Wednesday, June 27, 2007

Censorship

The Baghdad bombings in which over 75 people have been killed are not being covered due to censorship. Tapes of the bombings and subsequent coverage are being confinscated. Stories that were posted on CNN.com a few days ago have been removed. Fourtnunately, the BBC doesn't have to do what the Bush Administration says and is reporting that over 200 people have been killed in these bombings. I can't imagine why the Bush Administration would want to this information from the American people. Could it be that they want us to believe that this war is going better than it really is?

1 comment:

United We Lay said...

Daniel Hoffmann-Gill said...
WE ARE WINNING YOU KNOW!

HONEST!

8:18 AM
United We Lay said...
LOL. I know. It's my imagination tha my friends keep coming home in flag drapped coffins.

8:27 AM
Vigilante said...
14 USA KIA in 24 hours.

9:44 AM
Laura said...
War is depressing, and depressed people don't like to buy new cars and diet pills. Until the corporate stranglehold is lifted from our media, this will persist.

The media is not a wing of the democratic party - not sure what news channels you're watching UL, but it seems to be a wing of corporate lobbyists... it spans the political spectrum.

11:17 AM
Balloon Pirate said...
A disturbing facet of that blog is the responses. The first half-dozen or so were from members of the 101st Fighting Keyboardists, all fully in support of the censorship, because that way ABC can't report 'only bad' news.

Then there's the faux-intellectual who doesn't know the difference between a filed report and a blog entry...

UL: Does not covering the bombing make it less of a news story? Should we then have not covered the massacre at Virginia Tech? Comparatively speaking, that was small potatoes compared to the routine carnage in Iraq. Are we not allowed to know about these things because reporting them will encourage others of a similar mind?

Of course, it's different when it's us discussing the killing of them. Go read Glenn Greenwald's column on how casually Norman Podhoretz discusses massive annihilation of millions of Iranians for political purposes.

yeharr

1:55 PM
undergroundlogician said...
Balloon Pirate:

Not covering the bombings in Iraq is not the answer either. Deliberately screening out the positive actions of our military to make the Iraq War as a completely bumbling endeavor is a not just misinforming the public, it is dis-informing the public. I don't think its simply incompetence on the media's part--it's malicious and destructive. We show our distrust and dislike of these news outlets with our pocket books and our viewership. When their viewship tanks, like NBC's, then maybe they'll have a wake up call. I will not hold my breath, though.

These news outlets have access to information we do not have. They are a fiduciary of information; they are given a trust by the public to give us the truth of what is happening, good or bad. When only the bad is given in order to manipulate public opinion, they cease to be a news outlet--they become propagandists.

So let's look at your example of Virginia Tech murders. Of course they needed to report it. Did they need to report and show the warped videos made by this killer? I don't think so. Did they need to report how the tragic event was poorly handled by either police or the university. Absolutely! We need to know so as to prevent it from happening again. We don't need to fulfill some voyueristic desire to see weirdness and blood lust on parade. I think they stepped over the line.

3:49 PM
Holly said...
This is so sad and 14 more US soldiers were reported killed today

5:26 PM
daveawayfromhome said...
@ UL: the old canard of "reporting the good things that the military is doing" is beginning to rub me raw. The military is not in Iraq to do "good things", that's not the function of a military. If you want good works done, then send in the peace corps, or missionary groups, or NGOs or something. Any military is trained to kill people, either offensively or defensively, that's their purpose, and to try to make them into cops or construction workers takes away from that central mission and (in a place where people are trying to kill them) endangers the soldiers.

Seriously, I dont want to hear about soldiers building schools. If they're building schools then they can come home to their regular jobs, becasue their job theri is finished.

***

"Comment moderation has been enabled".

Can I take that the flamers and the haters have come a'calling lately?

1:23 PM
TomCat said...
United, censorship is simple enough to understand. the MSM wouild rather cover the blood and gore. It rivits the sheeple to their seats, removes hands from remotes, and sells soap. When they fail to do so, the only possiblr explanation isd that the truth offends the interests of the corporate sponsors upon whose advertising dollars the broadcast MSM depend for their survival.

United, please check today's top article at my place. There's a surprise for you there. :-)

2:41 PM
United We Lay said...
Dave,
At some point I have to do something to protect my own sanity, and comment moderation is one of them. I need a break from the blindness of faith.

3:26 PM
Holly said...
I am so thankful that I have no relatives in this

3:33 PM
undergroundlogician said...
Dave:

I'm not talking about military school projects, or handing out candy to kids. I'm talking about successful missions that eliminate terrorists from neighborhoods so people can live in peace. I want to see both the successes and the failures, and what the military is doing to alter their strategies to meet the challenges.

I don't expect successes like in a video game. The main stream media does NOT give us the full story. It is heavily weighted against Bush and the Repubs; any story that brings them down is more likely to be published. It disturbs me when the Democrats and the terrorists are speaking the same political language. Roosevelt and Truman would never let it get this far. Never.

We live in a brave new world.

4:48 PM
Graeme said...
don't they know we will get the info anyway

4:06 AM
United We Lay said...
Graeme,
I think it's going to be increasingly more difficult to get information in the future. They're already putting restrictions on web streaming. We'll see what happens.

Holly,
It's difficult. I'm finding it harder to watch the news because I don't want to find out that way that something has happened to someone I care about.

8:15 AM
daveawayfromhome said...
@ UL: "Liberal Press" is another bogus talking-point. The kid-glove treatment given an under 30 point president vs. the constant reporting of any and all savaging of Bill Clinton (over 50%) is just one example.

I'm not sure how many successes there actually are. The term "whack-a-mole" hasnt caught on for nothing. Yes, we kill insurgents, and they kill us in smaller numbers. But their support and numbers grow as ours dwindles. This is success?

As for terrorists and Democrats "speaking the same language", the Bush Administration does that far more often than the Democrats do. References to the "evil enemy", calls to "destroy" them, a wish to transfer our way of life onto another people, whether they want it or not: who does this sound like?

I did a post once where I took a speech Bush had made, changed a few words (switching the side the speaker was talking about, for the most part), and attributed it to bin Laden. Guess what, it worked.

Not wanting to stay in an invaded foriegn land and kill people does not make one have the same goals as the terrorists, unless you feel that we should stay only because the terrorists want us to go.

6:44 PM
Larry said...
Eight more soldiers killed in Bush's worthless war.

At least it makes Bush happy.

7:08 PM
United We Lay said...
Larry,
I don't know how to reconcile the losses with anything involved in this war. There's no reason for our soldiers to be dying. The best way we can spport our troops is to find a way to get them home.

7:38 AM
undergroundlogician said...
Dave:

You said: Democrats "speaking the same language", the Bush Administration does that far more often than the Democrats do. References to the "evil enemy", calls to "destroy" them, a wish to transfer our way of life onto another people, whether they want it or not: who does this sound like?

Let me clarify. The Dems and the terrorists speak the same language against the Bush administration and the Iraq War. Apparently you don't know or have forgotten how important Iraq is for Al Qaeda.

The same language to demoralize US citizens and our military are being broadcast from terrorists and from the liberal wing of the Democratic party. I'm being very specific, not all Dems do this. But, there are a majority of Dems who are mimicing the propaganda of the terrorists, which is rife with disinformation that has been planted for political purposes.

I don't know if much can be gained by all this discussion. You seem pretty entrenched, as I am.

Let me acknowledge to you Dave, that I see in you a person who cares what happens in this country, what proceeds from this country and the value of a free press; so do I. I know we agree enough about this to carry on a lively discussion about things we disagree. I think this is good.

Peace.

8:32 AM
daveawayfromhome said...
As far as what the terrorists are saying we should or shouldnt do, I've gotta say that I dont really give a rat's ass what they think, except when they say it with a bomb. Everything else is hot air, manipulation, or... well, something else.

I dont think calling for an end to a war in a far off country, invaded under false pretenses and leading to thousands of casualties and the misery of millions, is demoralizing. If you want to talk about demoralizing, lets talk about a government that does nothing to stop a war even though a majority of the nation wishes to do so. This is especially galling coming from an Administration that declared itself to have a "mandate" with a mere 52% of the vote.
Not enough? How about electing a congress for the purpose of doing something about Iraq, only to have them turn around and hand yet another (un)conditional victory to George Bush, who is responsible for this war.

More than anything though, I am distressed by a country once moral enough to hold the Nuremburg Trials, but which now has a torture policy consisting of more than "DONT". And before I hear any bluster about the U.S. not being like Nazis, I didnt say they were. But isnt it odd that the administration would be building detention camps for "illegal immigrants" while pursuing a course towards amnesty? Just how many "terrorist" cells do they expect to find here, anyway. (And if thie above source isnt good enough for you, google "Rex 84", which was Reagan's baby, and has since been updated.)

Do I find these things demoralizing? Absolutely. I suspect soldiers do, too.

You're right, I care deeply about what happens to this country, and I think that the Bush Administration is one of the worst things to happen to it since the McCarthy era. And I think the Bush Administration has happened to us largely due to concentration of ownership in the media.
Partially this has the effect of concentrating power in the hands of a few individuals who use that power for their own ends, rather than the common good (one of those people is a "naturalized" citizen, who didnt bother to take that step until he was denied ownership of TV stations because he was a foriegner - I guarantee you that the illegal alien family down the street cares more about the people of this country than Rupert Murdoch does).
It also enhances the "bandwagon" effect, leaving fewer voices to go "hey, wait a minute here, maybe this story isnt right".
Additionally, when media outlets become a commodity rather than a service (hell, not a service, a civic necessity, really), then it invites the usual capitalistic behavior of minimum product for maximum return.

But mostly it's the concentration of media in a few hands. The editorial decisions in this country are not made by liberals, whatever the bent of the reporters themselves may be.

I would also question the definition of "liberal", which seems to involve daring to ask people in power to justify their actions. Unless you are a believer in Might Makes Right (which I would hazard that many Republicans and/or Evangelical Christians are), then there should be no problem with telling those who put you in office what it is that you are doing (unless, of course, politicians know that those voters had nothing to do with their position of power - which might go a long way to explain the attitude of politicians of both stripes).