Wednesday, November 01, 2006

More PR for serial killers: Pentagon gears up for new media war - WATCH IT, BECAUSE WE'RE WATCHING YOU...

It's another Pentagon assault on facts and reality, the state of denial getting worse. It's also a threat by those serial killers from Washington: watch it, because we're watching you...

LET'S HOPE WE CAN WATCH THEM SOON IN COURT, ACCUSED OF THEIR WAR CRIMES.

Pls. keep in mind that the BBC is one of the worst war propaganda channels ever. They this far broadcasted on average two percent (2%) dissent concerning the illegal wars, which they daily advocate and justify. Their two percent is criminally less than even FOX, CNN or similar propaganda sewers spout. - HR

Maybe it's better to read MediaLens and others before - Url.: http://tinyurl.com/yngdbg

Personally I really dislike the BBC, which has become one of the worst warmongers on earth. And I sincerely hope to see the responsible propagandists - of any and double nationality, who all are guilty of crimes against humanity - in court soon. - Url.: http://tinyurl.com/y9oahj

So when reading this war propaganda, we all know this is just the BBC, equal to Broadcasting Blair's Crap!

''Broadcasting Bush's Crap'' is OK too...


PENTAGON GEARS UP FOR NEW MEDIA WAR

By Paul Reynolds

World affairs correspondent, BBC News website

2006/10/31 - The Pentagon's new effort to influence media coverage of the war in Iraq is an example of how governments react when a war is not going too well.

They begin to think it is not the war that is the problem, but the presentation of it.

THE MEDIA, BEING THE MESSENGERS, GET THE BLAME, NOT THE MESSAGE ITSELF.

The plan, detailed in a memo seen by the Associated Press news agency, is for a rapid response unit that would "correct the record" in the 24/7 news cycle that exists today - including, crucially, on the internet. One aim, AP says, seems to be to deflect criticism of Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld himself.

It is on the internet that blogs and other sites rapidly spread information, sometimes as fact and sometimes as rumour, and build up pressure points of opinion. These are then reflected in the mainstream media.

There would also be a list of favourite speakers or "surrogates" who would be offered to broadcast media, especially to the US talk shows, where fast appearances and faster opinions matter.

Whether this will make much difference is open to question.

INSURGENT VIDEOS

The insurgents in Iraq are brilliant at using the media, especially the internet, and it will not be easy for the Pentagon to counter the impact these videos can have.

[THAN HOW COME 99% OF ALL VIDEOS BY SO CALLED ''INSURGENTS' ETC. ARE ALL SHOT WITHOUT AUTO-FOCUS ETC.? 99% IS BLURRED AND FUZZY STUPID FAKES BY THE CIA AND OTHER CRIMINALS, TRYING TO SELL THEIR CRAP AND FEAR.]

An example of the way can be seen on a site run by Memri, the Middle East Media Research Institute. This is a pro-Israeli research group that specialises in showing extracts from Arab TV stations.

In this case, it has downloaded from a jihadist website an eight-minute video of a US ammunition dump on fire in Baghdad on 10 October. It is a spectacular display, well-packaged and accompanied by a commentary praising the fighters who carried out the attack.

Mr Rumsfeld signalled the Pentagon move in a speech to the Foreign Relations Council in New York in February. He said: "Our enemies have skilfully adapted to fighting wars in today's media age, but for the most part we, our country, our government, has not adapted.

"Today we're engaged in the first war in history - unconventional and irregular as it may be - in an era of e-mails, blogs, cell phones, Blackberries, instant messaging, digital cameras, a global internet with no inhibitions, cell phones, hand-held video cameras, talk radio, 24-hour news broadcasts, satellite television. There's never been a war fought in this environment before."

He returned to the theme of the media deficit in August: "That's the thing that keeps me up at night", he told an audience of naval personnel.

CRONKITE MOMENT

The Pentagon, however, has tried before to influence the media, especially the Iraqi media, and fell on its face.

In 2005, the New York Times revealed that the Department of Defense was paying a public relations company to write and place articles in Iraqi newspapers. One of these had the lyrical line that "the sands are blowing toward a democratic Iraq," dismissing sceptical Western views that democracy was not working in Iraq.

This latest effort is supposed to be more open, but also more fleet of foot, and the memo compared it to the kind of political operation run by Bill Clinton in the 1992 presidential election campaign, in which immediate responses were made to criticism from opponents.

A cautionary tale comes from the Vietnam War. There, the war was lost when viewers in the living room realised what was happening on the battlefield. No amount of spin could change it.

The turning point in the media war came when the veteran CBS News presenter, Walter Cronkite, went to Vietnam after the Tet offensive in 1968. He came back and declared that there was "stalemate".

This is how he ended his TV broadcast:

"To say that we are closer to victory today is to believe, in the face of the evidence, the optimists who have been wrong in the past. To suggest we are on the edge of defeat is to yield to unreasonable pessimism. To say that we are mired in stalemate seems the only realistic, yet unsatisfactory, conclusion.

"On the off-chance that military and political analysts are right, in the next few months we must test the enemy's intentions, in case this is indeed his last big gasp before negotiations.

"But it is increasingly clear to this reporter that the only rational way out then will be to negotiate, not as victors but as an honourable people who lived up to their pledge to defend democracy, and did the best they could.

"THIS IS WALTER CRONKITE. GOOD NIGHT."

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RELATED REFERENCES & LINKS:

Story at BBC - Url.: http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/americas/6103056.stm

The Pentagon and the US/Israeli war machine have been killing journalists for ages - Url.: http://tinyurl.com/yyvsns

* FOX: Video 49 min. - The example how viewers are brainwashed and 'outfoxed' - Url.: http://tinyurl.com/b2zzl

* What Bush c.s. their collaborators and media propagandists are afraid of - Url.: http://tinyurl.com/95nk2

* Google search "Biggest threat to world peace" - Url.: http://tinyurl.com/dk2lj

* MSNBC - Live Vote: Do you believe President Bush's actions justify impeachment? - Url.: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/10562904/

* "People do not forget. They do not forget the death of their fellows, they do not forget torture and mutilation, they do not forget injustice, they do not forget oppression, they do not forget the terrorism of mighty powers. They not only don't forget: they also strike back." - 2005 Nobel Literature Prize winner Harold Pinter - Url.: http://tinyurl.com/9cyeq

* The Nuremberg principles: "Any person who commits an act which constitutes a crime under international law is responsible therefor and liable to punishment." - Url.: http://tinyurl.com/byurp

* 'Crying Wolf' - Media Disinformation and Death Squads in Occupied Iraq - Url.: http://tinyurl.com/7ttx8

* Al Qaeda – The Database - Url.: http://tinyurl.com/cqx69

*Read the Fightin' Cock Flyer - Url.: http://fightincockflyer.blogspot.com/

* 'Freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one' — A.J. Liebling - The merciless engine of propaganda has been turned on: The infamous US 'Lie Factory' - Url.: http://tinyurl.com/8ncal

* He who travels far will often see things

Far removed from what he believed was the Truth.

When he talks about it in the fields at home,

He is often accused of lying,

For the obdurate people will not believe

Inexperience, I believe,

Will give little credence to my song.

'Journey to the East' - Hermann Hesse

* Help all the troops - of whatever nationality - to come back from abroad! - AND WITH ALL THEIR WEAPONS, WHICH WE ARE FORCED TO PAY FOR BY TAXES - [http://www.apfn.org/apfn/reserve.htm] - We need them badly at home in many countries to fight with us against our so called 'governments' and their malignant managers - Url.: http://www.bringthemhomenow.org/

* The Dutch author this far has lived and worked abroad - never in an English speaking country - for more than 4 decades for international media as an independent foreign correspondent, of which 10 years - also during Gulf War I - in the Arab World and the Middle East. Seeing worldwide that every bullet and every bomb breeds more terrorism!



FOREIGN PRESS FOUNDATION
Editor: Henk Ruyssenaars
http://tinyurl.com/amn3q
The Netherlands
FPF@Chello.nl

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