Fox News, CNN, MSNBC, CBS, ABC and NBC refuse to come clean on use of Pentagon propaganda

As I previously posted, last week the NY Times reported that the Pentagon and Bush administration used domestic propaganda, in the form of so-called retired generals with direct ties to the Pentagon and to military contractors, to sell the invasion of Iraq to the American public.

Since then, and it should come as no surprise, the networks have refused to come clean on their use of, and participation in the Pentagon’s domestic propaganda program during the lead up to the war. And when the subject is finally covered by a minor network, PBS, an apologists of domestic propaganda — with ties to the Pentagon and to corporate media — is prominently featured in the segment.

The take away of the segment for me is that the networks refuse to acknowledge their responsibility for the war, and that they will simply ignore the NY Time’s report all together. Thus, again, the vast majority of the public, which still gets their news from the networks, will remain in the dark about this on going manipulation of the public discourse by the Pentagon and by the Bush administration.

For the record, as Judy Woodruff mentions in the segment:

And for the record, we invited Fox News, CNN, MSNBC, CBS, ABC and NBC to participate, but they declined our offer or did not respond. [Emphasis added.]

Let’s see how long the networks go on ignoring their complicity in this fiasco that’s the Iraq war. I bet it’ll be a long while before a word is uttered.

Ashcroft: the banality of evil

Gutsy! Just plain gutsy. A diarist over at DailyKos documents her confrontation of John Ashcroft, as he spoke before an audience at Knox College. Here’s what happened, in the diarist’s words:

[STUDENT]: First off, Mr. Ashcroft, I’d like to apologize for the rudeness of some of my fellow students. It was uncalled for–we can disagree civilly, we don’t need that. (round of applause from the audience, and Ashcroft smiles) I have here in my hand two documents. One of them, you know, is the text of the United Nations Convention against Torture, which, point of interest, says nothing about “lasting physical damage”…

ASHCROFT: (interrupting) Do you have the Senate reservations to it?

[STUDENT]: No, I don’t. Do you happen to know what they are?

ASHCROFT: (angrily) I don’t have them memorized, no. I don’t have time to go around memorizing random legal facts. I just don’t want these people in the audience to go away saying, “He was wrong, she had the proof right in her hand!” Because that’s not true. It’s a lie. If you don’t have the reservations, you don’t have anything. Now, if you want to bring them another time, we can talk, but…

[STUDENT]: Actually, Mr. Ashcroft, my question was about this other document. (laughter and applause) This other document is a section from the judgment of the Tokyo War Tribunal. After WWII, the Tokyo Tribunal was basically the Nuremberg Trials for Japan. Many Japanese leaders were put on trial for war crimes and crimes against humanity, including torture. And among the tortures listed was the “water treatment,” which we nowadays call waterboarding…

ASHCROFT: (interrupting) This is a speech, not a question. I don’t mind, but it’s not a question.

[STUDENT]: It will be, sir, just give me a moment. The judgment describes this water treatment, and I quote, “the victim was bound or otherwise secured in a prone position; and water was forced through his mouth and nostrils into his lungs and stomach.” One man, Yukio Asano, was sentenced to fifteen years hard labor by the allies for waterboarding American troops to obtain information. Since Yukio Asano was trying to get information to help defend his country–exactly what you, Mr. Ashcroft, say is acceptible for Americans to do–do you believe that his sentence was unjust? (boisterous applause and shouts of “Good question!”)

ASHCROFT: (angrily) Now, listen here. You’re comparing apples and oranges, apples and oranges. We don’t do anything like what you described.

[STUDENT]: I’m sorry, I was under the impression that we still use the method of putting a cloth over someone’s face and pouring water down their throat…

ASHCROFT: (interrupting, red-faced, shouting) Pouring! Pouring! Did you hear what she said? “Putting a cloth over someone’s face and pouring water on them.” That’s not what you said before! Read that again, what you said before!

[STUDENT]: Sir, other reports of the time say…

ASHCROFT: (shouting) Read what you said before! (cries of “Answer her fucking question!” from the audience) Read it!

[STUDENT]: (firmly) Mr. Ashcroft, please answer the question.

ASHCROFT: (shouting) Read it back!

[STUDENT]: “The victim was bound or otherwise secured in a prone position; and water was forced through his mouth and nostrils into his lungs and stomach.”

ASHCROFT: (shouting) You hear that? You hear it? “Forced!” If you can’t tell the difference between forcing and pouring… does this college have an anatomy class? If you can’t tell the difference between forcing and pouring…

[STUDENT]: (firmly and loudly) Mr. Ashcroft, do you believe that Yukio Asano’s sentence was unjust? Answer the question. (pause)

ASHCROFT: (more restrained) It’s not a fair question; there’s no comparison. Next question! (loud chorus of boos from the audience)

Bush’s Generals: How they led America to war

These are some of the generals that the Pentagon and Bush administration deployed into our living rooms, courtesy of CNN, ABC, Fox News, NBC, CBS and the other usual suspects that make up our traditional media — yes, that unrepentant bastion of America-hating liberalism.

The New York Times reports on just how well the Pentagon and the Bush administration coordinated their efforts to manipulate the American Public as they duped us into the invasion of Iraq:

To the public, these men are members of a familiar fraternity, presented tens of thousands of times on television and radio as “military analysts” whose long service has equipped them to give authoritative and unfettered judgments about the most pressing issues of the post-Sept. 11 world.

Hidden behind that appearance of objectivity, though, is a Pentagon information apparatus that has used those analysts in a campaign to generate favorable news coverage of the administration’s wartime performance, an examination by The New York Times has found.

The effort, which began with the buildup to the Iraq war and continues to this day, has sought to exploit ideological and military allegiances, and also a powerful financial dynamic: Most of the analysts have ties to military contractors vested in the very war policies they are asked to assess on air.

Those business relationships are hardly ever disclosed to the viewers, and sometimes not even to the networks themselves. But collectively, the men on the plane and several dozen other military analysts represent more than 150 military contractors either as lobbyists, senior executives, board members or consultants. The companies include defense heavyweights, but also scores of smaller companies, all part of a vast assemblage of contractors scrambling for hundreds of billions in military business generated by the administration’s war on terror.

[...]

Records and interviews show how the Bush administration has used its control over access and information in an effort to transform the analysts into a kind of media Trojan horse — an instrument intended to shape terrorism coverage from inside the major TV and radio networks.

[...]

In turn, members of this group have echoed administration talking points, sometimes even when they suspected the information was false or inflated. Some analysts acknowledge they suppressed doubts because they feared jeopardizing their access.

[...]

The Pentagon paid a private contractor, Omnitec Solutions, hundreds of thousands of dollars to scour databases for any trace of the analysts, be it a segment on “The O’Reilly Factor” or an interview with The Daily Inter Lake in Montana, circulation 20,000.

Omnitec evaluated their appearances using the same tools as corporate branding experts. One report, assessing the impact of several trips to Iraq in 2005, offered example after example of analysts echoing Pentagon themes on all the networks.

Of course, as the New York Times goes on to point out, the manipulation of the American public by these very sources and tactics, continues:

Two weeks ago General Petraeus took time out from testifying before Congress about Iraq for a conference call with military analysts.

Mr. Garrett, the Fox analyst and Patton Boggs lobbyist, said he told General Petraeus during the call to “keep up the great work.”

“Hey,” Mr. Garrett said in an interview, “anything we can do to help.”

Guess which of the candidates has failed the commander in chief test?

Jon Soltz, co-founder of VoteVets.org and a veteran himself of the Iraq war, points out that the candidate touting his military record this presidential season has, in fact, incorrectly answered two basic questions. The first was, when McCain confused the Sunni and Shia populations or Iraq. And, now, the second question, “[W]ho commands what in our military?”

Mr. Soltz points out:

Just yesterday, John McCain seemed to say that General Petraeus is the top military commander of our Armed Forces, telling the Associated Press that he wouldn’t shift the focus of the military from Iraq to Afghanistan “unless Gen. [David] Petraeus said that he felt that the situation called for that.”

Petraeus, of course, is our commander of forces in Iraq. That’s it. He’s not responsible for Afghanistan, or our regional commitment, or our global commitments. As a Commander in Chief, McCain should know that there are people much more qualified to speak to our global strategy than Petraeus — including the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, the Secretary of Defense, and the CENTCOM commander.

[...]

It sounds to me like Senator McCain has become confused because of the White House strategy. The White House, of course, has sent General Petraeus to Capitol Hill a number of times, and tried to paint it as an overall assessment of the global war on terror. If they were serious, they’d would have long ago sent the CENTCOM commander up for days upon days of hearings, followed by General McNeill, who could talk about the situation on the ground in Afghanistan, followed by General Petraeus.

The head of Petraeus

Great take on this photo of Gen. Petraeus, before the House Armed Services Committee, via BagNewsNotes.com:

[T]he General [represents] the serpentine head of of a military institution which has been cut off but for the one spokesman, who is marginalized and dislocated. Checking out the hands under the table, the school boy quiescence demonstrates that assessment has been silenced. Also noted was the fact that Petraeus’s mug is actually blocking a symbol of one of the service branches on the wall — more evidence that Petraeus has become a branch unto himself.