After watching the Moyers piece, I'm physically ILL

Yes, I had always said that we were being fed *spin*, and always looked for alternative news via the BBC or other European sources. That was my way of doing things.

But I've never really sat down and thought how DEEP the lies went, how DEEP the manipulation of a country can go. I didn't think how many of these talking heads on our TV sets, and in our papers were READY and WILLING to buy into the LIE in order to maintain their lifestyle.

This is a punch to the gut of a freedom we NEED -- a press that will report the TRUTH. A press that WE have trusted in the past. But we should trust NO MORE.

Those of us with children should be scared shitless with this revelation. We grew up in a time when we were supposed to respect and trust these individuals. And we've been screwed. And our children will be screwed.

It's time to STOP giving them respect. It's time to STOP listening. It's a time to start screaming, in the form of emails and phone calls -- point out that THEY lied. Demand resignations of the Russerts, Novaks and Blitzers. It's time to find out who places ads on these shows, and DEMAND that they pull their support.

If they WON'T report the truth -- SILENCE them. Shut them DOWN. Show THEM that they need to fear US more than they need to fear their *access to the White House*.

The name Traitor has been bandied about over the course of 6 years. I think we can finally find the group that deserves that label the most.

The Main Stream Media.

rant off.

if these bastards aren't led away in chains...

This is the worst administration in history, and the press is no better for their stupidity (except for Bill Moyers of course)

last night...nothing can be more obvious on how this administration strong-armed the media to push their propaganda...Judy Miller, Friedman, hell..the NYTimes, WaPo and especially Fox News should be held accountable for irresponsible journalism...I just loved that reporter from Knightridder Mr. Landay...we need more reporters like Knightridder's...One person who really disappointed and sadden me was Dan Rather...I just wonder now how all media-people sleep at night lately...or could even live with themselves...

.... put me over the edge. He was able to figure out that Iraq had WMDs
form google and phone calls.

IRAQ = A mistake based on lies.

myself. I didn't have the phone contacts but I googled history, psychology, reliable foreign newspaper articles, and UN reports. It was very obvious and easy to find. Red flags were everywhere.

because at that time they would still invite Scott Ritter once in a while. I saw Ritter maybe twice, and Hans Blix a few times more, and I concluded there were no WMDs in Iraq. All the material on the net I read after that filled in plenty blanks, of course, but the correct determination could be made even if you only watched CNN and BBC. That is not to say they weren't cheerleading the war, but for nine Ahmed Chalabis and Richard Perles there was one Scott Ritter, and you could tell who was telling the truth.

Sorry to yell, but TV is the non-stop propaganda machine. Turn it off. Opt out of the propaganda.

But we can yell all we want here -- how do we get to the other 300 million?

I walked away from TV news at about that time, too.

I just couldn't stand the cognitive dissonce that came from the clash of TV news and my Harper's subscription (and the books I was reading like The Great American U-turn).

It's one of the main reasons there has never been Cable TV in this house.

and would watch the last 15 minutes of CBS News when Rather was on because that's when some of the truth would sneak through, usually between the lines.

I stopped watching all of it, gasbag shows, the evening propaganda hour, even the local news on 11/3/04. The only surprise was how little I missed it.

After all, if some wildly unimportant old bat in a middling sized city in flyover country knew that there were no WMDs in Iraq, why the hell didn't Congress and the mass media?

The only way to punish these lying bastards is to stop buying any of their shit. Turn the TV off, stop delivering an audience to advertisers. Drop those newspaper subscriptions. If you need the ads, buy a Sunday paper and that's it. Listen to music on that radio instead of insane ranters.

We have laws against slander and libel but they are so difficult to enforce they might as well not be on the books. There are no laws covering lying by omission, which is what most of the propagandists do.

Our only recourse is to turn our backs on them.

But the problem is that poison will still go out to others. DUers watching that bilge aren't the problem.

I'm beyond it shocking me and actually got a bit bored with the show.

With 70% of the nation now wanting us out of the war, I doubt it will make much difference to the decision makers. The 30% of folks who need the education probably didn't watch it. I'm sure the Decider didn't.

We talked Ritter here. We talked about Donuhue's firing here. Needless to say, I wasn't too terribly shocked with the program. However, it's very good to see that someone with the guts (ie Moyers) put this out there for all to see.

sufficiently to drive the bastards out.

the news reports from KR & other outlets, also folks like Scott Ritter were out there speaking the truth the whole time. None of what Moyers reported is any surprise, we knew it while it was happening.

1) The propaganda was well planned by the administration,(propaganda the admistration can handle...it's the war they couldn't plan ahead for) and
2) The complicity of the MSM to get the message across, and finally,
3) The laziness of the press

Wish the Knight Ridder reporters could receive the Congressional Medal of Honor. They were the only ones outside of internet people who seemed interested in getting the facts assembled.

You beat me to it.

That is exactly the theme of what I was going to post about the Moyer's program.

I, too, became queasy as I watched.

Of course, I know all that stuff, but to see it laid out in a narrative by the great Bill Moyers makes it all the more powerful.

Yes, the corporate news media did very bad ... but still, in the end, it is just criminal that a President and Vice President of the United States of America could so brazenly lie to us -- lies that have now killed hundreds or thousands of people.

If we do not impeach and convict these two, that will be a great injustice and will set a terrible precedent for the future.

Bush and Cheney MUST be held accountable ... I simply do not understand why anyone, especially those in Congress, cannot see that.

when we tried to tell other Americans..

many of us were treated by friends and family as if we had a contagious disease..because we tried warning people..

but that was part of the media shut down of truth and little lord pissy pants taking us into fascism..

we the people stopped talking..people were made to be afraid to talk...

i put huge signs on my house and i was threatened and the town tried to make me take the signs down..( i had to take big giant ones down..to comply with laws..but i made every business have to take their signs down too..the i had professional signs made to conform with laws..)

but it was systematic..the shutting down of conversation of what was going on in our country..

several people stopped at my resort home last summer and said they missed my signs ..and that i was a legend on the island i live..and i said why? and the people said i was all the talk on the beach..

and i said that was my whole point..to make people talk..to make people think...to make people question..and discuss among their families and friends...


the worst thing americans can ever do is stop communicating and to be intimidated into silence.

fly

We need more like you!

Was to the administrations advantage.
No one knew what a Curd was. Or what motive a Curd would have.
The common Joe public and probably many reporters, lacked the knowledge so the administration used this and took advantage.
Looking back, It seems like it was so easy for them to do.
Sticking the truth on page 59 was also helpful.

the thick protein rich part of coagulated milk.

I think what you meant was a Kurd, which is an ethnic group within Iraq.

Oil. A marriage of controlling the world's most precious natural resource and promoting "democracy" to curb Arab terrorism and lay the foundation for Middle East peace where Big Oil's access to product cannot be denied. Everything else, including Israeli security, enormous oil profits and gargantuan war profits, flows from this fact.

Moyers' program was excellent, but is it really a surprise that reporters and their corporate conglomerate masters raised nary a whimper to question the War?

and that he had given in to the pressure to shut up even though he knew the administration was lying. And the bastards got him anyway. What little respect I had for him disappeared after watching this show.

should be held in contempt. No apologies, hang your heads in shame.

Knight-Ridder, Landay & Strobel, Byrd & Kennedy - all heroes. The rest, do some penance.

murdock does the bidding of pissy pants and does the bidding for fascism in this country ..and the mtf 'er is not an american ..he is austrailian

why do we turn on any fox stations ..for anything?? when we do we support fascism!

i have every fox network station child blocked in my home..and have for almost 6 years..

no fox is allowed on any tv in my home! period

turn these sob's off..all of them..just turn them the hell off!!...when they lose ratings..they lose money..they won't get my money!

or my mind!

fly

But I don't blame the average citizen who was watching tv. They make me sick, but I don't blame them.

The fault lies with those who should have known better, but chose not to, those who should have looked at the lack of evidence, but didn't, those who were in a position to make a difference, but didn't and who ultimately failed us.

why on earth they are broadcasting such lunacy? They look and me with surprise, then turn it off. It's a small effort, but I feel good!

I would love to watch it.

:thumbsup:

....most are still there.

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when I realise that all of this is news to so many.DU has been a saving grace for me.

Corporate control of mass media and trust busting

If I remember correctly, only Rather came right out and said the control of media by huge conglomerates played a key role in suppressing real reporting and questioning the official lies. Isaacson kind of danced around the issue, but didn't really admit anything and immediately got off the subject. The rest didn't mention it at all.

Diversity is an absolute, non-optional value in all complex systems -- societal, biological and, in this case, opinion and ideological. Much as I detest wingnut radio and the various cable propaganda networks, they have a place in this country because, unfortunately, we're infested with functional illiterates and religious lunatics. And these people, who lack or suppress basic critical thinking skills, represent an appallingly large market and their needs, however ugly, should be served.

But decades of mergers, acquisitions and buyouts have all but eliminated the former diversity of mass media -- particularly radio and TV -- and instead placed democracy's most valuable check and balance in the money grubbing hands of a very few giant holding companies, who value the status quo above all and will simply refuse to allow information that could potentially alter the status quo to be put in front of the public. So the programming geared to functional illiterates is now presented as mainstream political and social consensus, as if the entire country had the collective IQ of a salad fork.

We're well past the point where TV "news" became irrelevant; news networks now actively subvert the democratic process by aligning themselves with the rest of the power elites and drowning their viewers in a bottomless ocean of distortions, omissions and outright lies. As such, they're not just laughable; they're dangerous to the continued functioning of representational government.

Unfortunately, I know exactly nothing about anti-trust law. I know the Sherman Act was an attempt to rein in vertical market monopolies back in the late 19th century. I have no idea if it was effective, whether newer anti-trust legislation has since replaced it, or even whether the Sherman Act is still on the books.

I do know that if this kind of "journalism" is allowed to continue and unorthodox facts are simply buried, we're looking at a nail the size of a railroad spike in the coffin of the great democratic experiment.

That reputable news gatherers and reporters would align themselves with official government propagandists and spend months and years peddling this trash as though it were the truth presents a problem so insidious that I wonder how anyone reads or hears anything whatsoever that counters the official state narrative.

Other than from the internet, I don't know where those 70 percent who oppose the Iraq occupation got the information that caused them to change positions. Same with Bushie's latest 28 percent approval rating. If their sole or primary source of information is TV news, and more than 90 percent of the American people consistently say it is, then how did they find the information that has gradually but steadily lowered his approval rating from more than 90 percent just after 9/11 to today's sorry number?

Maybe they're going with their wallets, as usual, and they see unbelievable deficits and zillions spent on war as a threat to their own financial well being. Maybe they’re not at all anti-war; they're only against this war because it's become too big a disaster for their patriotic little souls to handle.

I don't have a clue, but I'm glad that somehow a few facts managed to sneak in to cast some doubt on the cover story.

Anyway, what can be done? Are there any legal or legislative strategies that would break up the mass media trust and bring local control back? Would legislation targeting media conglomerates be unconstitutional because of some restraint of trade precedent?

Something needs to happen, and quickly, to diversify the spectrum of political opinion presented in this country. Wingnut groups have been buying up papers and radio and TV stations for quite a while now, and that strategy has paid off brilliantly. The spectrum of public discourse has been confined to a small box about half way between moderate right and fascism on the ideological continuum.

This can’t continue. A full spectrum of political ideology must be represented on THE PUBLIC'S airwaves, and that spectrum needs to be highly visible – not as it is now with liberal/left/progressive viewpoints only heard on some 40-watt college FM station or on local access cable at 3:30 in the morning.

I also think this needs to become part of the democratic presidential candidates' narrative. Being reasonably smart people, I'm sure they're all too aware of how the right wing echo chamber works to eliminate their airtime or ridicule what few sound bites that are actually played.

Some or all the candidates need to articulate the problem Democrats face in the current mass media freeze out, and propose a media diversification plan that people can understand and buy into.

I hope we start hearing something like that from some or all of the hopefuls. Or have any of them already discussed this?

Any suggestions? What do you think? Is media diversification an idea that could help differentiate a candidate and gain popular support?

Of course, the problem is that if a candidate announced a plan to break up mass media, would it be reported? So it all comes full circle.


wp

failure to speak the truth. Bush got a second term. The larger American public needed to get their butts kicked for their ignorance in the voting booth. Some of us did our reading and went with more than 'I trust him' in casting an informed vote. but like my MIL, many didn't READ and LEARN.

Hope this has been a sad lesson for some and we can get our country back now.

And take the Mic's from them.Media will not change until they realize they are betraying america PERSONALLy, the way to get insulated liars to shut the fuck up is to walk into a news station walk in and TAKE AWAY THEIR MIC'S.And the few seconds you have it SPEAK TRUTH. Make your message quick and memorable.Be willing to be tossed to the ground,tazered and arrested.This will be all over the news because as these fucking ghouls say if it bleeds it leads.

If someone did that every news station would be covering it,IF it gets on air. You have to realize there is a 30 second delay maybe longer before what happens in the studio gets on air.Its so they can censor live TV and blur out butts or boobs or cuss words to please uptight people or church ladies with money.So,maybe it should be locally done with stations that do not have the censoring capabilities of CNN Faux or whatever? Also Radio could be taken back this way too.Could you imagine angry Dem's crashing in a broadcasting studio during one of Rush Limbaugh's stupid rants and taking his microphone away and telling the TRUTH with it even if you only get less than a minute??? The sensationalism would draw the media hysterics like moths to a flame. And you know what happens to moths when they meet fire..hehehe

Just a thought I had, maybe a fantasy..maybe..

fed the media lies be held accountable? And elected officials who did not do their job, do we just promote them?

See this other thread about a speech given by John Walcott of Knight Ridder.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=3235578&mesg_id=3235578


Here is a speech from 1993 by Robert Parry which talks about many of the same issues. Here we are 14 years later and the situation is only getting worse because nobody wants to hold them accountable.


Fooling America

A talk by Robert Parry given in Santa Monica on March 28, 1993

http://www.webcom.com/~lpease/collections/conspiracies/parryspeech.htm

snip>>

"...And what we have seen at the end of these twelve years, and what I guess the challenge of the moment becomes is how that gets changed. How do the American people really get back control of this -not just their government, but of their history - because it's really their history that has been taken away from them. And it's really what the Washington Press Corps and the Democrats in Congress as well as the Republicans are culpable of, was this failure to tell the American people their history..."

It is easy and cheap.

Hand out or mail this particular show to those who need to see it.
Encourage (Remind) everyone to watch Bill Moyers regular (new) Friday night shows.

Ask yourself, "What are these same people lying about today?"

Are these same people trying to manipulate 2008?

Have these same people chosen your Democratic Primary favorite?

Focus on The ISSUES, not The Hype.



The Democratic Party is a BIG TENT, but there is NO ROOM for those
who advance the agenda of THE RICH (Corporate Owners) at the EXPENSE of LABOR and the POOR.

Both are a lot less appetizing if you see the entire process from start to finish. Bushco sure made a lot of baloney didn't they?

I was less than thrilled to hear Tim Russert trumpetting his blue collar roots, though I do give him credit for a least appearing on the program.