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News :: International Relations |
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U.S Spying On UN Delegates & U.S. Chemical Weapons In Iraq -- Stories The U.S. Media Is Censoring. |
Current rating: 0 |
by Sascha Meinrath
Email: sascha (nospam) ucimc.org (unverified!) |
03 Mar 2003
|
Two breaking stories that remain (as yet) censored by the U.S. media: 1. The U.S. has been caught spying on U.N. security council members -- including tapping phones and stealing e-mail; 2. Chemical weapons stores have been found and are planned to be utilized in Iraq, in contradiction to the Chemical Weapons Convention... by the United States.
The stories remain uncovered by the U.S. media, but are now being mentioned in British press. |
Two breaking stories that remain (as yet) censored by the U.S. media: 1. The U.S. has been caught spying on U.N. security council members -- including tapping phones and stealing e-mail; 2. Chemical weapons stores have been found and are planned to be utilized in Iraq, in contradiction to the Chemical Weapons Convention... by the United States.
The stories remain uncovered by the U.S. media, but are now being mentioned in British press:
From the Independent:
"US prepares to use toxic gases in Iraq"
By Geoffrey Lean and Severin Carrell
02 March 2003
The US is preparing to use the toxic riot-control agents CS gas and pepper spray in Iraq in contravention of the Chemical Weapons Convention, provoking the first split in the Anglo-US alliance. "Calmative" gases, similar to the one that killed 120 hostages in the Moscow theatre siege last year, could also be employed.
Full text: http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/story.jsp?story=383006
***
From the Observer:
"Revealed: US dirty tricks to win vote on Iraq war: Secret document details American plan to bug phones and emails of key Security Council members"
By Martin Bright, Ed Vulliamy in New York and Peter Beaumont
Sunday March 2, 2003
The United States is conducting a secret 'dirty tricks' campaign against UN Security Council delegations in New York as part of its battle to win votes in favour of war against Iraq.
Details of the aggressive surveillance operation, which involves interception of the home and office telephones and the emails of UN delegates in New York, are revealed in a document leaked to The Observer.
Full text: http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/story.jsp?story=383071
From the Independent:
"US accused of spying on Security Council Washington alleged to have ordered bugging of delegates' telephones and emails"
By Andrew Clennell
02 March 2003
The United States was accused last night of launching an aggressive telephone and email bugging operation on UN Security Council members whose votes will be critical to international support for a US-led war on Iraq.
Full text: http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/story.jsp?story=383071
***
It begs the question, "Where's the United States media?" |
Comments
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Re: U.S Spying On UN Delegates & U.S. Chemical Weapons In Iraq -- Stories The U.S. Media Is Censoring. |
by Sascha Meinrath
sascha (nospam) ucimc.org (unverified) |
Current rating: 5
03 Mar 2003
|
At this afternoon's press briefing Ari Fleischer was asked about the spy charges here is an exerpt from that press briefing (full briefing transcript is available at: http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/03/20030303-3.html ). His responses -- or lack thereof are incredibly interesting:
Q May I also ask you about a report in The Observer newspaper in London, of a memo purported to be from the NSA -- an email message from a man who actually works at the NSA they established -- in which he describes a surge in surveillance of U.N. Security Council members to see what these nations are thinking about an Iraq vote. What's your response?
MR. FLEISCHER: Terry, as a matter of long-standing policy, the administration never comments on anything involving any people involved in intelligence. For example, if somebody were to say to me, is Libya an object of American intelligence -- I would never answer that question yes or no. The administration does not answer questions of that nature. We don't answer who does or does not work in the intelligence community. Once you start that, you start getting into process of elimination and we do not do that about any question, about any report, as a blanket matter of policy.
Q But, then, if you're a Cameroonian diplomat or a French diplomat at the United Nations, because of what you just said, you're going to have to operate on the assumption that the United States is bugging you.
MR. FLEISCHER: No, it's a blanket matter of policy that we do not answer questions of that nature, whether it's true or not true, and I'm not indicating to you whether it is true or not true. It's a blanket matter of approach and policy that predates this administration.
[later in the same briefing]
Q Ari --
MR. FLEISCHER: Go ahead.
Q Ari, is there -- going back to the British newspaper, The Observer, is there really a need to spy on the non-permanent members of the Security Council, to wiretap their phones? Is it true what the newspaper is --
MR. FLEISCHER: I just go right back to my answer to Terry on that question. And, again, I hope you can appreciate, the reason that these questions never get answered -- and not to infer that that means a yes or a no, because it's impossible for you to make those judgments, because we are not -- I'm not indicating to you yes or no.
But I gave an example at the beginning. If I said, yes, we are, you would know something about what we do with our intelligence. If I say, no, we're not, you start asking that question around the world to try to use the process of elimination to find out what the United States does, from an intelligence point of view.
And that is not a position that I think the American people would want the government to go down the line and start to describe every specific item of intelligence. So I'm not saying yes and I'm not saying no, I'm stating the long-standing policy of the government on questions exactly like this, which do come up from time to time.
[and towards the end of the press conference]
Q Going back to the previous question, what is the U.S. policy about discussing intelligence information against other countries from the podium?
MR. FLEISCHER: The policy is the same about any country; we do not talk about intelligence.
Q I'm trying to square that with earlier in a briefing when you reminded us that Colin Powell spoke about wiretaps of Iraqi officials.
MR. FLEISCHER: Sure, and as you know, that was after a very lengthy declassification process involving the situation uniquely in Iraq.
Q Well, all we're asking you here to do is if you can, in effect, declassify -- (laughter.) What is the difference? You declassify stuff that helps make your case on Iraq. We're asking you if you're bugging our allies. It seems to be --
MR. FLEISCHER: Well, first of all, I'm not making any presumption that it is classified. I'm not saying whether there is or is not anything of the kind that you are asking.
Q Well, if there's not of a kind, that's why I don't understand why you can't say it's not of the kind.
MR. FLEISCHER: Because then you're playing process of elimination around the world, which is a process we do not --
Q Well, we've already eliminated one, Iraq. (Laughter.) How about a couple more, the two that are mentioned in this memo, that very clearly --
MR. FLEISCHER: This is something that those of you who have covered the White House for many years know exists -- pre-exists prior to this administration, and it is a standard response on any such questions about intelligence.
Q But you do know there have been times when officials have knocked down that intelligence, and you're certainly not doing that today.
***
When will the U.S. media start covering this story??? |
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Double Standard |
by anon
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 1
03 Mar 2003
Modified: 09:02:42 PM |
My primary complaint about indymedia - you criticize everything featured in the "mainstream media" as corporate propoganda without any opportunity for critique - except, of course, for the stuff you agree with, in which case, you hold it up as undeniable truth. The "NSA memo" story is absolute bunk - the phony author should've remembered that Americans don't use a "U" in words like "color" "flavor" etc. Whoops. Guardian (a less than objective source, for those of us that are selective in the information that we get from the media, instead of either dismissing it or believing it in total) backpeddled a little, but it's just not very convincing.
The "chemical weapons" item is a non-starter. I trust many imc readers are more than familiar with "riot control agents"; to try to somehow make it on-par with the horrors visited upon the Kurds, or create a "gotcha" moment from it is, frankly, shameful. The fact is is that the US has tried to field less than lethal weapons to prevent loss of life in peacekeeping activities so that US troops have the same options for crowd control that any county sheriff in the US has, only to be stymied by the otherwise laudable terms of the CWBT.
At your next protest, imagine that the police are armed with machine guns and tanks instead of shields and tear gas, and then talk to me. Pretty shabby, guys. |
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Re: U.S Spying On UN Delegates & U.S. Chemical Weapons In Iraq -- Stories The U.S. Media Is Censoring. |
by Sascha Meinrath
sascha (nospam) ucimc.org (verified) |
Current rating: -1
03 Mar 2003
Modified: 09:31:32 PM |
Anon,
While the story may indeed be "bunk" -- it may also be quite true. And neither you, nor I, know the reality of this. But I for one would like to know the truth -- and until that time, I think the question remains an open one.
What we do know is that the president's spokesman has refused to comment on the issue, the Guardian has directly addressed the issue of why British spelling was used in their transcription, and there's been a virtual media blackout in the United States of this issue.
As for your statement about U.S. chemical weapons being a "non-starter" I would suggest you do your homework before so definitively stating that the U.S. is using "the same options for crowd control that any county sheriff in the US has" -- actually, they're using the same types of weaponry that the Russian military used in the Moscow theater standoff -- the one where many more innocent civilians were killed by the chemical weapons than were killed by the hostage-takers.
I would be more than happy to hear that the U.S. is not spying on fellow U.N. delegations; and I would be quite happy to learn that the U.S. is only employing teargas -- but given that all you're bringing forward to refute the stories I've cited is a "hunch", I hope you'll understand if i continue to remain skeptical.
There are certainly multiple avenues for constructive dialogue over your differences of opinion on this issue -- all I'm asking is that before you simply dismiss, you back up your statements with some basic research. And if you're so sure of your stance, I'd also suggest that you stand behind your words instead of hiding in anonymity. |
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Where There's Smoke, There's Usually Fire |
by ML
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
03 Mar 2003
Modified: 11:04:12 PM |
I think Sascha addressed some of the points of contention, but I do want to point out a couple of things.
The NSA _regularly_ spies on the diplomats of all nations, including those with whom we maintain friendly relations (although we seem to be burning our bridges quite frequently these days.) What is unusual is the timing of such a leak as this memo. It seems timed as part of the process of intimidation that the US has used in the Iraq affair when it can't get what it wants by persuasion or bribery. It sounds as if the NSA just wants to remind everyone that they are listening, so watch what you say. Most diplomats probably are smart enough to assume they are being spied on anyway, so it was a bit of a tempest in a teapot to take the particular approach which the Observer took. This stuff goes on all the time anyway, which is why Fleischer didn't want to comment on it. Practically anything he might have said would have been a lie (of course, that's pretty normal for him anyway) so that's why the no comment -- he just didn't want to go there, because a denial would be laughed at. So in that limited sense, anon has sort of a point.
I do have to quibble with his dismissal of the charges re: CS, etc. It's kind of funny how supporters of various Bush positions always try to cite international law when it suits their purposes -- and completely ignore it when international law inconveniently conflicts with what they desire to do.
Even though it IS technically legal under the CWC treaty for police to use such stuff domestically, it IS still illegal, not just inconvenient, for the US military to use it internationally in conflict. That's just the way it is, the US is a party to the CWC treaty and is bound by its provisions. Not just the ones Bush's buddies think serve them best, but the whole thing. So the point is well taken that the Bushies appear to be getting ready to break yet another international agreement.
BTW, stuff like CS, etc IS often lethal to those whose health or breathing are compromised, infants and children, and the elderly. Even otherwise healthy people can have bad reactions to this shit and die. Do you really think they will be checking to see if everyone's healthy enough to get dosed with this shit before using it? I don't buy the "non-lethal" tag and the public shouldn't either. This crap is NOT used, or even meant to be used, compassionately, so don't pull this kind of double-talk, anon.
The real question should be is why the police should even get an exemption for the use, and often misuse, of these agents. They should be banned from their use just like the military.
For more info on the CWC:
http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~hsp/regime.html
http://cns.miis.edu/research/cbw/control.htm
http://cif.miis.edu/cif/archive/archive2.htm |
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Re: U.S Spying On UN Delegates & U.S. Chemical Weapons In Iraq -- Stories The U.S. Media Is Censoring. |
by Ben Grosser
grosser (nospam) uiuc.edu (unverified) |
Current rating: 0
03 Mar 2003
|
It finally hit US media at Salon.com. Will have to wait and see if it ever hits US multi-national corporate media...
see:
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2003/03/04/spy/index.html |
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More From Cryptome |
by *
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
03 Mar 2003
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http://cryptome.org/koza-eyeball.htm |
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More Coverage, This Time In French Media |
by Joe Futrelle
futrelle (nospam) shout.net (verified) |
Current rating: 0
04 Mar 2003
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http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0304-02.htm |
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You're Backpeddling |
by anon
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 2
04 Mar 2003
Modified: 10:00:50 AM |
You didn't frame these stories as possibly being "bunk"; you held them up as undeniable fact, being intentionally blacked out by the big bad US media. Are you kidding me? The media love scandal. But even the most brazen, cynical, Vietnam generation news editors have something you apparantly don't - an internal BS detector! (And yes, the Guardian explained the spelling - after the fact. Whooups. I mean, whoops.)
It's as though this is the first time you've read something in the newspaper. You're assuming (and I suppose the Independent is, too) that because less than lethal agents include among other things, the narcotic "sleep gas" employed by the Russians, that the US is going to therefore deploy all of them. The defense establishment is on record, however, that they wish that tear gas could be deployed in operations other than war situations. But after what happened in Russia (and assuming the military has such an agent deliverable, and in amounts for battlefield, rather than for hostage rescue/couterterrorism, use - a real stretch), you really think that the US military would shoot themselves in the foot like that? Disagree with the Pentagon if you like, but they're pretty seasoned when it comes to PR. I mean, come on.
To the second comment: No, tear gas is not nice (though you'd know better than I would). But I think we need to temper "often lethal infants and the elderly" just a bit, don't you? I don't think anyone is proposing going and hosing down the Baghdad KinderCare with CS. There is concern that Sadaam's goon squads (special, unique snowflakes that they are, or so we're told by the pacifist types around here) are going to try to use Iraqi civillians as human shields. You'd rather see them succeed? No, you say, you don't want to see a war at all. Fine. But it's looking pretty certain that it is. When people are dancing in the streets celebrating their liberation and the end of Sadaam's murderous rule, I want you to be sure that you tell them that you did your best to deny them of it, and that you tried to make it as dangerous as possible as well. |
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Mainstream U.S. Media Weighs In On U.S. Spying On U.N. Delegates |
by Sascha
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
04 Mar 2003
|
In a rather stunning analysis of the spy charges brought to light by the British Press, the U.S. corporate media is attempting to spin the allegations into irrelevance. Read the articles below for yourself... incredible!
***
Washington Post downplays U.S. Spying:
From: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A37250-2003Mar3.html
Spying Report No Shock To U.N.
By Colum Lynch
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, March 4, 2003; Page A17
UNITED NATIONS, March 3 -- Security Council diplomats today shrugged off a British newspaper report that the super-secretive National Security Agency had ordered an eavesdropping "surge" on their telephones to determine their voting positions on a resolution that would pave the way for a U.S.-led war against Iraq.
"The fact is, this sort of thing goes with the territory," Pakistan's U.N. ambassador, Munir Akram, said in an interview. "You'd have to be very naive to be surprised."
******************************************
CBS News follows suit:
From: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/03/03/iraq/main542516.shtml
Spy On The Wall Treatment A Given
NEW YORK, March 4, 2003
(CBS) U.S. government spokesmen refused to confirm or deny that the National Security Agency is spying on United Nations delegations, but the subjects of the reported surveillance were nonplussed Monday.
Britain's Observer newspaper reported that an NSA memo it had obtained described a "surge" in surveillance of the U.S.-based missions of Security Council members whose votes could be critical to a resolution backing war against Iraq.
But rather than taking offense to the snooping, the Russian ambassador considered it part of the game and the Bulgarian envoy said it was a badge of honor.
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Sascha And ML |
by Jack Ryan
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: -2
04 Mar 2003
Modified: 03:04:25 PM |
Hey it's me Jack. I have missed you guys so much. ML, you always go invisable on me after I comment. I am beginning to think you do not like me.
Do we spy on other countries? Yes, absolutely. Should we? Positively.
Not only should we spy on those ungrafeful weasels France, Germany and Belgium, but we should be loading up the landing craft for D-Day II. We could even give the French our battle plan and we would still whip them in short order.
But I digress, any chance we might be deploying these chemical agents in an effort to reduce the amount of Iraqi and US casualties if the fight carries on into an urban setting? While it is true this stuff can be dangerous, I am sure you would rather take your chances with this stuff than being on the other end of a Flame Thrower.
Anyway, it is nice to hear from you again. I am might drop by the book club meeting tonight. Will the naked ladies be there?
Your Friend,
Jack
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Re: U.S Spying On UN Delegates & U.S. Chemical Weapons In Iraq -- Stories The U.S. Media Is Censoring. |
by anon
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
04 Mar 2003
|
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Oh my god! The US spies on other countries? Why we must be the only country in the world spying on others! Come on people, this is pretty much a non-story. Governments all around the world spy on each other. You only hear about it when someone gets caught. |
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Re: U.S Spying On UN Delegates & U.S. Chemical Weapons In Iraq -- Stories The U.S. Media Is Censoring. |
by Sascha Meinrath
sascha (nospam) ucimc.org (unverified) |
Current rating: 0
04 Mar 2003
|
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Come on Anon... first the story was "bunk" now it's a "non-starter" -- if it does turn out to be true, why don't you just admit it -- your hunch was wrong, and Indymedia's coverage was right on the money. I understand you disagree with the progressive-radical nature of the story, but certainly your response is disingenuous at best. |
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Re: U.S Spying On UN Delegates & U.S. Chemical Weapons In Iraq -- Stories The U.S. Media Is Censoring. |
by anon
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
04 Mar 2003
Modified: 08:41:10 PM |
Fair enough. For what it's worth, the last comment beginning with "Oh my god" was not me, but someone else. But OK, I can admit being wrong on this, if you can as well, should additional (non-absurd, faintly credible) information become available. I think that the depiction of "tapping phones and stealing e-mail" is highly unlikely, and the idea of someone from the world's most secretive organization forwarding an email to the frikkin' Guardian totally laughable.
I stand by my comments on the chemical weapons ban as is, and re-hashing of shabby news favorable to "progressive" viewpoints (or regressive, or sideways ones) only when politically expedient is still dirty pool. |
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I Wouldn't Take Anon Too Seriously |
by ML
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
04 Mar 2003
Modified: 08:40:07 PM |
It's a pretty good guess that "anon" is also "Jack Ryan". Note this quote where anon sounds just like Jack:
"When people are dancing in the streets celebrating their liberation and the end of Sadaam's murderous rule, I want you to be sure that you tell them that you did your best to deny them of it, and that you tried to make it as dangerous as possible as well."
Jack's upset because we're ignoring him. Which is what you do with trolls, assuming the hunting season on them is closed (too bad, not all of us are pacifists.) That's definitely the three-year old in him coming out again. I'm really surprised his parents don't supervise his Internet access a little more closely.
Based on some of the other traffic on this site in the last few days, it looks like "Jack" is on a one man campaign to make it appear like there's a minor surge in public condemnation of IMC. That is, him and his multiple nymns are _the_ culprit. There does _not_ seem to be anyone else involved. And we know how to deal with that kind of juvenlie behavior anyway. |
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Re: U.S Spying On UN Delegates & U.S. Chemical Weapons In Iraq -- Stories The U.S. Media Is Censoring. |
by anon (the first one)
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
04 Mar 2003
Modified: 11:48:02 PM |
Sorry, I'm not "Jack". I'm the same person that made all of the comments below, except, as I mentioned above, the one beginning "Oh my God". Regardless, you shouldn't be so dismissive of the fact that there's a diversity of opinion on these issues, and that there are people who want to take you to task over them when they see the truth being stretched. I guess that's what people do when their ideas are threatened - they lash out, or cite subsection (2)(a) of the rulebook, and while your remarks weren't pointed at me, the veiled threat about "troll season" was unfortunate - and decidedly not-scary (the absence of pacifism does not a tough guy make).
Back to the point: I wholeheartedly believe that the anti-war crowd is in for a real embarrassment a few months from now. If post-Taliban Afghanistan street-celebrations isn't to your liking (though I'll agree that those seeds of freedom need a little more time to germinate), how about Kosovo? They re-named their public commons, now "Bill Clinton square" in Pristina, after the same man that ordered air strikes on their country! I think that the Iraqis are in equally dire straights, and I think that it's really unfortunate that there are people in this country that are trying to oppose something that will, one, work to our nation's strategic interests, and two, help unseat one of (if not the) most brutal dictators in the world - just to further their own narrow political/ideological goals (and, to get back to my original beef, bending the truth in doing so).
So suit yourself; you want to play kommisar, fine. But the fact remains that the charge that "the media" (gee, all of 'em? They must've had a meeting!) is guilty of censorship on these two issues is a big, fat, lie. |
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US Bugs United Nations, American Media Doesn't Care |
by NYC IMC Feature
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
05 Mar 2003
|
On Sunday March 2, The Observer, Great Britain's oldest newspaper, released an exclusive report documenting the National Security Agency's (NSA) extensive spying campaign against members of the UN Security Council. According to the Observer, "the United States is conducting a secret 'dirty tricks' campaign against UN Security Council delegations in New York as part of its battle to win votes in favour of war against Iraq."
Great Britain is six hours ahead of the United States, meaning the story was published well over thirty hours ago. Yet a Google News search for the keywords "nsa un security council," conducted at 10:30 am EST today (March 3), revealed that twenty-three media outlets in the Google News database had reported the story. Six were British, six Australian, six Middle Eastern or Pakistani, two Canadian, one German. Two of the sources were American, including a Common Dreams reprint of the original story. And on Monday morning Democracy Now interviewed Observer journalist Martin Bright who broke the story. [Listen: http://stream.paranode.com/democracynow/dn2003-0303.m3u]
According to the Google News website, "Google News continuously crawls more than 4,500 news sources from around the world."
Virtually the only coverage of the story in the American press comes from the right-wing Washington Times, which questioned the "British English" used in the "smoking email" of the original Observer report. The Observer responded online by noting that "this email was originally transcribed with English spellings standardised for a British audience," but stuck by its story.
Try it yourself ... click here [ http://news.google.com/news?q=nsa+un+security+council+&hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&scoring=d&start=0&sa=N&filter=0 ] to see if and when American newspapers pick up this story.
Comment and Report Back: http://www.nyc.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=49135&group=webcast
Read the Original Observer Report: http://www.observer.co.uk/iraq/story/0,12239,905936,00.html
Ari Fleischer Questioned on UN Bugging: http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2003/03/20030303-3.html
http://nyc.indymedia.org/
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Re: U.S Spying On UN Delegates & U.S. Chemical Weapons In Iraq -- Stories The U.S. Media Is Censoring. |
by Joe Futrelle
futrelle (nospam) shout.net (verified) |
Current rating: 0
05 Mar 2003
Modified: 02:42:08 PM |
> the charge that "the media" (gee, all of 'em? They must've had a meeting!) is guilty of censorship on these two issues is a big, fat, lie.
Since the original post, the spying story has indeed been given a significant amount of coverage in the U.S. media -- though we can still quibble over how much, and how it's been spun.
But where's the chemical weapons story in the U.S. media? Unless someone can find a reference to coverage of this story in the U.S. media, it is fair and accurate to say that the U.S. media has failed to adequately report on this story.
It is clear that the story is as important as others that have been given more attention -- e.g., Michael Jackson's continuing scandals. And it also seems reasonable to assume that media organizations with a conservative slant might want to suppress this story, since it shows that the U.S. is not opposed to the use of chemical weapons -- in fact, the U.S. is prepared to break a treaty that it signed banning the use of the weapons in question. That at least weakens the U.S.'s argument that Iraq should get rid of its chemical weapons.
Note that while we have been discussing this the U.S. has switched from disarmament to regime change as justification for the war, perhaps sensing that at least overseas, no one's buying it. We might buy it here in the U.S., but maybe that's in part because the U.S. media doesn't give us a complete and accurate picture of where the U.S. stands on chemical weapons. |
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Re: The Chemical Weapons Story |
by Joe Futrelle
futrelle (nospam) shout.net (verified) |
Current rating: 0
05 Mar 2003
Modified: 03:06:19 PM |
There was an AP story on Monday. It was picked up by:
The Boston Globe
http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/062/nation/US_eyes_plan_for_tear_gas_use_in_IraqP.shtml
The Chicago Sun-Times
http://www.suntimes.com/output/iraq/cst-nws-iside03.html
The Houston Chronicle
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/story.hts/special/iraq/1801934
... and numerous other papers, mostly smaller ones.
As far as I can tell, the following U.S. news organizations have not picked up the story: CNN, Fox, MSNBC, CBS, ABC, NPR, PBS. |
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ML, Anon, And Sascha |
by Jack Ryan
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: -1
05 Mar 2003
Modified: 10:15:43 PM |
Dear Kids,
Anon is not me. In fact, he or she hits me pretty hard on the entire "naked protest" crap. Although, you have to admit, my critique of that stuff has been pretty first rate.
I am pretty sure that Anon is as loopy as you guys, but realizes that spying on other countries is not a story, but rather a neccesity. In any case, ML, ignore me if you will, but I gain converts everyday that you do.
Soon we win and this will make you sad. Are you going to come back and respond then or will you weep in shattered credibility.
Your Friend,
Jack |
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Anon |
by Jack Ryan
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: -2
05 Mar 2003
|
Anon,
ML thinks you and I are the same person. You need to thank her for the compliment.
Jack |
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Re: U.S Spying On UN Delegates & U.S. Chemical Weapons In Iraq -- Stories The U.S. Media Is Censoring. |
by anon
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
05 Mar 2003
Modified: 10:38:55 PM |
Joe,
You can't possibly equate the use of tear gas with VX. It's not even in the same ballpark. Regardless, the notion that the issue is somehow being "censored", that is, someone is actively intervening to prevent the media from discussing it, is just plain silly.
Good stuff on the student anti-war (or as I will now refer them, anti-Iraqi liberation) protests today - particularly the rebuttal from an Iraqi exile on why the protesters have got it wrong. Also see the Washington Post article on the autonomy the Kurds have been able to secure in the Northern no-fly zone. The rest of the country should so benefit. |
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Re: U.S Spying On UN Delegates & U.S. Chemical Weapons In Iraq -- Stories The U.S. Media Is Censoring. |
by anon
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
05 Mar 2003
Modified: 11:07:37 PM |
"...my critique of that stuff has been pretty first rate."
"...I gain converts everyday..."
Jack-off, put down your crack-pipe immediately, the delusions have really taken hold now. As I pled of you before, please seek professional help. |
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Re: U.S Spying On UN Delegates & U.S. Chemical Weapons In Iraq -- Stories The U.S. Media Is Censoring. |
by Joe Futrelle
futrelle (nospam) shout.net (verified) |
Current rating: 5
06 Mar 2003
Modified: 12:35:03 AM |
> You can't possibly equate the use of tear gas with VX.
I made no such claim, so your objection is a red herring.
> Regardless, the notion that the issue is somehow being "censored", that is, someone is actively intervening to prevent the media from discussing it, is just plain silly.
I didn't claim that, either. Instead, I demonstrated that the story is being downplayed, and explained what I think the motive is. The silly conspiracy theory you knocked down was a straw man. |
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Anon |
by Jack Ryan
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: -1
06 Mar 2003
Modified: 07:39:39 AM |
Good Morning Anon,
Hey, do realize that if you "spell check" your name it comes back A-Hole? Interesting huh. You continue to recommend therapy. I am not so sure. What if I become a political, Nancy, loser like yourself?
Thanks for caring though,
Jack |
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Re: U.S Spying On UN Delegates & U.S. Chemical Weapons In Iraq -- Stories The U.S. Media Is Censoring. |
by anon (the first one)
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
06 Mar 2003
Modified: 10:05:31 AM |
Joe,
On herrings and strawmen: you stated that the use of tear gas by the US weakened its moral authority on Iraq's possession of WMD. You're really saying that the US is essentially no better than Iraq, and I think that equating the (possible, potential) use of tear gas to the (real, 35 9/11's of dead Kurds and Iranians) use of nerve agent is just plain crazy.
Your critique of why this didn't get more play is a little more articulate than the one offered in the original post. I still think that if the story had any legs, the non-conservative slanted news outlets would have a field day playing "gotcha" on this, but most people just don't have a problem dropping a little CS on the Republican Guard to get them away from civillians.
This is what I get for not choosing a more creative sig. The little games with it are getting annoying. Is the divide and conquer strategy working yet? Guess not. |
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Re: U.S Spying On UN Delegates & U.S. Chemical Weapons In Iraq -- Stories The U.S. Media Is Censoring. |
by Joe Futrelle
futrelle (nospam) shout.net (verified) |
Current rating: 5
06 Mar 2003
Modified: 11:53:25 AM |
> You're really saying that the US is essentially no better than Iraq, and I think that equating the (possible, potential) use of tear gas to the (real, 35 9/11's of dead Kurds and Iranians) use of nerve agent is just plain crazy.
No, that's not what I'm saying. What I'm saying is that if we announce our willingness to disregard the CWC we weaken our position that we are trying to enforce international norms. I never said that using tear gas is in any way equivalent to using a nerve agent, and of course I don't believe that. It's another straw man.
> I still think that if the story had any legs, the non-conservative slanted news outlets would have a field day playing "gotcha" on this, but most people just don't have a problem dropping a little CS on the Republican Guard to get them away from civillians.
Which news outlets are you referring to? I don't think news outlets should make decisions about which stories to cover based on ideology. We're talking about news coverage here, not the op-ed page. I think the media should report this story because it represents the very real possibility of a significant policy shift on chemical weapons, and it seems to me that the public needs to be informed about this kind of policy shift. Perhaps the public won't have a problem with it, but that is certainly no reason *not* to report it.
And I have no idea what makes you think the story "doesn't have legs". After all, the statements being covered here were made by Rumsfeld to congress and are a matter of public record. It's not like the facts are in doubt. |
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Re: U.S Spying On UN Delegates & U.S. Chemical Weapons In Iraq -- Stories The U.S. Media Is Censoring. |
by anon
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
06 Mar 2003
Modified: 12:34:22 PM |
I get your point. It's still a bit like comparing a speeding ticket to vehicular homicide. It's remarkable how easily the Russians got off the hook for goating the Chechen hostage crisis.
You sez -
"And it also seems reasonable to assume that media organizations with a conservative slant might want to suppress this story..."
Whichever news orgs you are referring to are the ones that I'm referring to. No, news outlets shouldn't have an ideological slant to their reporting, but they do, which is the important part. I can see a Fox producer being less receptive to a story critical of the war, just as I can see the Washington Post chomping at the bit to do one. That's why I'd like to see people become more critical consumers of media, rather than discounting it altogether. |
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Washington Post Anti-War? Not Hardly |
by via *
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
06 Mar 2003
|
The Unbalanced Hawks at the Washington Post By Russell Mokhiber and Robert Weissman
What is going on at the Washington Post?
We would say that the Post editorial pages have become an outpost of the Defense Department -- except that there is probably more dissent about the pending war in Iraq in the Pentagon than there is on the Post editorial pages.
In February alone, the Post editorialized nine times in favor of war, the last of those a full two columns of text, arguing against the considerable critical reader response the page had received for pounding the drums of war.
Over the six-month period from September through February, the leading newspaper in the nation's capital has editorialized 26 times in favor of war. It has sometimes been critical of the Bush administration, it has sometimes commented on developments in the drive to war without offering an opinion on the case for war itself, but it has never offered a peep against military action in Iraq.
The op-ed page, which might offer some balance, has also been heavily slanted in favor of war.
In February, the Post op-ed page ran 34 columns that took a position on the war: 24 favored war and 10 were opposed, at least in part. (Another 22 mentioned Iraq, and sometimes were focused exclusively on Iraq, but didn't clearly take a position for or against the war.)
Over the last four months, the Post has run 46 op-ed pieces favoring the war, and only 21 opposed.
This constitutes a significant change from September and October, when the opinion pieces were much more balanced, and even tilted slightly in favor of peace.
A few words on our methodology: We reviewed every editorial and op-ed piece in the Post over the last six months that contained the word "Iraq." We looked at the substance of the articles, and did not pre-judge based on the author. We categorized as neutral pieces which mentioned Iraq as an aside, or which discussed the war without taking a position. For example, an article which assesses how European countries are responding to U.S. Iraq-related proposals, but does not take a position on the war itself, is categorized as neutral. Neutral articles are not included in our tally.
The methodology tends to undercount pro-war columns. We categorized as neutral articles which we thought presumed a certain position on the war, but which did not explicitly articulate it. Over the last four months, there were 17 "neutral" articles which we believe had a pro-war slant, and only five "neutral" pieces with an anti-war orientation.
Our methodology also tended to overcount pro-peace op-eds. We tallied an op-ed as pro-peace if it took a position opposing the drive to war on the issue of the moment -- even if the author made clear that they favored war on slightly different terms than the President proposed at the time (for example, if UN authorization was obtained).
Someone else reviewing the Post editorial page might disagree with our categorization of this or that article. We concede it may be rough around the edges. But overall, we think other reviewers would agree that our count is in the ballpark, and tends to underestimate the disparity between pro- and anti-war pieces.
Moreover, the dramatic quantitative tilt in favor of the war if anything underplays how pro-war the Post's editorial pages have been.
Among the regular columnists at the Post, those providing pieces that we considered anti-war include E.J. Dionne, a self-described "doubter" not opponent of the war, Mary McGrory, who pronounced herself convinced by Colin Powell's presentation to the United Nations (a position from which she has backtracked) and Richard Cohen, who actually is pro-war. Only William Rasberry could be labeled a genuine and consistent opponent of war.
On the other side, the regular pro-war columnists are extraordinarily harsh and shrill. George Will labeled David Bonior and James McDermott, two congresspeople who visited Iraq, "American collaborators" with and "useful idiots" for Saddam. Michael Kelly, in one of his calmer moments, says no "serious" person can argue the case for peace. Charles Krauthammer says that those who call for UN authorization of U.S. military action in Iraq are guilty of a "kind of moral idiocy."
The Post op-ed page has been full of attacks on anti-war protesters. Richard Cohen has managed to author attacks on John Le Carre, for an anti-war column he wrote, poets against the war, and Representative Dennis Kucinich. Cohen joined war-monger Richard Perle in calling Kucinich a "liar" (or at very least a "fool"), because Kucinich suggested the war might be motivated in part by a U.S. interest in Iraqi oil. (Is this really a controversial claim? Pro-war New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman says that to deny a U.S. war in Iraq is partly about oil is "laughable.")
Neither Le Carre, the poets, nor Kucinich has been given space on the Post op-ed page.
Indeed, virtually no one who could be considered part of the peace movement has been given space. The only exceptions: A column by Hank Perritt, then a Democratic congressional candidate from Illinois, appeared in September. Morton Halperin argued the case for containment over war in February. And Reverend Bob Edgar, a former member of Congress who now heads the National Council of Churches, a key mover in the anti-war movement, was permitted a short piece that appeared in the week between Christmas and New Year's, when readership and attention to serious issues is at a lowpoint.
Edgar only was given the slot after editorial page editor Fred Hiatt, in an op-ed, characterized the anti-war movement, and Edgar by name, as "Saddam's lawyers."
Does this shockingly one-sided treatment on the Post editorial pages of the major issue of the day matter?
It matters a lot.
The Washington Post and the New York Times are the two papers that most fundamentally set the boundaries for legitimate opinion in Washington, D.C. The extraordinary tilt for war in the Post editorial pages in the last four months makes it harder for officialdom in Washington and the Establishment generally to speak out against war.
Everyone who might be characterized as an "insider" in the political-military-corporate establishment knows there are major internal divisions on the prospect of war among elder statesmen, retired military brass and present-day corporate CEOs. There are many reasons those voices are inhibited from speaking out, but the Post's extremist editorial pages are certainly a real contributor.
The failure to give a prominent platform to anti-war voices has also worked to soften the debate among the citizenry. It's no answer to say a vibrant anti-war movement, reliant on the Internet, its own communications channels and dissenting voices in other major media outlets, has sprung up. Sending out an e-mail missive is not exactly the same thing as publishing an op-ed in the Washington Post.
The Post editorial page editors have failed to fulfill their duty to democracy. The heavy slant on the editorial pages, the extreme pro-war rhetoric offset only by hedging and uncertain war critics, and the scurrilous attacks on the anti-war movement to which minimal response has been permitted -- all have undermined rather than fueled a robust national debate.
At this point, there is no real way for the Post to rectify its wrongdoing. It could start to mitigate the effect by immediately making a conscious effort to solicit and publish a disproportionately high number of pro-peace op-eds, and to let the peace movement occasionally speak for itself, especially since the paper's regular columnists so savagely and repeatedly attack it.
Unfortunately, the drive to war, which the Post editorial pages have helped fuel, may not stop in Iraq. There is good reason to believe that a war with Iraq will be followed by calls from the hawks at the Post and around the administration for more military action, against some other target. Will the paper's editorial page editors find a better way to achieve balance in advance of the next military buildup? Or are the paper's editorial pages now simply devoted to the Permanent War Campaign?
\Russell Mokhiber is editor of the Washington, D.C.-based Corporate Crime Reporter. Robert Weissman is editor of the Washington, D.C.-based Multinational Monitor, http://www.multinationalmonitor.org. They are co-authors of Corporate Predators: The Hunt for MegaProfits and the Attack on Democracy (Monroe, Maine: Common Courage Press; http://www.corporatepredators.org).
(c) Russell Mokhiber and Robert Weissman
This article is posted at: http://lists.essential.org/pipermail/corp-focus/= 2003/000147.html
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Defining Censorship |
by *
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
06 Mar 2003
Modified: 01:21:47 PM |
It has been insinuated at least once in these comments that unless it could be proven that the government or an organized conspiracy of the press decided to actively censor this story, then censorship did not occur. This approach is one that fundamentally misunderstands the relationship of the press in the US to the powerful and too narrowly defines what constitutes censorship.
The most common and invidious form of censorship in the US press is self-censorship. It is, admittedly, hard to prove any individual editorial decision is directly attributable to self-censorship. But even a rather basic analysis analysis of data on a number of decisions about a particular story will often show rather interesting patterns. These patterns show that important stories are often ignored or downplayed in ways that indicate that there is obviously a great deal of self-censorship going on. This clearly the case with this story.
In a mass media market that is owned by large corporations and relatively homogenized, like the US press is, the fact that a story can not be said to have been totally or officially censored is nowhere near as important as the fact that most citizens will not see an important story and thus lack crucial information needed to decide for themselves what is important to know. When editors make political choices about what stories their readers need to see, even when they themselves understand the importance and relevance of the story being downplayed or ignored to serve their own class interests or the intersts of their owners, they self-censor.
Indymedia is a project that intentionally breaks this pattern. Trite dismissals of important stories like this demonstrate that some of our readers need to educate themselves on the issues of power and control in the media which are being addressed here. Otherwise, you are completely missing the point of what we do. |
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Re: U.S Spying On UN Delegates & U.S. Chemical Weapons In Iraq -- Stories The U.S. Media Is Censoring. |
by anon
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
06 Mar 2003
Modified: 03:28:54 PM |
Oh, I get the premise, *, that the patterns of corporate onwnership and commerical interest in the business that report the news taints the news product as a matter of course. I just think it's half baked (though not totally raw).
I get the sense that there isn't a paper in America that is "progressive" enough to your liking (more on that in a minute), so you'll have to forgive my timid example. The Washington Post was my example of a news outlet whose coverage tends to be widely perceived as in the mainstream of public opinion (the NY Times could be another), and very well regarded. My reason for using it was because I, in part, agree with you. News is a business, and especially since Watergate, scandal sells. But if the information isn't credible, or is perceived as unbalanced, it won't. The unfortunate exception to this is "niche" news, like Fox - or for that matter, Zmag. At least they wear their bias on their sleeves.
The conservative right says just the opposite (and some on the left concede as well) - that there is an institutional bias built in to news reporting by the background, attitudes, and experience of the people who choose journalism as a profession. Their perspective on which events are newsworthy taints what gets covered.
Look at your source of criticism of the Washington Post. If I put up something similar from Fox News, you'd dismiss it (probably correctly so). I'd say that the Multinational Monitor piece is even further in the opposite direction than Fox News, though; more like "The 700 Club".
It's all about perspective. No, NBC Nightly News is not as probing as some other sources of information. But neither is it a 30 minute infomercial for GE. It's something in the middle. That's why I said I'd rather see people become more critical consumers of media, as opposed to discounting it altogether.
That in a nutshell is why I object to much of what I read in this project: it is, at best, a simplistic and anti-intellectual denunciation of the media and the information in it as a whole - and at worst, a tool for political manipulation. |
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Then, Was IS Your Point? |
by *
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
06 Mar 2003
Modified: 04:17:47 PM |
First anon (one of them, anyway) points out how much he thinks we are just like the dominant media. And then anon insists that Indymedia is somehow even more like "The 700 Club" than "The 700 Club" itself. Bad analogy. We don't do religion, generally, unless its actually news. Multinational Monitor and IMC both use factual information, not articles of faith, to make our points. If the facts don't add up to something anon likes, then he thinks we are the problem, not the facts. That's pretty convenient for his argument, but readers can judge for themselves what they think of the facts, taking into consideration what anon has to say, of course.
Anon completely misses the point that the corporate media _pretend_ to objectively present the news. And IMC does _not_ pretend to do so, which seems to irritate him. And because we don't pretend to so-called "objectivity" like the dominant media, somehow our honesty in admitting our bias is more "extreme" than the dominant media he trumpets as near-models of journalistic rectitude. I guess Fox's habit of repeating every 20 minutes that they are balanced and objective (or whatever catchy phrase they use these days), despite the rather obvious fact that they are _not_, somehow makes them a better and more accurate source of news than Indymedia in anon's eyes.
Sheesh, get serious anon.
Finally, we have this gem:
"That in a nutshell is why I object to much of what I read in this project: it is, at best, a simplistic and anti-intellectual denunciation of the media and the information in it as a whole - and at worst, a tool for political manipulation."
Why don't you just come right out and say you don't like our politics (and that you find the politics of the Washington Post and Faux News so much more agreeable)? Because that's what this is about, not some false standard that you've constructed to compare us to.
Besides, none of the rest of your semi-idealized media would have given you as much space as Indymedia has for a chance to critique it for what you see as the occassional failures of the dominant media, versus what you claim are the fatal flaws of Indymedia. But I'm sure you'll give us some more sophistry to represent that this is just part of the Indymedia conspiracy to subvert the real truth of the dominant media or something equally ridiculous. You need to start admitting your own hidden biases, rather than criticizing us for being up front about ours. |
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Some In The Dominant Media Agree |
by via *
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
06 Mar 2003
|
From USA Today, 6 March 2003
War-protest coverage now in the forefront
Some find the media's attention too little, too late
By Peter Johnson
Did the media stumble by downplaying opposition to war with Saddam Hussein until the U.S. government's confrontation with Germany and France and worldwide protests gave them no choice?
Or was opposition to a war a gradual process that came to a head only recently, prompting widespread media coverage?
That issue is now being debated in media circles.
Cable news has ''acted as if the decision to invade Iraq has already been made, and have in effect seen it as their job to prepare the American public for the coming war,'' New York Times columnist Paul Krugman wrote last week. ''Some media outlets -- operating in an environment in which anyone who questions the administration's foreign policy is accused of being unpatriotic -- have taken it as their assignment to sell the war, not to present a mix of information that might call the justification for war into question.''
Says Greg Mitchell, editor of Editor & Publisher: ''The press woefully underplayed the anti-war movement until recently. Now coverage is growing, of the large marches at least. But I still don't see the kind of regular day-to-day coverage that was common during, say, the nuclear freeze movement of the early 1980s. That's the true test of taking dissent seriously.''
Robert Lichter of the Center for Media and Public Affairs says it might have been difficult for the media to gauge how Americans felt until just recently, when organized protests began.
''The media are better covering events than ideas,'' he says. ''You can see what people think from the polls, but you can't really see what drives them unless you see people marching in the street. There's a difference between 'opposition' and 'an opposition.' ''
And polls have consistently shown support for President Bush's stand on Iraq. From September to now, CBS News has found that nearly two-thirds of Americans support military action to remove Saddam from power. But six in 10 Americans oppose U.S. military action without allied or U.N. support.
Democrats also have largely been supportive of Bush since last September, when he called on the United Nations to authorize weapons inspections in Iraq. That left the media without an obvious Democratic-Republican fight to cover in Congress.
The media also fell down, says Harvard media analyst Alex Jones, in not paying closer attention to strong anti-war sentiment in Europe, which eventually came to a head at the United Nations.
''That came as a big shock to most Americans,'' he says. ''But this was something the American media should have been on top of.''
Last week's peace marches made front-page news in many cities, including New York, Baltimore, Denver, San Antonio, Seattle, San Francisco and Atlanta.
Too much too late, says Jay Rosen, a professor of journalism at New York University. ''There's no reason it should take that much organization and demonstration for the peace theme to loom larger in the press as a parallel theme when the country moved closer to war.''
The media, news analyst Andrew Tyndall says, rightly covered the buildup to war with their reporting from the White House, Pentagon and State Department. But in doing so, they may have helped make the administration's arguments ''more bellicose than they were'' while ignoring smaller, grass-roots opposition to Bush's plan or individual opposition that can be found only by going into the field.
Tyndall says that until the peace demonstrations, the Big Three networks concentrated heavily on the Bush administration.
Of 414 stories on the Iraqi question that aired on NBC, ABC and CBS from Sept. 14 to Feb. 7, Tyndall says that the vast majority originated from the White House, Pentagon and State Department. Only 34 stories originated from elsewhere in the country, he says.
Similarly, a check of major newspapers around the country from September to February found only 268 stories devoted to peace initiatives or to opposition to the war, a small fraction of the total number.
''Most editors and reporters think the diplomatic story -- the great power narrative -- is more real,'' NYU's Rosen says. ''And people who move into the White House know how to dominate the news agenda.''
Since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the Bush administration has held frequent media briefings at the White House, Pentagon and State Department, which are easy for news outlets to cover.
But Tyndall says major media organizations have ''a penchant for inside-the-Beltway policy coverage, where policy is made by elected officials and think tanks,'' and the opinions of ordinary Americans often fall by the wayside.
CNN spokeswoman Christa Robinson disagrees. From covering what students are saying on college campuses to addressing issues of war and peace on TalkBack Live, ''I think we have offered our viewers a diversity of viewpoints for months now.''
Marcy McGinnis, who heads news coverage for CBS News, also disagrees with Tyndall.
''The best indicator of how a news organization covers a story is the content of the coverage, not the dateline,'' McGinnis says. ''We've conducted nine polls in the past five months on how Americans in all parts of the country are feeling about the Iraq issue, every one of which was reported on The CBS Evening News and on many occasions, in a piece with a Washington or New York dateline.''
No doubt true, Tyndall says, but he says his dateline analysis indicates where the networks' priorities have been on the Iraq story. ''This was a Washington-driven story. It has not been a heartland story. It has been an inside-the-Beltway story.''
© Copyright 2002 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Co. Inc.
http://www.usatoday.com/usatonline/20030225/4894862s.htm |
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Re: U.S Spying On UN Delegates & U.S. Chemical Weapons In Iraq -- Stories The U.S. Media Is Censoring. |
by Joe Futrelle
futrelle (nospam) shout.net (verified) |
Current rating: 0
06 Mar 2003
Modified: 07:29:09 PM |
> That in a nutshell is why I object to much of what I read in this project: it is, at best, a simplistic and anti-intellectual denunciation of the media and the information in it as a whole.
Yes, but what about this post? Is it a simplistic and anti-intellectual denunciation of the media, or are you talking about some other post? Do the simplistic, anti-intellectual posts you're complaining about really represent the "best" of Indymedia? |
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Re: U.S Spying On UN Delegates & U.S. Chemical Weapons In Iraq -- Stories The U.S. Media Is Censoring. |
by FAIR via Joe Futrelle
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
06 Mar 2003
|
"Media Dodging U.N. Surveillance Story"
http://www.commondreams.org/views03/0306-12.htm |
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Re: U.S Spying On UN Delegates & U.S. Chemical Weapons In Iraq -- Stories The U.S. Media Is Censoring. |
by anon
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
06 Mar 2003
Modified: 10:20:12 PM |
Let me respond to some of the points raised (though *'s comments were a little circular and rambling):
I don't like your politics.
I thought that my obvious digs in the beginning of this whould've revealed that - so much for subtlety. Don't get hung up on the 700 Club remark - I was merely trying to point out that the source of information that you were putting forth was, in my opinion, as or less objective than the one you were trying to refute. But moreso, I don't like your style. I would be much less irritated if you just called this site "The Whacko Commie Bulletin Board". That you instead try to pass yourselves off as some kind of objective, untainted source of news - and by inference, that all others are hopelessly corrupted - and at the same time are (apparantly, by your admission) carrying forth a political agenda is the height of hypocracy. Any that you so often propogandize information from sources that you state, by definition, are already compromised, is even worse. That's why I challlenged the initial story.
It would be desirable if news were completely free of bias, but it never will be, for a number of reasons previously mentioned. Therefore it's important that members of a well-informed, democratic society be capable of selectively, carefully, and vigorously consuming information. That outlets like Fox cater to a niche audience is a step in the wrong direction; that you do it makes it worse. You beget WorldNet Daily (what's the opposite of crap? Crap?), anti-semitic bile, and worse - an endless stream of hitler mustache posts. You're absolutely correct that other forms of media wouldn't afford me this space to criticize (except maybe talk radio - maybe there's an analogy there), and that's admirable. I don't think I'm using the space as you intended or as you'd prefer, however.
Do the simplistic, anti-intellectual posts that I complain about really represent the "best" of Indymedia? Maybe not, but they represent the vast majority of it. The stuff that's used to deceive, recruit, and slander, to meet your stated political objectives, however, represents the worst of it.
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Re: Anon's Critique Of Indymedia |
by *
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
07 Mar 2003
Modified: 10:40:15 AM |
* “I don't like your politics.”
Well, it’s good that you’ve come right and finally stated YOUR bias.
* “I thought that my obvious digs in the beginning of this whould've revealed that - so much for subtlety.”
You and the dominant media share this trait. The dominant media hasn’t come clean yet about their biases, though, and you seem to not be troubled by that nearly as much as Indymedia troubles you.
* “Don't get hung up on the 700 Club remark - I was merely trying to point out that the source of information that you were putting forth was, in my opinion, as or less objective than the one you were trying to refute.”
We can only hope that some day the media might be as willing to be as straightforward as you are now about your biases. So far, they would rather hide behind the pretense of objectivity. Which once again points out that you ought to be criticizing them just as much as us if you wish for people to believe that you are at least being consistent and fair in your critiques. Indymedia is not more biased, we are just differently biased, than what you are used to reading
* “But moreso, I don't like your style. I would be much less irritated if you just called this site "The Whacko Commie Bulletin Board".”
You’re entitled to your opinion and you’ve been allowed to express it here. Once again, it would be nice if the dominant media would treat us the same as we’ve treated you. Last I checked, the News-Gazette isn’t offering an Open Newswire. There might be a communist or two around here, but your remark reflects far more accurately your own biases and simplistic generalizations than it does the actuality of the political viewpoints of our membership.
* “That you instead try to pass yourselves off as some kind of objective, untainted source of news - and by inference, that all others are hopelessly corrupted - and at the same time are (apparantly, by your admission) carrying forth a political agenda is the height of hypocracy.”
No, we have never made a claim that we are an “objective, untainted source of news.” In fact, just the opposite is the case.
From our mission statement, http://www.ucimc.org/info/display/mission/index.php :
“We are dedicated to addressing issues that the mainstream media neglects and we do not conceal our politics behind a false objectivity. We will empower people to "become the media" by providing democratic access to available technologies and information.”
* “An[d] that you so often propogandize information from sources that you state, by definition, are already compromised, is even worse. That's why I challlenged the initial story.”
I think what you may be referring to is that we often point out the subtle, propagandistic slanting of news that you, somehow, consider objective, when they really are not any more objective than we are. Since you usually agree with the bias that the dominant media has, you perceive their slant as “objective,” when it is not. Now that we know your view of our politics, we understand why you criticize us, but it still doesn’t make the dominant media “objective.” They’re not, so why do you insist that we be held to a higher standard at Indymedia than they?
* “It would be desirable if news were completely free of bias, but it never will be, for a number of reasons previously mentioned.”
Desirable, yes. But this is simply not reality. You can choose to cling to this strawman. We reject it and, unlike the dominant media, choose to not hide behind such subterfuge.
* “Therefore it's important that members of a well-informed, democratic society be capable of selectively, carefully, and vigorously consuming information.”
Well said and we certainly agree. We’re doing our part. If only the dominant media would do theirs…
* “That outlets like Fox cater to a niche audience is a step in the wrong direction; that you do it makes it worse. You beget WorldNet Daily (what's the opposite of crap? Crap?)…”
Faux and WorldDreckDaily both pre-exist Indymedia, so we can hardly have caused or “begat” them. It’s far more useful to see Indymedia as a reaction to the dominance of powerful corporate interests that sponsor such media as that. It should also be noted again that both of them (and the rest of the dominant media) do not allow the kind of free discussion that the Indymedia model does. Your statement sounds about like some of the anti-semitic trash that shows up blaming the Jews for Hitler and anti-semitism, but I do not think that is what you intended to mean, so I’ll go on.
* “…anti-semitic bile, and worse - an endless stream of hitler mustache posts.”
Apparently you don’t know our history of dealing aggressively with some of the dreck of society that does wash up when an Open Newswire is maintained as a matter of principle. I can point you to hundreds of posts of this nature which we have hidden. The primary person behind most of these posts exploits the anonymity offered by the Open Newswire, but we have dealt with him to effectively limit his presence here, while maintaining the Open Newswire for a wide variety of points of view, including yours.
The “hitler mustache” guy was funny the first time he exhibited the one thing he has learned to do with Photoshop. Now it is simply boring and ridiculous and says much more about his own poorly translated obsessions than it does about those he criticizes. You can also see that his posts are now grouped together and that he is only granted an occasional appearance on the Newswire, in keeping with our policy to not let any single viewpoint dominate our Newswire.
And this is also a good time to point out our disclaimer about what appears on the Newswire: http://www.ucimc.org/info/display/disclaimer/index.php
“The Newswire is an open publishing system where all posters are responsible for their own posts and the views contained in them. Posts to the Newswire do not necessarily represent the views or opinions of the Urbana-Champaign IMC nor U-C IMC members.
“The Editorial collective of the Urbana IMC oversees and administers the site whenever necessary, based on our editorial policy, but we should not be held accountable for all of the information you may find on this web site.
“If you have a particular complaint about something you've found on this web site, please email editors (at) ucimc.org.”
If something really irritates you, you can file a complaint and we will consider it, although there is a pretty high standard to meet to actually have stuff hidden here. But it does happen when people reach the point where they attempt to dominate and takeover our Newswire for their own purposes to the effective exclusion and discouragement of diverse and under-represented points of view on the Newswire, which is our goal.
* “You're absolutely correct that other forms of media wouldn't afford me this space to criticize (except maybe talk radio - maybe there's an analogy there), and that's admirable. I don't think I'm using the space as you intended or as you'd prefer, however.”
Thanks for at least realizing, in part, what we are trying to do. And, no, you are completely within the guidelines of our website use policy. We really do mean to offer a space for a variety or points of view. None of us wants Indymedia to read like a Freeper website, where all you hear is the voices of people agreeing with themselves in a critical vacuum. However, as you’ve found out, we also will not let views we disagree with go un-criticized. And we are not particularly interested in offering up what you read, see, and hear in the dominant media, with just a little addition from us. We intend to offer a powerful voice for points of view that are underrepresented in the dominant media. You may feel that there are good reasons why these points of view are under-represented there, but we take that as a good reason to offer space here for these points of view
* “Do the simplistic, anti-intellectual posts that I complain about really represent the "best" of Indymedia? Maybe not, but they represent the vast majority of it. The stuff that's used to deceive, recruit, and slander, to meet your stated political objectives, however, represents the worst of it.”
As I noted when I mentioned the disclaimer, people represent only themselves here for the most part and only rarely the official point of view of the UC IMC. I realize that this approach makes you uncomfortable, but this is how we do things. This is one reason why we are tolerant of your dissent. After all it’s only YOUR opinion and our readers can decide for themselves how much stock to put in it. This certainly goes for your statement that “the vast majority of…[Indymedia post are]… simplistic, anti-intellectual posts.” One only needs to open any edition of the News-Gazette to read “simplistic, anti-intellectual” news coverage and opinion, along with some occasionally good material by dedicated journalists. Your mileage may vary.
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Re: U.S Spying On UN Delegates & U.S. Chemical Weapons In Iraq -- Stories The U.S. Media Is Censoring. |
by Joe Futrelle
futrelle (nospam) shout.net (verified) |
Current rating: 0
07 Mar 2003
Modified: 10:16:36 AM |
> I would be much less irritated if you just called this site "The Whacko Commie Bulletin Board". That you instead try to pass yourselves off as some kind of objective, untainted source of news ...
Hmm. "Whacko Commie". Who's being "simplistic"?
Since when does Indymedia claim to be an objective source of news?
From this website's own use policy:
"The Urbana-Champaign IMC website newswire is an open publishing system, and its use for both posting and reading messages is available to anyone on the Internet. The newswire is primarily intended for the posting and discussion of news, opinions, ideas and experiences that relate to current events and news, ..."
Opinions, ideas, experiences. Would posting manifestos, diatribes, tirades, satire, and poetry violate the use policy? No. Would a right-wing article violate the use policy? No. |
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Re: U.S Spying On UN Delegates & U.S. Chemical Weapons In Iraq -- Stories The U.S. Media Is Censoring. |
by anon
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
07 Mar 2003
Modified: 04:22:07 PM |
Maybe we should wrap up or I'm going to get carpal tunnel.
You criticize Fox News for bias and in the same breath speak of promoting your politics. While you're up front about it in this discussion and in the somewhat obscured disclaimer/statemet on your Web site, I don't know if it's obvious to someone who might find an article here from, say, searching on news google. While Fox might run their assurance of objectivity every 10 minutes, it's done with a wink and a nod, just as you do with your proclaimed "independent" nature.
I think you overstate the corporate influence on news and downplay the effect of personal political biases of reporters and editors. I think you'd better achieve some of the social change you promote if you made a more sincere attempt at media education, and did so with brutal objectivity. Surprisingly, MTV does a fair job at that sometimes. But here I see, ad infinitum, no blood for oil. We'd be invading Canada if that were the idea and it goes totally unchallenged, except by random cranks like me.
I said that I don't like your politics. I used to dislike them much less. But post-9/11 some of the stuff that I've seen come out of the left-and maybe, paid more attention to-really makes me angry (insert Todd Gitlin here). It didn't bother me before - it didn't occur to bother me before - but now it makes me mad that U of I employs, with my tax money, a former anti-American terrorist. It makes me mad that the protests against war on/liberation of Iraq have been the in large part the work of communists of the most hard-core, authoritarian kind who've used the Internet to make astroturf look like grassroots. If we need anything in these times, it's honesty, not more political manipulation. That's why I'm flipping out on you.
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Re: U.S Spying On UN Delegates & U.S. Chemical Weapons In Iraq -- Stories The U.S. Media Is Censoring. |
by Joe Futrelle
futrelle (nospam) shout.net (verified) |
Current rating: 0
07 Mar 2003
Modified: 11:31:08 PM |
> While Fox might run their assurance of objectivity every 10 minutes, it's done with a wink and a nod, just as you do with your proclaimed "independent" nature.
Independence is orthogonal to political slant. There are independent media of all political persuasions -- Indymedia is one example. For example there are militia radio outlets with extreme right-wing content that are as independent of mainstream, corporate-controlled media as Indymedia is. The claim that Indymedia has this independence could be easily falsified if you could explain to us which closed organization Indymedia is accountable to. But you can't -- the meetings and committees are open and transparent. That cannot be said for Fox or any of the other dominant corporate-controlled media, whose primary responsibility is to their shareholders.
It's boring to explain this to you, anon -- you don't listen. |
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Re: U.S Spying On UN Delegates & U.S. Chemical Weapons In Iraq -- Stories The U.S. Media Is Censoring. |
by observer
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
08 Mar 2003
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I don't think you ever listen to anon, either. While he seems to have some sort of commie-paranoia thing going on, he (or she) is correct that many on these site do not analyze media in any kind of fair way. for instance, you don't distinguish in a newspaper what is on the opinion page and what it is the news pages. It's very possible that a right- or left-wing paper (in its editorials) makes a strong effort to be fair in its news coverage. you also don't understand copyright law, which would explain why you see some articles only in certain papers, or news cycles, which explains why trent lott's comment might not be in on e edition and show up in the next, with no need to bring censorship into it |
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Use Of CS Gas In Gulf Is Illegal, Says Red Cross |
by Severin Carrell
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
09 Mar 2003
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The International Committee of the Red Cross has led protests by medical and human rights groups at plans by the US to deploy tear gas and pepper spray to the Gulf.
Senior officials in the ICRC, which champions legal rights for soldiers and civilians in wartime, warn that using these "riot control agents" would violate the 1993 Chemical Weapons Convention.
Peter Herby, an arms and mines control specialist with the ICRC, said: "We can say quite categorically that the use of chemical agents, whether riot control agents or lethal agents, in warfare would be entirely prohibited."
Their protests, which follow The Independent on Sunday's disclosure last week that US troops could use CS gas and pepper spray in the Gulf, were supported by the British Medical Association and the Geneva-based International Commission of Jurists.
They claimed that using even CS gas would undermine the prohibition on using chemical and biological weapons in war, and would be exploited by rogue states to justify their use of more dangerous weapons.
In the Commons, four senior Labour MPs have tabled questions asking the Foreign Secretary, Jack Straw, and the Defense Secretary, Geoff Hoon, whether the Government had objected to the US plans. British officials also believe the use of CS gas in war would be illegal.
But, in a letter to the IoS, a senior Pentagon official insisted the use of tear gas for "defensive purposes to save lives" and to "protect non-combatants" would be "consistent" with the convention.
Victoria Clarke, the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Public Affairs, denied allegations from a senior US military expert and Gulf War veteran that US special forces could use "knock out" gases.
The US Defense Secretary, Donald Rumsfeld, said using tear gas against human shields or to pacify prisoners would be justified – claims disputed by international legal experts.
© 2003 Independent Digital (UK) Ltd
http://www.independent.co.uk/ |
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Re: U.S Spying On UN Delegates & U.S. Chemical Weapons In Iraq -- Stories The U.S. Media Is Censoring. |
by U.. S. Citizen and human being
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 5
09 Mar 2003
Modified: 08:36:26 PM |
This anon character(s) and Jack both suffer from the malignancy of an attitude best observed in a threatened status quo. Much like those who challenge the current practice of equal opportunity admissions standards or that "minorities"--esp. those of African descent--possess "equality" under the law and should be satisfied with such, anon and Jack propagate the logic that "everything's fair in love and war": regardless of what heinous act one perpetrates, once discovered, the playing field for both parties must immediately revert to "objective" standards of fairness, thereby ignoring the precepts of Newtonian Physics and the observable laws of nature.
This modern, opportunistic variety of justice enables Enron to continue exploiting non-domestic sources of profit while Americans dependent on their Lay-looted pensions will never see a dime from Bolivian oil and natgas profits, just like the Bolivian people. The laws of science require a balancing or opposing force to counter or halt overreach and excessive force. Not only do anon and Jack overlook this foundational premise in their arguments for an "objective" press, the reactionary right in general tends to suppress or ignore the Newtonian Corollary while the agents of global plunder continue to operate under cover supplied by these very apologists. Someone is laughing at the amount of time and energy spent debating the faulty rhetoric of X-type political personalities who thrive on conflict and devote their angst and emptiness to ennervating argumentation (and sound like Hannety and Limbaugh clones--note their use of humour: it should have a patent, or at least a label to cite a la Schopenhauer).
The world is certainly a much more dangerous place than it appeared to be not so long ago, but what complexity of independent variables caused this to be so? Simple answers are for schoolchildren, and unfortunately the great majority of citizens are treated as such, out of necessity for "National Security," most often. We are alone responsible for increasing our political sophistication. Even Veerhoven's rendering of a society responding with fascism and xenephobia to outside provocation and attack offered the "civilians" an opportunity by asking "Do you want to know more?" when broadcasting an eerily CNN-like account of the ongoing Bug War. "Starship Troopers" deserves a second look in these times, if only to compare and contrast the slippery slope of the militarized republican anti-communisn in Heinlein's novel to the movie's degenerate, voluptuary Fascism conveyed so blatantly as to almost appear tongue-in-cheek.
During the Roman revival sparked by the emperor Diocletian's (CE 284-305) centralization of state powers and dynamic militarization resulted in an autocratic regime that sapped citizens economically and spiritually. This period produced some of the earliest recorded debate and argumentation concerning the paradox of procuring safety through sacrafice of freedom. By preserving a way of life by adopting means that negate this way of life, one loses the justification for the sacrafice and risks adopting the ways of the enemy, both short and long term. As a society, Americans today face the identical challenge. Much like Roman citizens of Diocletian's day, we are not allowed to vote on official policy spelled out in the Homeland Security Act, Patriot I, and whatever version of Patriot II that will be rammed through congress; a vote of the centuries in CE 300 is just as preposterous. The hypertrophy of Empire is upon us, and the media can only reluctanly (but ever more prevelantly) invoke its true name.
"'By the foresight of Diocletian the fronteirs were everywhere studded with cities and forts and towers, and the whole army stationed along them.'"--qtd. in Stephen Williams, Diocletian and the Roman Recovery
The future is laid out in reports issued by the Project for a New American Century (visit their website-they have recently pulled the 1997 report with Vice-President Cheney's name on it) and the Hawks in Washington (also well-represented in this report) have no intention of letting populist opinion interfere. If the dupes of right-wing reactionary demagouges envision a rosy future for those playing foot-soldier for an autocratic or totalitarian regime, examples of payment-in-kind for loyalty to these regimes abound even in this century. I feel pity for those who sell themselves out so early in the game for so little.
"Meanwhile the poor are being robbed, widows groan, orphans are trodden down, so that many, even persons of good birth, who have enjoyed a liberal education, seek refuge with the enemy to escape death under the trials of persecution. They seek among the barbarians the Roman mercy, since they cannot endure the barbarous mercilessness they find among the Romans...So you find men passing over everywhere, now to the Goths...or whatever other barbarians have established their power anywhere...for they would rather live as free men, though in seeming captivity, than as captives in seeming liberty. Hence the name of Roman citizen, once not only much valued but dearly bought, is now voluntarily repudiated and shunned, and is thought not merely valueless, but even almost abhorrent."--Salvian, On the Government of God, trans. Eva M. Sanford
What choices can Americans make in the face of a world aroused to enmity and dangerous powers provoked into the ready stance of total war? Our elected officials have played the role of madmen, employing Nixonian brinksmanship and high-stake bluffs, with our lives as kitty in the pot. Surely we are not foreign policy experts, but anyone who has been lied to once can better detect a liar the next time around. Obviously, Plato's "little lies" have found new currency today, for the truth must be too horrible to comprehend. Solzhenitsyn, if alive today, could be threatened with the second deportation of his lifetime, as "inferred from his conduct" (Patriot II - section 501). Any news-gathering can be construed as being "clandestine intelligence activities under the guidance of or for a foreign power (Patriot II - section 102). The rapid-fire chatter of aggressively propagandizing "entertainment" radio shows and the vaccuum-sealed environment of warblogs provide the means for mobilizing the X-type political personalities against "dissenters," "anti-americans," or "traitors," whipping them into frenzied states of an emotional ecstasy known only to religious fanatics, madmen, and those who believe that they possess a monopoly to the truth. "Islamo-fascism" certainly poses a threat to all that is good in Western civilization and must be controlled (viz. Iranians in Croatia and Commander Oric of the KLA), but how far will we allow those who serve to protect us go in their attempt? And more importantly, for anyone who even pretends to a capacity for critical thought, who stands to benefit most from the current strategic policies, and what vested interests are concealed within the Project for the New American Century's call for "Rebuilding America's Defenses" (1997)?
fas'cism, n. 2. Any program for setting up a centralized autocratic national regime with severely nationalistic policies, exercising regimentation of industry, commerce, and finance, rigid censorship, and forcible suppression of opposition.
Are the responsibilities and virtues of citizenship within this Republic threatening to those who would dissolve it?
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UN Launches Inquiry Into American Spying |
by Martin Bright, Ed Vulliamy in New York and Peter Beaumont
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
10 Mar 2003
|
Sunday March 9, 2003
The Observer
The United Nations has begun a top-level investigation into the bugging of its delegations by the United States, first revealed in The Observer last week.
Sources in the office of UN Secretary General Kofi Annan confirmed last night that the spying operation had already been discussed at the UN's counter-terrorism committee and will be further investigated.
The news comes as British police confirmed the arrest of a 28-year-old woman working at the top secret Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) on suspicion of contravening the Official Secrets Act.
Last week The Observer published details of a memo sent by Frank Koza, Defence Chief of Staff (Regional Targets) at the US National Security Agency, which monitors international communications. The memo ordered an intelligence 'surge' directed against Angola, Cameroon, Chile, Bulgaria and Guinea with 'extra focus on Pakistan UN matters'. The 'dirty tricks' operation was designed to win votes in favour of intervention in Iraq.
The Observer reported that the memo was sent to a friendly foreign intelligence agency asking for help in the operation. It has been known for some time that elements within the British security services were unhappy with the Government's use of intelligence information.
The leak was described as 'more timely and potentially more important than the Pentagon Papers' by Daniel Ellsberg, the most celebrated whistleblower in recent American history.
In 1971, Ellsberg was responsible for leaking a secret history of US involvement in Vietnam, which became known as 'the Pentagon Papers', while working as a Defence Department analyst. The papers fed the American public's hostility to the war.
The revelations of the spying operation have caused deep embarrassment to the Bush administration at a key point in the sensitive diplomatic negotiations to gain support for a second UN resolution authorising intervention in Iraq.
White House spokesman Ari Fleischer and Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld were both challenged about the operation last week, but said they could not comment on security matters.
The operation is thought to have been authorised by US National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, but American intelligence experts told The Observer that a decision of this kind would also have involved Donald Rumsfeld, CIA director George Tenet and NSA chief General Michael Hayden.
President Bush himself would have been informed at one of the daily intelligence briefings held every morning at the White House.
Attention has now turned to the foreign intelligence agency responsible for the leak. It is now believed the memo was sent out via Echelon, an international surveillance network set up by the NSA with the cooperation of GCHQ in Britain and similar organisations in Australia, New Zealand and Canada.
Wayne Madsen, of the Electronic Privacy Information Centre and himself a former NSA intelligence officer, said the leak demonstrated that there was deep unhappiness in the intelligence world over attempts to link Iraq to the terrorist network al-Qaeda.
'My feeling is that this was an authorised leak. I've been hearing for months of people in the US and British intelligence community who are deeply concerned about their governments "cooking" intelligence to link Iraq to al-Qaeda.'
The Observer story caused a political furore in Chile, where President Ricardo Lagos demanded an immediate explanation of the spying operation. The Chilean public is extremely sensitive to reports of US 'dirty tricks' after decades of American secret service involvement in the country's internal affairs. In 1973 the CIA supported a coup that toppled the democratically-elected socialist government of Salvador Allende and installed the dictator General Augusto Pinochet.
President Lagos spoke on the telephone with Prime Minister Tony Blair about the memo last Sunday, immediately after the publication of the story, and twice again on Wednesday. Chile's Foreign Minister Soledad Alvear also raised the matter with Foreign Secretary Jack Straw.
Chile's ambassador to Britain Mariano Fernández told The Observer: 'We cannot understand why the United States was spying on Chile. We were very surprised. Relations have been good with America since the time of George Bush Snr.' He said that the position of the Chilean mission to the UN was published in regular diplomatic bulletins, which were public documents openly available.
While the bugging of foreign diplomats at the UN is permissible under the US Foreign Intelligence Services Act, it is a breach of the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations, according to one of America's leading experts on international law, Professor John Quigley of Ohio University.
He says the convention stipulates that: 'The receiving state shall permit and protect free communication on the part of the mission for all official purposes... The official correspondence of the mission shall be inviolable.'
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2003
http://www.observer.co.uk/international/story/0,6903,910567,00.html
http://www.observer.co.uk/
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Americans Ill-served By Own Media |
by Antonia Zerbisias
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
10 Mar 2003
|
Here are a few under-reported yet telling statistics from a Princeton Survey Research Associates poll conducted two months ago:
At the time, 65 per cent of Americans were convinced that Al Qaeda and Iraq were "allied" even though the U.S. administration had yet to present its "evidence'' — which turned out to be cribbed, typos and all, from a student paper.
Despite the fact that 15 of the 19 Sept. 11 hijackers were Saudi, with the rest Egyptian, Lebanese and from the United Arab Emirates, 49 per cent of those surveyed were convinced that at least one of them, if not most of them, was a card-carrying Iraqi citizen. Only 17 per cent knew that not one was a boy from Baghdad.
Now, as much as we Canadians like to rag on our nearest and dearest neighbours, telling ourselves that they're so stupid, we have to cut them some slack.
That's because they are so ill-served by their news media. Not all of it, mind you, but certainly most of it, and definitely by the most pervasive of it, whether local or national.
They package and market this "Showdown" thing like info-burger: Pre-ground, overcooked, and then served with a side of processed cheese, just like the Monica Lewinsky scandal.
No wonder more than two dozen authors, historians, scholars and journalists this week signed a group letter to media organizations charging them with overplaying military tactics while ignoring significant and relevant issues.
Can we say oil, kids?
Or ask about how some of the weapons of mass destruction got to Iraq in the first place? (Read the memo at http://www.tompaine.com.)
The media's failure to serve the public interest helps explain why, as the Internet audience measurement company Nielsen NetRatings revealed last month, Americans are turning more and more to news sites outside the country for a more accurate and balanced picture of the world.
How else would they have learned, for example, that, as reported by the London Observer on Sunday, the U.S. government had pulled out its bag of "dirty tricks'' to spy on recalcitrant members of the United Nations Security Council?
While the U.S. media ignored the story, the Star had it immediately. CBC Newsworld had one of its co-authors on the line by Monday. But, as he told Salon.com, NBC, CNN and Fox had all booked him — and then backed out. That despite how, even when directly questioned about the surveillance, neither the White House nor the U.S. State Department denied the charges.
The U.S. mainstream media — in the past few days alone — have also largely ignored reports by the brave and brilliant British correspondent Robert Fisk exposing how CNN ("By Appointment To The Pentagon'') war reports will undergo a new and especially rigorous screening process and how doubts have been cast on the arrest of Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, who has been mysteriously promoted from a minor scowling face on the FBI's terrorist list to, as MSNBC put it the other day, "Al Qaeda's CEO."
In fact, as the media are playing guessing games over whether this guy is being tortured and what might be found in his laptop, almost nobody seems to be questioning how it was only last September, when the U.S. netted Ramzi bin al-Shibh, that President George W. Bush was crowing how they had nabbed "one of the chief planners and organizers'' of 9/11.
Now Mohammed is top gun?
Only one journalist that I could find noticed this little we-caught-the-big-one game going on.
Wrote Debra Pickett, a columnist at the Chicago Sun-Times: "The cynical view on this is that Mohammed is still the relatively small fish we were first told he was, but the news of his arrest is being hyped because the Bush administration needs a victory in the war on terrorism before going to war in Iraq.
"The merely skeptical view is that we are clueless about how Al Qaeda really works.''
But, as they all drag out their ex-FBI experts, most of whom haven't been seen since the SniperVision bonanza, few major media seem to be even skeptical, let alone cynical.
All of which leads me to a very devastating conclusion: I have to agree with U.S. Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.
Last week, under heavy questioning, for once, by a snappish press corps, he hit back, accusing its members of churning up trouble and turning out lies: "Everyone's so eager to get the story before, in fact, the story's there that the world is constantly being fed things that haven't happened."
No? Really?
Can't imagine how that could happen.
Copyright 1996-2003. Toronto Star Newspapers Limited.
http://www.thestar.com |
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Re: U.S Spying On UN Delegates & U.S. Chemical Weapons In Iraq -- Stories The U.S. Media Is Censoring. |
by John Rambo
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: -1
11 Mar 2003
Modified: 01:30:44 PM |
US Spying? Is this news? Frankly, I hope my government is spying on those weasels; I would be scared if they didn't do everything they can to try to asertain other countries plans for the UN. I am sure that Russia, France, China and Germany are doing everything they can to spy on the US; Do you doubt that they also are trying to fiqure out what the US is going to do and say before it is public. Kids it is time to join the real world here. All the players at the UN are spying, prying and lying to each other. All trying to get a leg up on the other before they speak. As for proof I don't really see anthing that amounts to proof of US spying, but I feel safe to say they did. Just like everyone else spies on the United States at the UN. All is fare in love and war.
John Rambo
"I am your worst nightmare" |
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FYI |
by Jack Ryan
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: -1
12 Mar 2003
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Our spies were orginally sent in to steal France's Military Secrets. After years of exhaustive pursuit, our CIA has only managed to locate some recipes, about 100,000 white flags and some cheese.
Jack |
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British Intelligence Employee Questioned On NSA Memo Leak |
by Scott Shane
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
12 Mar 2003
|
Message revealed rise in spying on members of U.N. Security Council
A British intelligence employee is under criminal investigation in connection with the leak of a National Security Agency memorandum calling for stepped-up eavesdropping on countries whose United Nations Security Council votes on Iraq could be crucial, police reported.
The investigation of a 28-year-old female employee of Government Communications Headquarters, known as GCHQ, appears to confirm the authenticity of the NSA memo printed last week in The Observer, a British newspaper.
An NSA spokesman declined to comment yesterday.
Inspector Richard Smith of the Gloucestershire Constabulary said the GCHQ employee, who lives near the agency's complex in Cheltenham, England, was arrested Wednesday and held overnight at a police station before being released on bail Thursday.
Smith said the employee, whom authorities declined to name, has not been charged but is being investigated "on suspicion of contravening the Official Secrets Act," the British statute protecting sensitive intelligence.
The Jan. 31 memo, marked "top secret" and sent by Frank Koza, described as chief of staff for "regional targets," said NSA had begun a "surge" of extra eavesdropping on communications by officials from Angola, Cameroon, Chile, Bulgaria, Guinea and Pakistan, all among the 15 members of the Security Council.
All the countries are being furiously lobbied by the United States to back the use of force against Iraq and by France to block or delay any war.
While the recipients of the electronic message were not revealed, it appeared to be directed to eavesdroppers at GCHQ or other closely cooperating foreign signals inteligence agencies. "We'd appreciate your support in getting the word to your analysts," it said.
When The Observer printed the memo March 2, several intelligence experts speculated that the memo might have been leaked to the British paper by a GCHQ officer unhappy with the U.S. push for war against Iraq.
The public reactions from the targeted countries ranged from mild complaint to a sort of jaundiced shrug, since most U.N. foreign officials are well aware that NSA engages in aggressive eavesdropping.
Pakistan's U.N. ambassador told reporters eavesdropping "is considered one of the privileges of the host country."
Still, the embarrassing leak of U.S. spying at such a sensitive time might add to the feeling overseas that the United States is bullying other countries to support a war, said James Bamford, author of two books on NSA.
"It's one more negative for the U.S.," he said. "It may push one or two delegations over the edge" into opposition to any U.S.-backed resolution on Iraq.
Daniel Ellsberg, the former National Security Council member indicted in 1971 for leaking the Pentagon Papers, said the NSA leak is important because it could influence a U.N. vote on an Iraq war, which he strongly opposes.
"This 'coalition of the willing' is actually a coalition of the bugged," he said.
Leaks related to NSA's highly classified eavesdropping are rare and considered damaging to U.S. intelligence because they can prompt the targets to begin encrypting communications or taking other steps to protect their secrets.
Sun staff writer Ariel Sabar contributed to this article.
Originally published March 11, 2003
Copyright © 2003, The Baltimore Sun
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