Our Big Media Lies
It is not always clear as to whether the oft repeated misrepresentations by our media are deliberate lies or rather simply marks of bad educations and laziness as the same falsehoods are passed around and repeated over and over again.
Let's look at some of the most basic ones this summer season:
1) We hear over and over again that our problems with Iran began with the religious revolution in 1979 that caught out Carter and dumped Reagan on us. In fact in 1979 we were seeing a COUNTER revolution against the evil Shah who had been installed by American and British oil interests -- displacing the democratic government of Mossadeq in 1953:
http://cryptome.org/cia-iran-all.htm
One would expect an occasional reference to the suffering of the Iranian people brought about by our coup installing the Shah. Certainly there are enough surviving Iranians to remember that event and to pass on details of it to the present generation. Why is this kept a deep dark secret from Americans? It might help explain why we are resented and what we have to make up for -- and to talk of regime change? They scarcely want another corrupt one of our making!
2) We are busily killing off 'al Qaeda' in Iraq. Apart from the fact that most either locate bin Laden somewhere in the wilds of Pakistan or see al Qaeda as just another diffuse bumper sticker cover for resistance movements in general, this label strikes one as both propagandistic and horrendously misleading if we are trying to make peace with the resistance movement in Iraq. Were I a Sunni, I would be making tracks out of there which I gather about a million or more, including 40% of the professionals, have already done before the Shiites go full force in extracting their revenge against their traditional Sunni enemies.
3) And then there are the 'bad' states. If one recollects at this time last year Syria was the root of all evil, sponsoring and funding Hezbollah in Lebanon, sending weapons towards Iraq, etc., etc. This was a bit improbable in that nothing would ultimately be more threatening to a Sunni nation than dominant Shiite neighbors on the march. But wait, now it is Iran that is the source of evil weapons scattered around to harass us. Maybe so, but from all reports Iran is having its own economic problems and most likely does not feature having to absorb yet more refugees from its beleaguered neighboring states. Besides its population is quite young and by all reports simply dreams of living the good life such as that they see glimpses of on the Internet.
4) And then there are Pakistan and Afghanistan. Each of these nations is made up of 5 separate tribal groups -- Musharraf came from India and is not a member of any of these clubs. But the dominant one that spans both nations is the Pashtuns. Now would not one expect these folks to be united against an occupying Western coalition? Poor Karzai is pleading with us to stop killing off civilians with our misdirected air strikes from on high. In that part of the world, if you harm a relative of mine, I am obligated to take out a dozen or so of yours -- and so it goes.
Still soft voices only occasionally slip through the mass media drum beats of misleading and missing critical information. Will we ever learn? Probably not, as it may already be too late to put Humpty Dumpty back together again. Iraq is the world's second most disrupted nation. Afghanistan is eighth. Fourteen of our good and decent men died this past two days. For what? Take heed!
--
"A war is just if there is no alternative, and the resort to arms is legitimate if they represent your last hope." (Livy cited by Machiavelli)
--
Ed Kent 718-951-5324 (voice mail only) [blind copies]
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/CollegeConversation
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/PeaceEfforts
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EndingPoverty
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/440neighborhood
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/StudentConcerns
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/AcademicFreedom
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/PrivacyRights
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Israel_Palestine
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FindingHumaneJobs
http://BlogByEdKent.blogspot.com/
http://www.bloggernews.net
Let's look at some of the most basic ones this summer season:
1) We hear over and over again that our problems with Iran began with the religious revolution in 1979 that caught out Carter and dumped Reagan on us. In fact in 1979 we were seeing a COUNTER revolution against the evil Shah who had been installed by American and British oil interests -- displacing the democratic government of Mossadeq in 1953:
http://cryptome.org/cia-iran-all.htm
One would expect an occasional reference to the suffering of the Iranian people brought about by our coup installing the Shah. Certainly there are enough surviving Iranians to remember that event and to pass on details of it to the present generation. Why is this kept a deep dark secret from Americans? It might help explain why we are resented and what we have to make up for -- and to talk of regime change? They scarcely want another corrupt one of our making!
2) We are busily killing off 'al Qaeda' in Iraq. Apart from the fact that most either locate bin Laden somewhere in the wilds of Pakistan or see al Qaeda as just another diffuse bumper sticker cover for resistance movements in general, this label strikes one as both propagandistic and horrendously misleading if we are trying to make peace with the resistance movement in Iraq. Were I a Sunni, I would be making tracks out of there which I gather about a million or more, including 40% of the professionals, have already done before the Shiites go full force in extracting their revenge against their traditional Sunni enemies.
3) And then there are the 'bad' states. If one recollects at this time last year Syria was the root of all evil, sponsoring and funding Hezbollah in Lebanon, sending weapons towards Iraq, etc., etc. This was a bit improbable in that nothing would ultimately be more threatening to a Sunni nation than dominant Shiite neighbors on the march. But wait, now it is Iran that is the source of evil weapons scattered around to harass us. Maybe so, but from all reports Iran is having its own economic problems and most likely does not feature having to absorb yet more refugees from its beleaguered neighboring states. Besides its population is quite young and by all reports simply dreams of living the good life such as that they see glimpses of on the Internet.
4) And then there are Pakistan and Afghanistan. Each of these nations is made up of 5 separate tribal groups -- Musharraf came from India and is not a member of any of these clubs. But the dominant one that spans both nations is the Pashtuns. Now would not one expect these folks to be united against an occupying Western coalition? Poor Karzai is pleading with us to stop killing off civilians with our misdirected air strikes from on high. In that part of the world, if you harm a relative of mine, I am obligated to take out a dozen or so of yours -- and so it goes.
Still soft voices only occasionally slip through the mass media drum beats of misleading and missing critical information. Will we ever learn? Probably not, as it may already be too late to put Humpty Dumpty back together again. Iraq is the world's second most disrupted nation. Afghanistan is eighth. Fourteen of our good and decent men died this past two days. For what? Take heed!
--
"A war is just if there is no alternative, and the resort to arms is legitimate if they represent your last hope." (Livy cited by Machiavelli)
--
Ed Kent 718-951-5324 (voice mail only) [blind copies]
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/CollegeConversation
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/PeaceEfforts
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EndingPoverty
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/440neighborhood
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/StudentConcerns
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/AcademicFreedom
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/PrivacyRights
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Israel_Palestine
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/FindingHumaneJobs
http://BlogByEdKent.blogspot.com/
http://www.bloggernews.net
posted by Ed Kent at 8:59 AM
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