Mosaic of facts
from RT
Can you tell truth from lies in mass media? RTD’s Miguel Francis-Santiago delves deep to try to understand the intricacies of information war. He meets media experts and puts together the Mosaic of Facts, showing how public opinion is manipulated, not just over the Ukrainian Crisis but throughout the world.
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As a long time student and observer of the effects of propaganda, I have assembled some very interesting links on this subject over the years. Following are some of the better ones beginning with the “prove a negative” trap.
The “prove-a-negative” trap has its roots in the Big Lie technique of both Hitler and Goebbels. How this works is that target nations are put into a position by Western Leaders, as trumpeted in the Western Media, in which a country or a leader must prove a negative.
When they can’t, sanctions are imposed and in some cases this is the first step to war. For example: Saddam had to prove he had no WMD’s, but he couldn’t prove the lack of something and when the inspectors never found anything, that became evidence that the WMD’s were there and were well hidden.
Similarly, Iran is now being asked to prove that they don’t seek to build a nuclear bomb, even though there has never been any evidence to prove that they are. Finally, in the Ukraine, estimates of Russian Troops there have ranged from 10,000-40,000 and Putin has to prove that they are not there—even though there has been no proof offered in the West of anywhere near those numbers, if any. This is an excellent article, which covers this technique in more detail.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article42116.htm
Here’s more “prove a negative” garbage from the “intelligence” community in the form of the recent accusations by unnamed British Officials that China and Russian have hacked Snowden’s Files and that he has “blood on his hands”.
https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2015/06/14/sunday-times-report-snowden-files-journalism-worst-also-filled-falsehoods/
This article contains some wonderful links and examples of how the mainstream media in Britain propagandizes its interviews. There’s one outstanding examples of Glenn Greenwald eating the BBC’s Lunch. The story also addresses the absurd “moral equivalence” argument as in: Surely, you don’t mean to suggest that Bush and Blair are comparable to Saddam…?
http://off-guardian.org/2015/06/18/edward-snowden-the-sunday-times-and-the-death-of-journalism/
The West spreads intellectual ignorance.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article42685.htm
A new pentagon manual authorizes some very nasty repercussions for reporters that don’t support the military’s wars, including imprisonment and targeting on the “battlefield”, which includes any place the US Military wishes to target. This article links to the pentagon’s new manual and the author, Don North, goes into great detail about reporting in combat, including his own experiences dating back to Vietnam.
It also includes a number of anecdotes regarding relations between the military and the press throughout US History, including a quote from General Sherman about “newspapermen” in which he notes that if he killed them all that there would be “news from hell before breakfast”.
https://consortiumnews.com/2015/08/19/pentagon-manual-calls-some-reporters-spies/
Here’s another article on the new war against information, journalism and journalists by the Pentagon.
https://consortiumnews.com/2015/09/02/usnato-embrace-psy-ops-and-info-war/
Fox News lies and misinforms. Here are seven studies that show that Fox Viewers are the most misinformed of all American TV Viewers.
http://www.alternet.org/media/science-fox-news-why-its-viewers-are-most-misinformed
Robert Parry dismantles the NY Time Propaganda Machine (again).
https://consortiumnews.com/2015/06/08/cold-war-ii-to-mccarthyism-ii/
Robert Parry explains how propaganda has evolved in the US Media over the years and why he finally left the big outfits to found Consortium News. He also outlines the methodology in which the US first denigrates a world leader who is targeted and then develops stories to make him into a cartoon character so that the people will laugh at him.
https://consortiumnews.com/2015/06/16/explaining-myself/
This discusses Obama’s recent remarks at the G-7 and how they were a complete turnaround from what Kerry agreed to in Sochi.
https://consortiumnews.com/2015/06/09/obamas-stupid-propaganda-stuff/
The Washington Post Editorial Board welcomes Yatsenyuk and Jaresko to Washington with a stenographic news story and editorial that repeats their comments virtually verbatim. They fail to ask a number of key questions that absolutely should have been asked, which Robert Parry of Consortium News points out. This story is also well-sourced.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article42117.htm
Media “Pundits” cash in on the National Security State Surveillance of NSA, while attacking Snowden and Greenwald. This article shows the direct nexus between the security industrial complex and recognized media “consultants”.
https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2015/05/12/intelligence-industry-cash-flows-media-echo-chamber-defending-nsa-surveillance/
„Seit fuenf Uhr fuenfundfuefzig wird jetzt zurueckgeschossen,“ („Since 5:45 we are now firing back“) was one of the original big lies that started WWII. Hitler was able to make this claim because the German People had been reading and hearing about Polish “Atrocities” against native Germans within Poland’s Borders. As obviously false as this lie was, many Germans continued to believe that they had been attacked by Poland long after the war. Hitler and Goebbels showed the way to manipulate an entire populace through the use of the media.
The Washington Cocktail Circuit and its effect on the news.
https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2015/05/18/infernal-corruption-washingtons-elite-media/
Seymour Hersh on the killing of Bin Laden and why the official story was bullshit.
http://www.lrb.co.uk/v37/n10/seymour-m-hersh/the-killing-of-osama-bin-laden
Hersh discusses his story on the Official Bin Laden Lies. This interview may actually be better than Hersh’s written version.
http://therealnews.com/t2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=74&jumival=13859
Two excellent defenses of Seymour Hersh in one article.
http://www.truthdig.com/eartotheground/item/why_the_mainstream_medias_treatment_seymour_hersh_20150517
Report on CIA Torture and the falsification of the bin Laden Story in ‘Zero Dark Thirty’.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/secrets-politics-and-torture/
Frontline’s Expose’ on CIA Lies in Zero Dark Thirty as reported in the intercept, with frontline clip.
https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2015/05/19/cia-myths-and-myths-of-bin-laden-raid/
John Stewart eats Judith Miller’s Lunch
http://thedailyshow.cc.com/videos/b7akvf/judith-miller-pt–1
http://thedailyshow.cc.com/videos/56vvo5/judith-miller-pt–2
The NY Times coverage of US Imperialistic Wars, from Guatemala, through Vietnam, and now the Ukraine is always favorable. The same is true in regard to Israel, the tail that wags the dog.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article42576.htm
Newt Gingrich on the use of words for success in politics (and propaganda)
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article4443.htm
Excellent work – thankyou.