The Increasingly Unhinged Russia Rhetoric Comes From a Long-Standing U.S. Playbook (Greenwald)

For aspiring journalists, historians, or politically engaged citizens, there are few more productive uses of one’s time than randomly reading through the newsletters of I.F. Stone, the intrepid and independent journalist of the Cold War era who became, in my view, the nation’s first “blogger” even though he died before the advent of the internet. Frustrated by big media’s oppressive corporatized environment and its pro-government propaganda model, and then ultimately blacklisted from mainstream media outlets for his objections to anti-Russia narratives, Stone created his own bi-monthly newsletter, sustained exclusively by subscriptions, and spent 18 years relentlessly debunking propaganda spewing from the U.S. government and its media partners.

What makes Stone’s body of work so valuable is not its illumination of history but rather its illumination of the present. What’s most striking about his newsletters is how little changes when it comes to U.S. government propaganda and militarism, and the role the U.S. media plays in sustaining it all. Indeed, reading through his reporting, one gets the impression that U.S. politics just endlessly replays the same debates, conflicts, and tactics. (...)

 oldviolin wrote: 
Windex!!!

 Red_Dragon wrote: 
see edit

 oldviolin wrote: 
But you still bought a new shirt. 

 Proclivities wrote: 
intellectual dishonesty and mass manipulation continued at a steady clip even at record cost overruns...PEI adjusted to reflect evidential negation sub societal flatline

Exaggeration and hyperbole increased by at least a million percent in 2016.

Brexit Could Cost Britain $42 Billion of Direct Funding From EU

From the European funds... Where does this money come from? And how much did the UK pay for this 'gift'? Hint: It's more than they will get in return.

Weather Channel strikes back at Breitbart

The Propaganda About Russian Propaganda

 ScottFromWyoming wrote:
Probably right. Unfortunately there are always those that think underlying problems can be fixed with a big dose of PR, which obviously makes things worse. Consultants are happy to oblige.

Good luck getting rid of a popular meme.

 R_P wrote: 
Katehi should be gone, and the Chancellors should overhaul the campus security system systemwide. Once those two things happen, I have no problem with the school trying to present a better image. Davis is a good school and the more this stuff drags on, the harder it is for it to remain a good school.

 R_P wrote: 
it didn't work very well

UC Davis spent thousands to scrub pepper-spray references from Internet

UC Davis contracted with consultants for at least $175,000 to scrub the Internet of negative online postings following the November 2011 pepper-spraying of students and to improve the reputations of both the university and Chancellor Linda P.B. Katehi, newly released documents show.

The payments were made as the university was trying to boost its image online and were among several contracts issued following the pepper-spray incident.

Some payments were made in hopes of improving the results computer users obtained when searching for information about the university or Katehi, results that one consultant labeled “venomous rhetoric about UC Davis and the chancellor.”

Others sought to improve the school’s use of social media and to devise a new plan for the UC Davis strategic communications office, which has seen its budget rise substantially since Katehi took the chancellor’s post in 2009. Figures released by UC Davis show the strategic communications budget increased from $2.93 million in 2009 to $5.47 million in 2015.

“We have worked to ensure that the reputation of the university, which the chancellor leads, is fairly portrayed,” said UC Davis spokeswoman Dana Topousis. “We wanted to promote and advance the important teaching, research and public service done by our students, faculty and staff, which is the core mission of our university.”

Money to pay the consultants came from the communications department budget, Topousis said. (...)

Back to square one...

Tequila, Painted Pearls, and Prada: How the CIA Helped Produce 'Zero Dark Thirty' | VICE News

Look At Their Evil Propaganda, Not Our Identical Evil Propaganda

America, they tell us, is exceptional.

Exceptionally wrong about how exceptional it is.

Here comes today’s New York Times to re-re-re-reconfirm that with an Opinion piece headlined “The New Dictators Rule by Velvet Fist.”

“In recent decades, a new brand of authoritarian government has evolved that is better adapted to an era of global media, economic interdependence and information technology. The ‘soft’ dictators concentrate power, stifling opposition and eliminating checks and balances, while using hardly any violence,” write Professors Sergei Guriev and Daniel Treismanmay. “These illiberal leaders — Alberto K. Fujimori of Peru, Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, Viktor Orban of Hungary, Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey, Mahathir Mohamad of Malaysia and Hugo Chávez of Venezuela — threaten to reshape the world order in their image, replacing principles of freedom and law — albeit imperfectly upheld by Western powers — with cynicism and corruption.”

“Imperfectly upheld,” indeed.

(...) Like, for example, how the democratically elected president of Venezuela – the above-mentioned Hugo Chávez was overthrown by a corporate junta backed by the CIA and the Bush administration, as well as the slobbering editorial page and front page of — ahem — the New York Times.

Or how the democratically elected president of Honduras was overthrown by military coup backed by the CIA and the Obama administration, and, oh yeah, the New York Times.

Or how Judith Miller used the Times to convince the American people that Saddam had WMDs, used to justify the disastrous Iraq War.

“The West needs to understand how these regimes work and how to confront them.” (...)

They Have ‘Propaganda,’ US Has ‘Public Diplomacy’–and a Servile Private Sector — FAIR

The New York Times headline (4/15/15) paints a dire picture:

Turmoil at Voice of America Is Seen as Hurting US Ability to Counter Propaganda

But wait a second–isn’t Voice of America itself a propaganda outlet? Not in the New York Times stylebook, apparently. The piece, by Ron Nixon, describes VOA as “the government agency that is charged with presenting America’s viewpoint to the world.” Later on, the Times refers to what it calls “America’s public diplomacy.”

The US’s enemies, on the other hand, have “sophisticated propaganda machines that have expanded the influence of countries like China and Russia and terrorist groups like the Islamic State.” The difference between “propaganda machines” and “public diplomacy” is never explained in the article, but the former appears to be what “they” do while the latter is what “we” do.

The only source quoted in the article who’s not directly connected to the government is Glen Howard, president of the Jamestown Foundation, described as “a Washington think tank.” (“We are getting our butts kicked…. Countries like Russia are running circles around us,” Howard says.) Not mentioned is the fact that Jamestown was founded with the help of then-CIA Director William Casey to provide financial support for the Agency’s spies (Washington Post, 1/10/05). (...)

House panel urges US to fight Russia's ‘weaponized information’ — RT USA

(...) Renowned linguist and public intellectual Noam Chomsky explained the reasoning behind this seemingly contradictory approach. “The idea that there should be a network reaching people, which does not repeat the US propaganda system, is intolerable” to the US establishment, Chomsky told RT.

“If the House wants to study the weaponization of the media, they can look right at the front pages of the newspapers that they get every day,” the MIT professor-emeritus said.“If we look closely at the conflict , you can find plenty of problems on both sides, but the way they’re interpreted here, is we’re necessarily right about everything. And if anyone’s in the way, they’re wrong about everything.”

The brigade will be responsible for what is described as non-lethal warfare. Both the Israeli and US army already engage heavily in psychological operations.

Against a background of 24-hour news, smartphones and social media, such as Facebook and Twitter, the force will attempt to control the narrative.

Chris Hedges: Killing Ragheads for Jesus - Truthdig