Thu 23 Apr, 2009
Do any of you know what WW2-era Germany and Italy and present-day Russia, Cuba, Venezuela, Peru, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Zimbabwe, North Korea, and China have in common with the United States? It isn’t torture. And it isn’t the slaughtering of thousands of innocent people either. Give up?
It’s propaganda!!!
What propaganda? The propaganda David Barstow reported on and won a Pulitzer Prize for.
Awarded to David Barstow of The New York Times for his tenacious reporting that revealed how some retired generals, working as radio and television analysts, had been co-opted by the Pentagon to make its case for the war in Iraq, and how many of them also had undisclosed ties to companies that benefited from policies they defended.
Of course some people will say, “The White House telling the Pentagon to hire retired high-ranking generals and putting them on ABC, NBC, CBS, Fox News, MSNBC, and CNN, and having them read talking points that the Pentagon prepared just for them so they could drum-up support for the Iraq war, which in turn helped the companies they worked for, isn’t called propaganda. It’s called patriotism.”
And those people are fucking wrong.
You see, propaganda is the dissemination of information aimed at influencing the opinions or behaviors of people. Propaganda often presents facts selectively (thus lying by omission) to encourage a particular synthesis, or gives loaded messages in order to produce an emotional rather than rational response to the information presented. The desired result is a change of the attitude toward the subject in the target audience to further a political agenda.
It’s what the White House used to gain support for the Iraq war. It’s what the Germans used to gain support for the Holocaust. It’s what North Korea uses to make its citizens think Kim Jong il pisses gold. It’s what China and Russia uses to control their populations.
Of course those countries don’t admit to using propaganda. They like to hide behind the “patriotism” statement just like retarded Americans do.
So if you’re one of those people who doesn’t believe our government uses propaganda, and the Main Stream Media really cares about America – please do the world a favor and follow in David Kellermann’s footsteps. Because we don’t need dumb motherfuckers like you reproducing.
Tags: China, David Barstow, Iraq War, Pentagon, Propaganda, White House
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