Head Games With Media's Help- ugh. The U.S. is giving American journalists amazing access to the Iraqi battlefield by "embedding" them within specific military units. As I predicted, some of these journalists are now identifying with their military cohorts and are therefore self-censoring. A British officer has referred to this tactic as a form of "white psyops."
Spooky Story- the story that the U.S. was spying on UN delegates is now turning into the British equivalent of the Pentagon Papers. American media does not seem to care.
AP Protests Gov't Seizure of Package- "Government agencies opened a package mailed between two Associated Press reporters last September and seized a copy of an eight-year-old unclassified FBI lab report without obtaining a warrant or notifying the news agency."
Spoon-Feeding the Press- examination of massive and increasing secrecy on the part of the Bush administration, and the sad acquiescence of the press to the trend.
Media Misquote and Excise Bush Comment About "Scripted" Press Conference- during Bush's press conference last week, he made a slip in which he alluded to the fact that the conference was scripted, that the reporters, and possibly even their questions, were pre-determined. While the White House put the slip into the conference transcript they posted on their website, most press outlets conveniently editted it out, or changed Bush's comment from "this is scripted" to "this is unscripted."
The "War on Terrorism" at Home- amateur video reporter arrested for "disorderly conduct" and "impeding a police officer." The reporter claims that he did nothing wrong-- except maybe videotape police brutality at a peace protest in southern Oregon.
New York Times Deletes Mention of Police Snipers- on February 15, the NY Times posted an article about local anti-war protests in which they described a massive police presence. The next day, the NYT replaced the story on their website with a new version which omitted the mention of police snipers and undercover officers in the crowd.
Thanks for that insightful comment! It makes interesting reading, especially when I need a payday loans.
Posted by: payday loans at November 25, 2004 09:23 AMLying Media Bastards is both a radio show and website. The show airs Mondays 2-4pm PST on KillRadio.org, and couples excellent music with angry news commentary. And the website, well, you're looking at it. Both projects focus on our media-marinated world, political lies, corporate tyranny, and the folks fighting the good fight against these monsters. All brought to you by Jake Sexton, The Most Beloved Man in America ®. contact: jake+at+lyingmediabastards.com |
Media News |
November 16, 2004Tales of Media WoeSenate May Ram Copyright Bill- one of the most depressing stories of the day that didn't involve death or bombs. It's the music and movie industries' wet dream. It criminalizes peer-to-peer software makers, allows the government to file civil lawsuits on behalf of these media industries, and eliminates fair use. Fair use is the idea that I can use a snippet of a copyrighted work for educational, political, or satirical purposes, without getting permission from the copyright-holder first. And most tellingly, the bill legalizes technology that would automatically skip over "obejctionable content" (i.e. sex and violence) in a DVD, but bans devices that would automatically skip over commericals. This is a blatant, blatant, blatant gift to the movie industry. Fuck the movie industry, fuck the music industry, fuck the Senate. Music industry aims to send in radio cops- the recording industry says that you're not allowed to record songs off the radio, be it real radio or internet radio. And now they're working on preventing you from recording songs off internet radio through a mixture of law and technological repression (although I imagine their techno-fixes will get hacked pretty quickly). The shocking truth about the FCC: Censorship by the tyranny of the few- blogger Jeff Jarvis discovers that the recent $1.2 million FCC fine against a sex scene in Fox's "Married By America" TV show was not levied because hundreds of people wrote the FCC and complained. It was not because 159 people wrote in and complained (which is the FCC's current rationale). No, thanks to Jarvis' FOIA request, we find that only 23 people (of the show's several million viewers) wrote in and complained. On top of that, he finds that 21 of those letters were just copy-and-paste email jobs that some people attached their names to. Jarvis then spins this a bit by saying that "only 3" people actually wrote letters to the FCC, which is misleading but technically true. So somewhere between 3 and 23 angry people can determine what you can't see on television. Good to know. Reuters Union Considers Striking Over Layoffs- will a strike by such a major newswire service impact the rest of the world's media? Pentagon Starts Work On War Internet- the US military is talking about the creation of a global, wireless, satellite-aided computer network for use in battle. I think I saw a movie about this once... Conservative host returns to the air after week suspension for using racial slur- Houston radio talk show host (and somtime Rush Limbaugh substitute) Mark Belling referred to Mexican-Americans as "wetbacks" on his show. He was suspended for a couple of weeks, and then submitted a written apology for the racial slur to a local newspaper. But he seems to be using the slur and its surrounding controversy to boost his conservative cred with his listeners. Stay Tuned for Nudes- Cleveland TV news anchor Sharon Reed aired a story about artist Spencer Tunick, who uses large numbers of naked volunteers in his installations and photographs. The news report will be unique in that it will not blur or black-out the usual naughty bits. The story will air late at night, when it's allegedly okay with the FCC if you broadcast "indecent" material. The author of this article doesn't seem to notice that Reed first claims that this report is a publicity stunt, but then claims it's a protest against FCC repression. I'd like to think it's the latter, but I'm not that much of a sucker. More Media News |
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"It is useless to attempt to reason a man out of what he was never reasoned into." -Jonathan Swift |
Snapshots |
Several years of mild sleep deprivation and only one hallucination? That's pretty good. |