that Iraqis were gleeful over the U.S. invasion and that the war was a smashing success. Acknowledging that the episode demonstrated that American troops had taken over the center of Baghdad, Maas nonetheless explains that "everything else the toppling was said to represent during repeated replays on television -- victory for America, the end of the war, joy throughout Iraq -- was a disservice to the truth."
Working jointly with ProPublica on this investigation, Maass describes the hidden, indispensable role the U.S. military played in that event -- which has long been known -- though he convincingly argues that the primary culprit in this propaganda effort was the Americans media. That is who did more than anyone to wildly distort this event. As usual, the Watchdog Press not only happily ingests and trumpets pro-government propaganda, but does so even more enthusiastically and uncritically than government spokespeople themselves.
The reason there's so little government censorship of the press in America is because it's totally unnecessary; why would the government even want to censor a media this compliant and subservient? Recall the derision heaped upon the media even by Bush's own former Press Secretary, Scott McClellan, for being "too deferential" to administration propaganda. As soon as an entity emerges that provides genuinely adversarial coverage of the U.S. Government -- such as WikiLeaks, whistleblowers, or isolated articles exposing its malfeasance -- the repressive measures come fast and furious. But in general, it's no more necessary for the U.S. Government to censor the American media than it would be for Barack Obama to try to silence Robert Gibbs.
Read the full article at Salon.com
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24 Comments so far
Show AllLOL, the US Press like the US Government is run out of Tel Aviv.
I love the depths of your posts, Ocean. Just as deep as the deepest of the deep. Always so lengthy, too. And they are each so very unique, depending upon the subject of the article!
Ah, yes. Those Jews. There HAS to be a final solution to this Jewish Problem, if only fine progressives like you can figure it out...
Ya know, it makes you wonder if Israel doesn't pay people to sound so anti semitic that it will dull any legitimate criticism of Israel.
I do think the state of Israel is an Apartheid state, and I think they are clearly guilty of war crimes, and they certainly spy, steal, and assassinate regularly.
But anytime people connect their criticism of the state of Israel to Jews as a people, no one listens.
If Israel doesn't do something like this, they're missing an opportunity. Any criticism or even analysis of Israeli positions gets choked out in the racist rot.
Someone else who can't differentiate between Zionism (a political movement) and Judaism (a religion)
Especially as a majority of Zionists profess Christianity, not Judaism.
The goal is, you see, to bring about the end of the world so Jesus can return.
Thank you, Glenn, for this and all your other articles.
Come on Wikileaks!!!!!!! Then maybe the American people , if the can read, can finally join the rest of the world in what the rest of the world already knows.
Anyone seen John Pilger's documentary "The War You Dont See?" It has a great interview with Julian Assange. On Youtube.
Also this http://tv.globalresearch.ca/2010/12/hollywood-and-war-machine
Interview with Chris Hedges, Oliver Stone and Michael Moore
The (Fawning) Corporate Media/Press is a better meme than the Liberal Media, which has been used so effectively against us by the oligarchs.
It's better because the more you think about it, the truer it rings.
We don't need no stinking media to disseminate it either.
What we do need is foreign media - Chinese, Russian, Arab, Latin American, African, etc. - viewpoints on what constitutes news.
Let's have a free trade in ideas.
I clicked on the link to Salon to read the rest and got a screen saying I was forbidden access. I assume it's because I don't have a subscription to Salon. So why is CD printing teasers like this when I can (or so far have been able) to go directly to Salon and read GG there but can't finish reading an article partially printed on CD?
I just went to GG on Salon by my usual link and had no trouble reading the whole article. Well worth it, too. Can't explain the crazy CD link.
I got the same thing when I used the link provided by CD. Just go to the site directly (www.Salon.com) and click on the link for Glen Greenwald.
If you look at the link provided by CD, it just leads back to CD. I suspect that whoever set up the link made a mistake.
Someone just screwed up the link. Google Greenwald and Salon and you can get his site through the ads, and from there you can find his articles.
As to Google running teasers, I have no idea. Maybe there's some demand made by Salon, which could probably use a few more surf-by readings. In this case it might not be a bad thing, despite the annoyance: Greenwald writes a lot of great stuff that never shows on CD.
"Read the full article at Salon.com"
____________________________________
The link is bad. The correct URL is:
http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2011/01/04/burns/index.html
Use this one if the above link is fractured in the posting process: http://bit.ly/f9XnzP
"Censorship" of the US Media = BAD.
Use of the "fairness doctrine" to remove Rush Limbaugh or Fox News = GOOD.
Censorship of, say the Venezuelan media? VERY VERY GOOD.
Got it?
I wouldn't mind if Rushbo was never heard from again. But the 'Fairness doctrine' wouldn't have done that. I think you know that the fairness doctrine only demanded that if the public airwaves were used to broadcast an opinion from one side of the political spectrum, the other side should have a chance to respond.
That doesn't happen in the USA anymore. You're suffering for that.
Your media is now printing/publishing/editorializing/broadcasting the same story. If you ever read the English version of the SOVIET papers, Izvestia and Pravda, you would find that they were a more 'free' press than your's is now. Sorry bucko, the totalitarian Communists were more interested in freedom of expression than the elite who now runs your prison.
Congrats. Ben Franklin would be just ever so proud of what you have done with your nation. Bwa ha ha ha!
If Franklin's clone first drew breath in October 1945, I rather doubt its actions would be anywhere similar to those of its parent, and would merely have become one of the members and defenders of what Greenberg's attacking. It should be very clear that people like Assange, Greenwald, Pilger, Fisk, Chomsky, and Nader are quite rare, being greatly outnumbered by people whose desire to go along to get along outweighs anything else. And the situation is likely to worsen before improving.
Thumbs up on your post.
At one point in 1984 (don't make me look it up, just reread the book--the text is free online), Winston Smith notes that there are no laws against the actions that people are regularly vaporized for. That's one of the details that most stuck with me in my last reading.
A rule-based society with few written rules.
Am I farking stupid?
The USA's mass media is owned by the same super-rich oligarchs that also own the US government (and the means of production and distribution).
Great trailer. For the rest of my response see hppt://wmw.followtheyellowbrickroad.jpg