Submitted by John Stauber on
Sheldon Rampton and John Stauber, co-authors of the Center's 2003 book Weapons of Mass Deception, appear in filmmaker Danny Schechter's latest movie of the same title, but the movie is completely the creation of Schechter. A review on the Portland Independent Media website asks "what do you get when you cross relaxed media ownership laws, the military industrial complex, and public opinion?
Submitted by Laura Miller on
"In 1996, journalist Gary Webb wrote a series of articles that forced a long-overdue investigation of a very dark chapter of recent U.S. foreign policy – the Reagan-Bush administration’s protection of cocaine traffickers who operated under the cover of the Nicaraguan contra war in the 1980s," Robert Parry of Consortium News writes. Webb paid a high price for his "Dark Alliance" stories written for the San Jose Mercury News.
Submitted by Diane Farsetta on
A new campaign charges Sinclair Broadcast Group, the "largest single owner/operator of television stations in the United States," with "misusing public airwaves with partisan news programming." The campaign, by Media Matters for America, MoveOn,
Submitted by Diane Farsetta on
Should "deceptive techniques endorsed for use on the battlefield to confuse an adversary" be adopted "for covert propaganda campaigns aimed at neutral and even allied nations"?
Submitted by Diane Farsetta on
In Kuwait, Defense Secretary Rumsfeld was asked why soldiers "had to dig through landfills to find scrap metal to up-armor vehicles." The soldier who asked the question discussed it beforehand with an embedded reporter.
Submitted by Diane Farsetta on
"U.S. Special Operations Command, whose antiterrorist missions are usually conducted in utmost secrecy, is in the market for an ad agency," reports the St. Petersburg Times.
Submitted by Sheldon Rampton on
Discovery Communications International (DCI) is about to launch a cable TV network called "the Military Channel," which will focus on all aspects of the armed forces, military strategies and personnel throughout the ages.
Submitted by Diane Farsetta on
The Washington, DC-based public affairs firm Susan Davis International "is handling the Pentagon's 'America Supports You' campaign to drum up support for the nearly 150,000 U.S. forces that may be occupying Iraq during the next four years," reports O'Dwyer's. "America Supports You," a Defense Department campaign, will run through May 2005.
Submitted by Laura Miller on
"In the end, the war in Iraq did not have the decisive impact on the election that many had expected," Michael Massing writes in the New York Review of Books. Why? Massing suggests that the American public may not have been "aware of just how bad things had gotten in Iraq." Of the many factors that shielded Americans from the "most brutal realities of Iraq," Fox News stands out. "The most striking feature of its coverage of the war in Iraq was, in fact, its lack of coverage," Massing writes.
Submitted by Diane Farsetta on
"Many Americans consider television their most important source of news and information on health," but TV is also "one of the least trusted sources." A study of 840 TV news health segments by communications professor Gary Schwitzer revealed "10 troublesome trends," including extreme brevity, little or no data, exaggeration and commercialism. "Rather than reporting on a company's hopes for its product or the potential sales, journalists could better serve their audiences by reporting on the evidence for and against a product," Schwitzer writes.
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