This book agrivates me more and more. It is a laundry list of excuses and jobs half done. In chapter 6 "Hail to the Heroic Leakers and Whistle-Blowers- and the Journalists who Protect Them" Thomas underscores her expose on the more informative of the press secretaries and insiders who buck the system and do what is right for the american people.
She describes the cloak and dagger envirnment of the D.C. press core. She explains how D.C. is a bedlam of dis, mis, ommit, lie, lie, lie for the myth spinners and enemies of the people. She explains the different levels of background and their importance. She describes how journalists bite the bullet and stand before grand juries to suffer humiliation at the expense of the american people and their right to know. How can journalists stand around and protect the first ammenment and feel so self righteous when it would be the suspecting public that admonishes guilt on the press?
It isn't the journalists responsibility to protect crony capitalists, career liers, cheaters, war mongerers, and haters of everything democratic. Journalists get their hands stomped on for telling the truth, you know why? Because the truth has power.
America is bursting at the seems, sick of the lies and the deciet. I am glad now that we were required to read this mish mash of soaporatic daytime drama. It has lead me to the source of our crumbling empire.
I can't determine if Helen Thomas is a cynic, a groupy, or a tattle tail but to end this chapter with the words of Thomas Jefferson out of contect was a spit in the face to this reader.
Perhaps she would have been better served representing Jefferson's real motives to protect the power of the people and our right to know. These quotes from Jefferson are more compelling and shine a brighter light on the issues at hand.
" The Anti-republicans consist of
1. The old refugees & tories.
2. British merchants residing among us, & composing the main body of our merchants.
3. American merchants trading on British capital. Another great portion.
4. Speculators & Holders in the banks & public funds.
5. Officers of the federal government with some exceptions.
6. Office-hunters, willing to give up principles for places. A numerous & noisy tribe.
7. Nervous persons, whose languid fibres have more analogy with a passive than active state of things.
The Republican part of our Union comprehends
1. The entire body of landholders throughout the United States.
2. The body of labourers, not being landholders, whether in husbanding or the arts.
The latter is to the aggregate of the former party probably as 500 to one; but their wealth is not as disproportionate, tho' it is also greatly superior, and is in truth the foundation of that of their antagonists. Trifling as are the numbers of the Anti-republican party, there are circumstances which give them an appearance of strength & numbers. They all live in cities, together, & can act in a body readily & at all times; they give chief employment to the newspapers, & therefore have most of them under their command. The Agricultural interest is dispersed over a great extent of country, have little means of inter-communication with each other, and feeling their own strength & will, are conscious that a single exertion of these will at any time crush the machinations against their government."
Let's examine that Jefferson quote by Hellen Thomas in it's true context and we will discover that those comments were intended to protect the people not "reporters privilege".
"The interposition of the people themselves on the side of government has had a great effect on the opinion here. am persuaded myself that the good sense of the people will always be found to be the best army. They may be led astray for a moment, but will soon correct themselves. The people are the only censors of their governors: and even their errors will tend to keep these to the true principles of their institution. To punish these errors too severely would be to suppress the only safeguard of the public liberty. The way to prevent these irregular interpositions of the people is to give them full information of their affairs thro' the channel of the public papers, & to contrive that those papers should penetrate the whole mass of the people. The basis of our governments being the opinion of the people, the very first object should be to keep that right; and were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter. But I should mean that every man should receive those papers & be capable of reading them."
Helen Thoams is a Manipulator of public opinion not a journalist. She actually give us great insight into her own complacencey and unwillingness to be dutiful in the face of tyranny.
"Asked why hte president speaks only to his supporters, White House press secretary Scott McClellan said Bush's intention it to "educate" the people." Thomas then goes on to apply her cynical aproach to wagging the tail by editorializing this monstorous statement, "He preobably meant "indoctrinate."
We are doomed.
GOEBBELS' PRINCIPLES OF PROPAGANDA
Based upon Goebbels' Principles of Propaganda by Leonard W. Doob, published in Public Opinion and Propaganda; A Book of Readings edited for The Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues.
1. Propagandist must have access to intelligence concerning events and public opinion.
2. Propaganda must be planned and executed by only one authority.
a. It must issue all the propaganda directives.
b. It must explain propaganda directives to important officials and maintain their morale.
c. It must oversee other agencies' activities which have propaganda consequences
3. The propaganda consequences of an action must be considered in planning that action.
4. Propaganda must affect the enemy's policy and action.
a. By suppressing propagandistically desirable material which can provide the enemy with useful intelligence
b. By openly disseminating propaganda whose content or tone causes the enemy to draw the desired conclusions
c. By goading the enemy into revealing vital information about himself
d. By making no reference to a desired enemy activity when any reference would discredit that activity
5. Declassified, operational information must be available to implement a propaganda campaign
6. To be perceived, propaganda must evoke the interest of an audience and must be transmitted through an attention-getting communications medium.
7. Credibility alone must determine whether propaganda output should be true or false.
8. The purpose, content and effectiveness of enemy propaganda; the strength and effects of an expose; and the nature of current propaganda campaigns determine whether enemy propaganda should be ignored or refuted.
9. Credibility, intelligence, and the possible effects of communicating determine whether propaganda materials should be censored.
10. Material from enemy propaganda may be utilized in operations when it helps diminish that enemy's prestige or lends support to the propagandist's own objective.
11. Black rather than white propaganda may be employed when the latter is less credible or produces undesirable effects.
12. Propaganda may be facilitated by leaders with prestige.
13. Propaganda must be carefully timed.
a. The communication must reach the audience ahead of competing propaganda.
b. A propaganda campaign must begin at the optimum moment
c. A propaganda theme must be repeated, but not beyond some point of diminishing effectiveness
14. Propaganda must label events and people with distinctive phrases or slogans.
a. They must evoke desired responses which the audience previously possesses
b. They must be capable of being easily learned
c. They must be utilized again and again, but only in appropriate situations
d. They must be boomerang-proof
15. Propaganda to the home front must prevent the raising of false hopes which can be blasted by future events.
16. Propaganda to the home front must create an optimum anxiety level.
a. Propaganda must reinforce anxiety concerning the consequences of defeat
b. Propaganda must diminish anxiety (other than concerning the consequences of defeat) which is too high and which cannot be reduced by people themselves
17. Propaganda to the home front must diminish the impact of frustration.
a. Inevitable frustrations must be anticipated
b. Inevitable frustrations must be placed in perspective
18. Propaganda must facilitate the displacement of aggression by specifying the targets for hatred.
19. Propaganda cannot immediately affect strong counter-tendencies; instead it must offer some form of action or diversion, or both.
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4 comments:
Hey dude I appreciate your comments and your enthusiasm. Yet I gotta admit this blog that you posted was a 3 bowler. I found it really interesting but I displaced alot of my soup each time my head fell into the bowl. Lo Siento.
I believe that what we have here is an emotional clash, inspired by loyalty and abhorrence. On one hand you see the misgivings of Thomas. On the other hand you have an enormous amount of respect for Jefferson.
I feel like your polarized view of these two figures has led to a very abstract post. Maybe emotion filled in the gaps for you, but the logic is hard to see in your post. It came across as simply "how dare Thomas invoke the name of Jefferson in this rag."
I see that you thought she misrepresented the qoute, but how? Were they not both trying to convey the necessity of journalism in a democracy?
I see how she framed the paragraph between two calls for reporters privilege, but she was commenting on the importance of the press in that paragraph.
She piggy backed her agenda upon some terrific quotes. She wanted to solidify her argument by ending with a solid logic block. she made the assertion that if Jefferson and Lincoln are correct and the press is truly necessary then the reporters privilge is also imperative since it is needed by the press.
She made an argument and finished it with figure-head quotes. *A tactic as old as Helen Thomas.
Rylan,
Actions are truly louder than words. If she was principled do you think the executive would have all of his privilages? I would suppose to say that Thomas Jefferson would feel the same way about his quote being misconstrued for the agenda of a propagandist.
I do not wish to give Helen Thomas enough credit to say that if she had principle the president would be forced to face his/her infractions before a court of law. Her arena is not the court of law but the court of public information. It is our collective principles which should be in question.
I agree that Thomas used quotes to her advantage. I think it is up to the reader to decide whether she used them in a misleading manner. I personally was able to distinguish the elements of the argument apart from each other. This may not be true for all readers, and this must be examined at all times. Take for instance, the independents staff editorial, it contained a sequence of language that if read without care could produce the wrong impression.
The impression that i got from your post was that you and possibly Jefferson disagree with her using the quote in any fashion, for she is undeserving of such well thought out material.
If you believed there was a misrepresentation of material I would have like to have seen a more logical explanation of such fallacies.
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