Submitted by Diane Farsetta on
Speaking at a media conference in Germany, Voice of America (VOA) director Danforth Austin advocated for "rigidly enforcing the dividing line between government-financed efforts to inform people and government-financed attempts to influence and even mislead a population without revealing that government's involvement or motives." According to Austin, VOA is the former. "The Voice of America does not do propaganda," he said. He also warned about other countries' attempts to use media to "mislead and manipulate" and engage in "'influence operations' that are disguised as journalism." As John Eggerton points out, Austin's warnings "resonated with those dealing with domestic media issues including alleged Internet-content blocking and the Defense Department's embedded analyst program." That's not to mention the Pentagon's new "Trans Regional Web Initiative," which hires local journalists to write stories that promote U.S. military interests overseas.
Comments
waterflaws replied on Permalink
VOA IS propaganda
An exerpt from Wikipedia:
"Under United States law (Section 501 of the Smith-Mundt Act of 1948), the Voice of America is forbidden to broadcast directly to American citizens. The original intent of this section of the legislation was to protect the American public from propaganda actions by its own government.
Although VOA does not broadcast domestically, Americans can access the programs through shortwave and streaming audio over the Internet."
Google has been using VOA articles HEAVILY, for some time now, in its news section. I contend that GOOGLE is "broadcasting" to Americans FOR VOA.
They do LOVE their "state-corporate partnerships".