Catapulting The Biblical Propaganda

I really wish that I believed in the devil and hell when I hear news like this. Then at least I would have the satisfaction of believing that the entire Bush administration would eventually be burning for eternity. Alas, if only it were true!

From Iraq war briefings headlined with biblical quotes, reports US magazine by Daniel Nasaw:

One of the top planners of the US war in Iraq gave President George Bush secret intelligence briefs headlined with biblical quotations, in a bid to boost his standing with the deeply religious president but one that risked sparking a conflagration in the Muslim world if the papers leaked.

In the days surrounding the March 2003 invasion of Iraq, US defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld prepared top secret briefing papers for the president adorned with triumphant images of US military personnel and adoring Iraqis, along with the quotes, according to a new article in GQ magazine.

Rumsfeld, said to be personally disinclined toward ostentatious displays of piety, included the quotes because he believed the religious message would appeal to Bush, whom he knew frequently to quote the Bible, journalist Robert Draper wrote.

Rumsfeld and other top military aides brushed aside complaints that the quotes were an inappropriate injection of religion into intelligence matters and ignored fears that if the documents leaked to the media, they would touch off worldwide fear that the US had embarked on an anti-Muslim crusade.

The previously unreleased documents are a shocking and unusual admixture of the two realms. The cover of one intelligence briefing shows US soldiers kneeling in prayer, headlined with a selection from the book of Isaiah: "Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?/ Here I am Lord, send me!" The same page is covered with the classification codes and handling instructions typical to secret US government documents.

Other cover sheets released by the magazine feature images of US military vehicles and troops trudging through desert landscapes, manning a machine gun emplacement, and US soldiers inside what appears to be a posh palace once belonging to Saddam Hussein. One shows an image of Saddam speaking into a television camera and quotes 1 Peter 2:15: "It is God's will that by doing good you should silence the ignorant talk of foolish men."

I believe that I do some good. Why have I not silenced at least a small portion of the ignorant talk of the foolish men of the Bush administration?

So, it appears that while Bush was busy catapulting, that he himself was being catapulted. Again, I wish we could catapult them all to hell!

Fascinating

Fascinating, as Mr. Spock so often said on Star Trek. I am fascinated by the fact that two people can look at one thing and come to totally opposite conclusions of what that thing is. I suppose that is why the stock market bounces around so much. But I digress.

Yesterday I wrote about seeing Tom Brokaw on the Today Show. Today I added an update to what I wrote. While googling around the web for information on this subject I found someone who had copied the entire Washington Times article that I linked to in my update. What fascinates me are the comments left at this site.

Here is the first one:

Hell. I never watch any of these Red Star Hammer and Sickle Socialist Propoganda channels and the bubling old left wing incompitents who dispence the Marxist Leninist party mantra to the brain dead masses who beleive this Neocomm vomit!

These people could disembowel each other on the set of the state run nightly News and, other than watching and saying, Sick, Cool, I would say,"Good riddence, to the agents of Communism that have come here to Eff up our great nation and it's proud people!"

Our Revolution needs to be as much against this Ministry of Obama propoganda as the Marxist's and their tratiorous Anti-American pro Socialist poison that they spew on a hourly and minute by minute basis!

First of all, is it at all possible to ignore the many misspelled words? I am the first to admit that I am a rather poor speller, but in this day and age of spell checkers there is no excuse, other than neglect and lack of attention to detail, for poor spelling. Perhaps that neglect and lack of attention carries over into how this commenter processes facts and information. How else does one explain his conclusion that we have a left wing bias in the media, and that Obama is a marxist and a socialist? Has this person been living under a rock for the last eight years? The criticism of the Bush administration has been marginal, at best. If the media had been doing its job, we would not be in Iraq, Bush would never have been reelected, and he (and Cheney) would have been impeached years ago.

One thing that scares me is that this commenter is not alone in how he thinks. A quick surf around the web turns up many others that share his belief that the commies are taking over.

I actually agree with the commenter that most of the media does produce propaganda for “the brain dead masses.” However, I strongly disagree that this propaganda is socialist and/or state controlled. The propaganda is capitalist propaganda, and it is corporate controlled. The corporations control the state through the many lobbyists that they also control. Follow the money. Why is the government bailing out the financial industry and the auto industry? Do a little research and find out how much money these industries have contributed to lobbyists and politicians (of both parties) over the years. The politicians do what the corporations want them to do. If the United States ever falls, it will most likely be because of capitalism run amok. (Believe it or not, I actually have nothing against capitalism. It does however need some regulation. Absolute power corrupts absolutely, and all that. Regulation does not equal communism. We have always regulated capitalism, we have never been a communist country.)

Most U.S. politicians (including Obama, and the Clintons) are centrists. They only lean a little bit to the left or right, if at all. George W. Bush is an exception. He is an extreme right-wing radical. Fat lot of good his extreme policies did for us. I would have preferred a true conservative in the White House rather than Bush. Of course my true preference would be for a true progressive/atheist in the White House, but that just ain’t gonna happen. The liberal/progressive agenda is almost invisible on the political landscape. There is Russ Feingold and… Well, nobody else. They wouldn’t let Ralph Nader debate when he was running for president way back when. Hell, they wouldn’t even let him attend the debate as an audience member.

Believe what you will, but there is no way that you can convince me that the liberal/progressive agenda, or the socialists, or communists, or Marxists have actual power in the United States.

I am trying to picture Tim Russert, David Gregory, Tom Brokaw, Katie Couric and Matt Lauer as communists. Kind of hard to do.

Now I am trying to picture Bill O’Reilly, Sean Hannity, Ann Coulter, and Rush Limbaugh as communists. Even harder to do.

None of them share their wealth and property like a good communist/socialist ought to.

Now I’m picturing all of them as capitalists. Hmm, very easy to do.

And just who is it that started spreading the “news” that Obama is a no good commie, socialist, marxist, Anti-American, Non-American? Why, it was the no good commie, socialist, marxist, Anti-American, Non-American media. Now, why would they do that?

Fascinating.

The Today Show Sucks

The Today Show on NBC is one huge propaganda machine. Matt Lauer and all those associated with the show should be ashamed of themselves. This show is one of the reasons why our country is rapidly continuing its downward spiral.

Here is one example.

From Today hosts Dick Morris, who says people are debating whether Obama will be seen as "sleeper agent":

Summary: On Today, Dick Morris asserted: "[T]his whole debate about what kind of president [Sen. Barack] Obama would make has swirled around almost an existential level. Is he sort of a Manchurian candidate? A sleeper agent?" Morris has previously stated that "the determinant in the election will be whether we believe that Barack Obama is what he appears to be, or is he somebody who's sort of a sleeper agent who really doesn't believe in our system."

Actually Morris said “existentional." Is existentional a real word?

Look Who's Talking About Propaganda

From Bush slams anti-US 'propaganda':

As Air Force One touched down, hundreds were gathering in the city centre in protest at the Bush administration and Italy's involvement in Afghanistan.

Another group of demonstrators chanted "Bush, go home" outside the American Academy in Rome's Villa Aurelia while the president met young entrepreneurs inside.

Mr Bush urged them to ignore the "misinformation and propaganda" spread about his country and to learn the "first-hand truth about America" by visiting.

"The best diplomacy for America, particularly among young folks, is to welcome you to our country," he said.

"We are compassionate, we're an open country, we care about people and we're entrepreneurial."

Unless you happen to be Mexican.

Oh, So Many Catapults

From House Votes to Ban Pentagon Propaganda: Networks Still Silent by Josh Silver:

Two things are certain. First, consolidated, corporate media is failing to provide critical journalism, and is aiding and abetting government propaganda. Second, this is not the last time this media blight will rear its ugly head, and as long as it does, the American public will continue to be led by the nose to support disastrous wars, policies and politicians.

Read more here.

Bush Just Keeps Catapulting The Propaganda

Lots of cuss words come to mind upon reading the New York Sun headline that says: “Senate Okays Telecom Immunity in Secret Surveillance”. How can George W. Bush say this with a straight face:

"This good bill passed by the Senate provides a long-term foundation for our intelligence community to monitor the communications of foreign terrorists in ways that are timely and effective and that also protect the liberties of Americans," Mr. Bush said.

Oh, I forgot, he probably said it with that asinine smirk of his. Only Bush can call a bad bill a “good bill” and only Bush can describe a bill that strips away more of our civil liberties as one that “protects the liberties of Americans”.

Catapult That Propaganda

Actually it’s more like they’re using cannons:

For the first time in human history, there is a concerted strategy to manipulate global perception. And the mass media are operating as its compliant assistants, failing both to resist it and to expose it.

The sheer ease with which this machinery has been able to do its work reflects a creeping structural weakness which now afflicts the production of our news.

Perhaps there really is a vast right-wing conspiracy, or at least a conspiracy of the powerful:

So, who exactly is producing fiction for the media? Who wrote the Zarqawi letters? Who created the fantasy story about Osama bin Laden using a network of subterranean bases in Afghanistan, complete with offices, dormitories, arms depots, electricity and ventilation systems? Who fed the media with tales of the Taliban leader, Mullah Omar, suffering brain seizures and sitting in stationery cars turning the wheel and making a noise like an engine? Who came up with the idea that Iranian ayatollahs have been encouraging sex with animals and girls of only nine?

Some of this comes from freelance political agitators. It was an Iranian opposition group, for example, which was behind the story that President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was jailing people for texting each other jokes about him. And notoriously it was Iraqi exiles who supplied the global media with a dirty stream of disinformation about Saddam Hussein.

But clearly a great deal of this carries the fingerprints of officialdom. The Pentagon has now designated "information operations" as its fifth "core competency" alongside land, sea, air and special forces. Since October 2006, every brigade, division and corps in the US military has had its own "psyop" element producing output for local media. This military activity is linked to the State Department's campaign of "public diplomacy" which includes funding radio stations and news websites. In Britain, the Directorate of Targeting and Information Operations in the Ministry of Defence works with specialists from 15 UK psyops, based at the Defence Intelligence and Security School at Chicksands in Bedfordshire.