Wednesday, August 25, 2010

There are no Coincidences in the Media

I know I have beat on this drum a couple of years ago, but for new readers (or folks my age with receding memory banks....) I wanted to remind you what it is that the thousands of Public Relations Firms actually DO.

They buy space for a client's agenda in the media.

It is my assertion that every politically charged article you read by AP, Reuters, NYT, CNN, MSNBC, FOX... on every single one of the big news outlets... has been bought and paid for -one way or another - and is designed to influence public opinion in favor of some special interest group or other.

NO EXCEPTIONS.

This is going to be horribly, terribly Politically Incorrect...

I have blogged posts before about the "Rape!" cry that pro-War supporters trot out every time public support wains (I will try to find the link shortly). Here is today's attempt to rally support for the War in Afghanistan. It would seem that the propagandist's have given up on "Wave the Flag"strategies, and work now entirely on the female voting population. Several weeks ago Time ran a cover story about a young Afghani girl who was forced to marry and had her nose and ears cut off when she fled. Stories of forced marriage, child rape, and the subjugation of women in Afghanistan ABOUND in American media. Why not the same issue in Somolia, Egypt, Morocco, the Sudan... and the rest of the Muslin world? Because, at this time, their is no WAR to agitate for in those regions.

American women are now more than 50% of the vote, and it seems that American women are only too willing to send their sons, brothers, fathers, uncles and cousins to die and be horribly maimed in order to protect Afghani women from their culture. How did I arrive at that nasty conclusion? Because market's do not continue that which does not work. This strategy is working for "them" (whoever "they" are). Just use your imagination and start googling.... read the news stories... not a shred about "Democracy for Afghanistan" or "Keeping Afghanistan safe for Freedom", or "whatever Bullsh*t the war profiteers have given up on"... Nope, its all about those poor women in Afghanistan...

I want to say that a feel horribly that mankind has evolved into the disgusting thing it is in that part of the world.

But I am unwilling to lose my son to save Afghanistan.


20 comments:

tweell said...

I saw one of those articles in Forbes, the writer got slapped around by the commenters (me among them). My family has a military tradition, most of us have served for terms ranging from a single enlistment to a career. I'm proud of that, but have discouraged my son from enlisting. It is one thing to protect the United States from it's enemies, but to protect the Afghanistan women from their men?

A Quaker in a Strange Land said...

Tweel:

My father's family has a military tradition... but my father would be the first to say there is a difference between defending one's country and losing his son's to the job of being the "World's Cop". I believe the world IS a dangerous place and that our nation MUST have the ability to defend itself... but when I hear "National Interests", my hair goes up. Whose interests? The corporatists and their continued funding of defunct social programs? Or to keep the world safe for Abortion!!?? Those are not interests that merit the spilling American blood OR the blood of innocents abroad.

My son expressed an interest in the Navy at some point in his future... that will be for him to decide... after he gets his M.D.!

PioneerPreppy said...

Amazing that the uber-equal feminist somehow managed to skip draft registration and equal numbers in combat deaths.

Of course having seen first hand the chaos females bring to a military unit I am glad for our boys that women still cannot serve in combat units.

It doesn't begin or end with Afghanistan or war. We are constantly bombarded by women suffering in Pakistan (just read one about them this morning). Rape in Africa (but not the deaths of the men) etc.

But hey why not use the protect the wimynz clause? It worked with the outdated white knights to get Western Women no fault divorce, affirmative action, open door alimony, biased DV legislation and title IX college spots.

Until men wake up and see this farce for what it is it will only get worse.

A Quaker in a Strange Land said...

The problem with seeing "minority rights" as a race issue and NOT as a political minority has many, many unintended consequences. This is just one of them.

"Democracy must be something more than two wolves and a sheep voting on what to have for dinner." – James Bovard

bureaucrat said...

Of the tens of thousand of people that served in Iraq, for instance, only 4,400 died. Too many, but not the 58,000 that died in Vietnam. From what I can see, the U.S. Army medical corps isn't going to even LET you die. :) You may be maimed, and screwed up for awhile, but you won't die in most cases.

And while Iraq is still a basketcase, I said nothing about that war for the first 2 years (2003-2004). I was glad they got Saddam out. And yes, I was willing to risk YOUR son's life to do it. I could justify that in my own mind. Unlikely he would have died, and 27 million Iraqis should become better off for it ... someday.

Anonymous said...

Greg,

That was alway my take on our invasion of any nation while I served in the Marines. " Why not here or there as well"? I came to the conclusion the hard way that these war games are mostly for profit,with little to do with human suffering. "They" do not care about that at all. Even higher up officers are willing to send up there boys for another star.

B, Your willing to send someone elses son to die, for what? A better Iraqi. It seems the media has once again fullfilled it job. I would never ask that of anyone, unlesss we are directed attacked.Period.

Bob

A Quaker in a Strange Land said...

Bur:

Battlefield trauma care has gone lightyears since Vietnam war... instead of war dead we have far more horribly wounded but surviving.

Joseph said...

My favorite series of commercials by a public relations firm....the public service announcement.

@bureaucrat
Of the tens of thousand of people that served in Iraq, for instance, only 4,400 died
Surely you are kidding? What about the private contractors and the 'collateral damage'? These people in uniform are doing their best but with the amount of ordnance we are volleying in Iraq and Afghanistan it is amazing the carnage has not been more.

bureaucrat said...

The facts are still the same. Due to inflated military medical spending, very few servicepeople were dying in Iraq and Afghanistan. I guess if you asked their families, I'll bet they'd rather have them disabled than dead.

I sleep quietly in a bed without having to worry my door will be kicked in, some cousins of Saddam dragging me off to some torture chamber where my family and friends get to watch. Americans just don't live in that kind of world. And we are expected to quash such a world when the opportunity comes.

Sometimes, oppressors need to be removed, by any means necessary.

Anonymous said...

Bur, what gives us the right to invade another country and leave 100s of thousands dead in our wake? We killed more people than Saddam has during his entire reign. Sure he was a bad person, but so was Mao and Stalin. We are there for the oil.

You guys need to watch this documentary titled "Manufacturing Consent" by Noam Chomsky. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OJuqoDvyXOk&feature=related

kathy said...

A little credit please. I am a woman who does not wish to send any of her boys or her grandsons to die anywhere either. Rape and torture are horrors that should be stopped but I have no illusions that the my children are responsible for the job. Once again I feel, as maybe the only woman who faithfully reads and comments on this site, like a second class citizen, to dumb to be trusted to make an informed decision. Granted, I don't have degrees in either economics or political science but, as the parent of 3 sons and 4 grandsons, I have skin in this particular game too and I read enough to be informed.

Phil23 said...

The war did not start because of propaganda, it started because of September 11 2001. Is it continuing because of propaganda or the decisions made by the top brass of the military? Interesting question, certainly propaganda could play a part but the fact is the military doesn't like to cut and run. They like to win. As far as sending anyone's son or daughter to Afghanistan, that is not up to the voting public because the draft is over. People enlist in the military for various reasons - they have a calling, or they have no other choices, or they can't function in any other role in society . But professional soldiers know the risk is death and disfigurement. And many of the people there would be in drug gangs or mercenaries for foreign armies in Africa if not for the US military. So its not as simple as just media propaganda.

Dextred1 said...

Bur, read this

http://noir.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601010&sid=aV5WoIxOb88I

High light from article

Unfortunately, the Trustees’ cash-flow accounting, like all such accounting, is arbitrary and misleading. In fact, Social Security is broke. Its fiscal gap, which the Trustees measure correctly, is $16 trillion.

This gap is small compared with the U.S.’s overall $202 trillion shortfall, not because the Trustees treat Social Security’s $2.5 trillion trust fund as an asset (a questionable choice), but because they credit one-third of federal revenue to the program.

But dollars are dollars. If we re-label Social Security “payroll” taxes as “general revenue wage taxes,” Social Security’s fiscal gap increases by $60 trillion, and the fiscal gap of all other government activities falls by $60 trillion, leaving the overall $202 trillion gap unchanged.

Even by the Trustees’ measure, there’s a massive problem. Coming up with $16 trillion requires permanently raising revenue or cutting benefits by 26 percent, starting now. In other words, the program is 26 percent underfunded.

Dan said...

Both Iraq and Afghanistan have enshrined Shara law into the constitutions we told them to create; so much for liberalism. Now what exactly is it we are fighting for?

A Quaker in a Strange Land said...

Kathy:

I do not wish to cast you as a "second class" member of this discussion. I find your input thoughtful and well reasoned.

I do maintain that this particular media propaganda IS, in fact, occurring... WORSE, it is having the desired effect(s)... and like any media advertising campaign the folks behind this propaganda are hammering away at this thru multiple channels.

I am THRILLED to hear you say that your sons and grandsons are not here to solve women's issues around the world, as that argument (not ours, "theirs") has enjoyed success for a reason... and I am very sad at the conclusion I have arrived at for that reason... but there it is. It is what it is.

A Quaker in a Strange Land said...

Anon @ 3pm:

You must be new here.

Most of the folks commenting here DO NOT believe that we, or any nation, has the right to invade nations and kill their citizens - any more than other nations have a right to invade, bomb, and murder OUR civilians.

In fact, if you read my stuff you will find that I reject these types of hostilities, the death penalty, abortion, Law Enforcement's use of deadly force in drug crime.... and any and every other place where people play G-d (but I AM a gun-totting-nose- picker... it wouldn't be healthy to have me catch them in my children's hallway at 3am).

Tit-for-Tat does not work for Tit OR Tat.

bureaucrat said...

Ask any older person if they got their Social Security payments last month, and every one of them will say yes (unless their Congresspeople have a death wish).

By the way, you are all aware that the baby boomers are going to start both dying as well as qualifying for Social Security benefits as of 2008, right? :)

This idea everyone is going to live to be 95 and bust the benefits system is silly. Not to mention, all these children of illegal immigrants are going to start paying in as well.

Question is ... is there enough time? Probably not. So they reduce payments by 10% for awhile. Problem solved.

Donal Lang said...

Interesting that we never seem to get these 'saving the Afgan women' stories in UK or France, although there is occasional coverage of UK funded charities setting up schools for girls.

The Afgan stories in the UK tend to be about getting the soldiers out as fast as we can, and the illegality of the war in the first place. Few people believe there is any 'winning' possible.

Similarly in France, its more 'thank god we had the sense not to get involved'!

BTW, there's also lots of comment over here about the building of a mosque a couple of blocks from the WTC site, and general astonishment at the fuss. The general feeling in Europe is that some U.S. politicians have lost the plot regarding the U.S. Constitution. Any comments?

Anonymous said...

Manifest destiny raises its head again. Is it really our duty to enforce our values and culture across the globe? I'd think not. I do not like what goes on the the Muslim world, but it is not our job to change them. (Nor they us!)

I supported going to Afghanistan to get Bin Laden, and Iraq to clean out the CBN weapons. Same kind of threat the Iran is beginning to pose. But that ended 6 years ago. We stand little chance of nation building in Iraq and absolutely none in Afghanistan. There is nothing to win, nothing to accomplish. When the oil money dries up, the ability to export terror will diminish, too.

One thing that seems odd to me, is the Left's push for us to do "something" in the Sudan. That's a boots-on-the-ground operation, if I ever saw one. Can someone explain that?

Regards,

Coal Guy

A Quaker in a Strange Land said...

Donal:

We have indeed lost "the plot for the Constitution". "The Mosque at Ground Zero"? THIS IS AMERICA. We do not hold people responsible for the crimes of others. We do not impose religious restrictions OR subsidies.

Period.

Unfortunately, Donald, we have lost our way... but there are many of us that want it back. I, for one, am confident that we WILL find our way back... but will have to go through one hell of a convulsion to get there.