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Propaganda in the United States comes from both the government and private entities of various kinds. Propaganda is information, ideas, or rumors deliberately spread widely to influence opinions and incite action. Propaganda can be disseminated through any medium, including radio, newspaper, posters, books, and anything else that might be sent out to the widespread public.
Neoliberals (and by extension neoconservatives, as neoliberals with the gun) took an important page from Bolsheviks doctrine: organized party should have a core of "professional revolutionaries" which should be supported by research organizations. this is how neoliberal invented the consent of the "think tank"
Later the same trick was used with color revolution, when NGO became organizing center to the uprising against the current regime (if the regime was too timid to suppress them on early stage).
The story behind neoliberal think tanks such as Heritage foundation and AEI is really fascinating (Where Conservative Ideas Come From - The Chronicle of Higher Education, June 26, 2016
These think tanks are very powerful propaganda units, a real "propaganda tanks". Their function is to produce “reports” and “papers” that offer the neoliberal solid justification of the current anti-labor policies and instill in the minds of the US population the necessity of extending and maintaining the global neoliberal empire led by the USA (i.e producing talking points, publishing papers on the subject and giving interview). Neocons engaged in this activity are often called national security parasites. Robert Kagan and Max Boot are nice examples of this specie. They ensure that the propaganda war is being won by the neoliberals.Stahl’s chief object of inquiry is the American Enterprise Institute, or AEI. Founded in 1938 by a group of businessmen devoted to unwinding the New Deal, its true history began five years later, when its headquarters moved from New York to Washington. Inside the Beltway, AEI staffers portrayed themselves as nonpartisan scholars eager to assist lawmakers from both parties. That stance became increasingly difficult to maintain as the conservative movement grew in strength, and in the 1970s AEI was reborn as a champion of the right in the battle for ideas.
Success bred imitators, and AEI soon found itself outflanked by an upstart known as the Heritage Foundation. More concerned with passing legislation than posing as researchers, Heritage became the dominant think tank in Reagan’s Washington. These nimble practitioners of war-by-briefing-books made AEI seem musty and academic by comparison. AEI revived itself by shifting toward the middle, but it never regained its former centrality. It had changed too much, and so had conservatism.
There is no formal regulation of think tanks. Anyone can set
one up. "According to US academic Dr James McCann, who compiles
an annual think tank ranking, there are 6,305 such bodies in the
world. He lists 285 in the UK, giving it the most after the US
and China ...
BBC News
I think there are too many in the western elites (the ones that actually own the MSM and give it its marching orders, the BBC and CBC public news services then have to goosestep to the same tune or else be shut down for producing too much cognitive dissonance) who think they won the propaganda war against the USSR. Even though they had actual leverage points back then, neoliberal propaganda might still collapse from its own internal rot like happened with Marxist propaganda in the USSR. If the gap with reality became too wide, no amount of efforts can fix that.
But today these elites and their storm troopers have nothing to worry about. they still dominate and even with Trump election comnitue to dominate TV and airwaves.
Think tanks are the most important part of neoliberal propaganda machine. They act like script writers, composing and writing the dialogue that the donors want to be the American public to be brainwashed with. Communist propaganda machine worked the same way and organizations that created untrue ideas, talking points which made their leaders ideas, and plans seem good to the population.
This international ensemble of neoliberal think tanks is essentially a reimplementation of the idea of Comintern ( Communist International - Wikipedia) ;-). Such a Neoliberalism International... Some of them have a world Institute in the name similar to "Institute of Marxism-Leninism" in the USSR. Brookings Institution, CATO, Heritage are just reuse of this idea. Adding the word ‘institute/institution’ or 'foundation' to the name of ‘think-tank’ is a measure devised to give the patina of legitimacy to what is simply a regional headquarters of casino capitalism propaganda machine.
This huge propaganda machine of "professional revolutionaries" is not that distinct from the way Bolshevik Party emerged in the part -- a close circle of people mainly from intelligencia and paid by the party to be able to devote all their time to revolutionary activities. It is instrumental in hiding the truth about the real essence of neoliberalism from "common folk". The ridiculously high levels of money that are pumped into this propaganda machine by financial oligarchy ensure that the so called shmucks never awaken
In general both the Republican party and Democratic Party in the USA are not so much a party as propaganda machines. For example, many European observers consider the US republican party to be a cult in a sense that members of the USA Republican political party, have political, economic, and scientific views that are completly unscientific but were created inside of corporate think tanks and promoted to ensure the success and staying power of neoliberalism as a social system. Media groups like Fox news, MSN NBC, CNN, etc repeat these phrases and ideas on their news broadcasts until they became imprinted is listeners minds.
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Nov 30, 2017 | www.theamericanconservative.com
According to recent reports the Heritage Foundation, clearly the most established and many would say politically influential conservative think tank in Washington, is considering David Trulio, Lockheed Martin vice president and longtime lobbyist for the defense industry, to be its next president. While Heritage's connection to Washington's sprawling national security industry is already well-established, naming Trulio as its president might be seen as gilding the lily.If anything, reading this report made me more aware of the degree to which the "conservative policy community" in Washington depends on the whims and interests of particular donors.
And this relationship is apparently no longer something to be concealed or embarrassed by. One can now be open about being in the pocket of the defense industry. Trulio's potential elevation to Heritage president at what we can assume will be an astronomical salary, will no doubt grease the already well-oiled pipeline of funds from major contractors to this "conservative" foundation, which already operates with an annual disclosed budget of almost $100 million.
A 2009 Heritage Foundation report, " Maintaining the Superiority of America's Defense Industrial Base ," called for further government investment in aircraft weaponry for "ensuring a superior fighting force" and "sustaining international stability." In 2011, senior national security fellow James Carafano wrote " Five Steps to Defend America's Industrial Defense Base ," which complained about a "fifty billion dollar under-procurement by the Pentagon" for buying new weaponry. In 2016, Heritage made the case for several years of reinvestment to get the military back on "sound footing," with an increase in fiscal year 2016 described as "an encouraging start."
These special pleas pose a question: which came first, Heritage's heavy dependence on funds from defense giants, or the foundation's belief that unless we steadily increase our military arsenal we'll be endangering "international stability"? Perhaps the answer lies somewhere in the middle: someone who is predisposed to go in a certain direction may be more inclined to do so if he is being rewarded in return. Incidentally, the 2009 position paper seems to be directing the government to throw more taxpayer dollars to Boeing than to its competitor Lockheed. But it seems both defense giants have landed a joint contract this year to produce a new submersible for the Navy, so it may no longer be necessary to pick sides on that one at least. No doubt both corporations will continue to look after Heritage, which will predictably call for further increases, whether they be in aerospace or shipbuilding.
Although one needn't reduce everything to dollars and cents, if we're looking at the issues Heritage and other likeminded foundations are likely to push today, it's far more probable they'll be emphasizing the national security state rather than, say, opposition to gay marriage or the defense of traditional gender roles. There's lots more money to be made advocating for the former rather than the latter. In May 2013, Heritage sponsored a formal debate between "two conservatives" and "two liberals" on the issue of defense spending, with Heritage and National Review presenting the "conservative" side. I wondered as I listened to part of this verbal battle why is was considered "conservative" to call for burdening American taxpayers with massive increases in the purchase of Pentagon weaponry and planes that take 17 years to get off the ground.
Like American higher education, Conservatism Inc. is very big business. Whatever else it's about rates a very far second to keeping the money flowing. "Conservative" positions are often simply causes for which foundations and media enterprises that have the word "conservative" attached to them are paid to represent. It is the label carried by an institution or publication, not necessarily the position it takes, that makes what NR or Heritage advocates "conservative."
In any event, Mr. Trulio won't have to travel far if he takes the Heritage helm. He and his corporation are already ensconced only a few miles away from Heritage's Massachusetts Avenue headquarters, if the information provided by Lockheed Martin is correct. It says: "Headquartered in Bethesda, Maryland, Lockheed Martin is a global security and aerospace company that employs approximately 98,000 people worldwide and is principally engaged in the research, design, development, manufacture, integration and sustainment of advanced technology systems, products and services." A company like that can certainly afford to underwrite a think tank -- if the price is right.
Paul Gottfried is Raffensperger Professor of Humanities Emeritus at Elizabethtown College, where he taught for twenty-five years. He is a Guggenheim recipient and a Yale PhD. He writes for many websites and scholarly journals and is the author of thirteen books, most recently Fascism: Career of a Concept and Revisions and Dissents . His books have been translated into multiple languages and seem to enjoy special success in Eastern Europe.
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Nov 30, 2017 | www.theamericanconservative.com
According to recent reports the Heritage Foundation, clearly the most established and many would say politically influential conservative think tank in Washington, is considering David Trulio, Lockheed Martin vice president and longtime lobbyist for the defense industry, to be its next president. While Heritage's connection to Washington's sprawling national security industry is already well-established, naming Trulio as its president might be seen as gilding the lily.If anything, reading this report made me more aware of the degree to which the "conservative policy community" in Washington depends on the whims and interests of particular donors.
And this relationship is apparently no longer something to be concealed or embarrassed by. One can now be open about being in the pocket of the defense industry. Trulio's potential elevation to Heritage president at what we can assume will be an astronomical salary, will no doubt grease the already well-oiled pipeline of funds from major contractors to this "conservative" foundation, which already operates with an annual disclosed budget of almost $100 million.
A 2009 Heritage Foundation report, " Maintaining the Superiority of America's Defense Industrial Base ," called for further government investment in aircraft weaponry for "ensuring a superior fighting force" and "sustaining international stability." In 2011, senior national security fellow James Carafano wrote " Five Steps to Defend America's Industrial Defense Base ," which complained about a "fifty billion dollar under-procurement by the Pentagon" for buying new weaponry. In 2016, Heritage made the case for several years of reinvestment to get the military back on "sound footing," with an increase in fiscal year 2016 described as "an encouraging start."
These special pleas pose a question: which came first, Heritage's heavy dependence on funds from defense giants, or the foundation's belief that unless we steadily increase our military arsenal we'll be endangering "international stability"? Perhaps the answer lies somewhere in the middle: someone who is predisposed to go in a certain direction may be more inclined to do so if he is being rewarded in return. Incidentally, the 2009 position paper seems to be directing the government to throw more taxpayer dollars to Boeing than to its competitor Lockheed. But it seems both defense giants have landed a joint contract this year to produce a new submersible for the Navy, so it may no longer be necessary to pick sides on that one at least. No doubt both corporations will continue to look after Heritage, which will predictably call for further increases, whether they be in aerospace or shipbuilding.
Although one needn't reduce everything to dollars and cents, if we're looking at the issues Heritage and other likeminded foundations are likely to push today, it's far more probable they'll be emphasizing the national security state rather than, say, opposition to gay marriage or the defense of traditional gender roles. There's lots more money to be made advocating for the former rather than the latter. In May 2013, Heritage sponsored a formal debate between "two conservatives" and "two liberals" on the issue of defense spending, with Heritage and National Review presenting the "conservative" side. I wondered as I listened to part of this verbal battle why is was considered "conservative" to call for burdening American taxpayers with massive increases in the purchase of Pentagon weaponry and planes that take 17 years to get off the ground.
Like American higher education, Conservatism Inc. is very big business. Whatever else it's about rates a very far second to keeping the money flowing. "Conservative" positions are often simply causes for which foundations and media enterprises that have the word "conservative" attached to them are paid to represent. It is the label carried by an institution or publication, not necessarily the position it takes, that makes what NR or Heritage advocates "conservative."
In any event, Mr. Trulio won't have to travel far if he takes the Heritage helm. He and his corporation are already ensconced only a few miles away from Heritage's Massachusetts Avenue headquarters, if the information provided by Lockheed Martin is correct. It says: "Headquartered in Bethesda, Maryland, Lockheed Martin is a global security and aerospace company that employs approximately 98,000 people worldwide and is principally engaged in the research, design, development, manufacture, integration and sustainment of advanced technology systems, products and services." A company like that can certainly afford to underwrite a think tank -- if the price is right.
Paul Gottfried is Raffensperger Professor of Humanities Emeritus at Elizabethtown College, where he taught for twenty-five years. He is a Guggenheim recipient and a Yale PhD. He writes for many websites and scholarly journals and is the author of thirteen books, most recently Fascism: Career of a Concept and Revisions and Dissents . His books have been translated into multiple languages and seem to enjoy special success in Eastern Europe.
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September 22, 2012 | stumblingandmumbling.typepad.com
Chris Skidmore, one of the authors of Britannia Unchained, says:
People aren't interested in looking at medians and graphs. We have a duty to try and broaden that message outside of the think tank zone.
I don't know what to make of this. It could be that Skidmore is recommending that politicians use social science in the way Paul Krugman urges economists to use maths - you base your policy upon it, but then find a way of advocating the policy in more populist language.
Sadly, though, it is not at all obvious that Britannia Unchained's authors are using this reasonable approach. They seem instead to have skipped the science and evidence and gone straight to the populism.
This suggests an unkinder interpretation - that Skidmore thinks formal science has no place in politics. What matters is what sells, not what's right.
The problem here is that there is no strong obstacle to this descent into post-modern politics. The anti-scientific culture of our mainstream media means they will not call politicians out on their abuse of facts, unless the abuser is not in their tribe - as Jonathan complained in noting the press's reaction to Britannia Unchained.
But does this matter? In one sense, maybe not. Expert support and empirical evidence does not guarantee that a policy will be a success - though I suspect it improves the odds.
Instead, what worries me is that this threatens to further corrode the standard of political discourse.Fact-free politics need not be the sole preserve of the right; some of my readers will have the name of Richard Murphy in their minds. And if we go down this road, we'll end up with one tribe thinking the poor are all scroungers and the other thinking our economic problem can be solved by a crackdown on tax dodging. And the two tribes will just be throwing insults at each other. And there's a few of us who think this would be dull.
BenSix | September 22, 2012 at 12:09 PM
I don't think that's what Skidmore's saying but nor do I think that what he's saying is any less silly. He replies to charges of slipshod research and laziness by saying..."...it's a 116-page book, there's 433 footnotes to it."
I see this a lot: the implicit claim that the merit of work can be judged by the amount of references that it contains. Yet that says nothing about the quality of its research or interpretation. I could argue that I'm God and add 433 footnotes that reference self-published blogposts in which I proclaim that I'm a deity but it wouldn't make it a work of scholarship.
Chris | September 22, 2012 at 10:05 PM
"Fact-free politics need not be the sole preserve of the right"
They need not be, but they are.
Blissex | September 23, 2012 at 12:47 PM
Continuing my previous comment on voter hypocrisy, yes there are many voters who consider politics a spectator sport, a source of entertainment, just like news.
But my impression is that "fact free" politics is really a cover for an unwillingness to discuss the available facts, because they are unpleasant, as they relate to nasty self interest and distributional issues.
Politics thus may be fact free because the facts cannot be be discussed in a politically correct way, and therefore dog whistling abounds.
It is not a question of tribes, but of interests, even if these interests relate fairly directly to culture and in particular theology (most "culture" is the corrupted legacy of some dead theologian).
Consider this quote:
http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/commentators/owen-jones-workingclass-toryism-is-dying-and-its-taking-the-party-with-it-7851880.html
"When I was at university, a one-time very senior Tory figure put it succinctly at an off-the-record gathering: the Conservative Party, he explained, was a "coalition of privileged interests. Its main purpose is to defend that privilege. And the way it wins elections is by giving just enough to just enough other people"."Are Richard Murphy's posts really that fact free? A lot of the left seem to rely a lot on his "insights" (especially the PCS trade union).
SR819 | September 24, 2012 at 02:28 PM
But my impression is that "fact free" politics is really a cover for an unwillingness to discuss the available facts, because they are unpleasant, as they relate to nasty self interest and distributional issues.
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Think Tank Spectrum, 1998-99Much like in the global economy, in the world of the think tanks that dominate the mass media, the rich have gotten richer.
There has been little shuffling at the top of the most cited think-tank list, based on references to the group in major papers and broadcast transcripts in the Nexis database. Once again, the Brookings Institution led the way, with close to 3,000 citations among major newspapers and television and radio transcripts.
While the Heritage Foundation once rivaled Brookings in prominence, Washington's premier centrist think tank has separated itself from the rest of the pack, more than doubling the frequency of the next most prominent think tank, the Cato Institute. The Heritage Foundation has fallen to third place.
While this survey reveals that media show a greater reliance on think tanks than at the time of the last survey two years ago, the constituencies representing a center/right debate have further cemented their positions as media-friendly analysts. In the survey of 1997, conservative or right-leaning think tanks received 53 percent of all citations, 32 percent of citations went to centrist think tanks, and only 16 percent of the citations went to progressive or left-leaning think tanks. The percentages for progressive or left-leaning think tanks have declined slightly since then.
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These think tanks along with Fox news and Rush radio, have placed 100's of ideas and phrases, into the brains of US republicans. And they are all untrue, unreal, and/ or fantasys.
The following are a few examples of (untrue) phrases, that were created inside of think tanks, and repeated by Fox news and Rush radio, that have become the actual political, economic, and scientific thought processes inside of US republican brains. All of the phrases created by theses think tanks, are designed to lower taxes and increase profits for, Americas rich and large corporations.
The following is one example of a (scientific) untrue belief, that was created inside of a corporate think tank, that has become a thought process of US republicans.
1. Fox news and Rush radio say the following "Global warming is not happening, and global warming is a hoax and a lie, created by the worlds political left."
Even though 97% of climate scientists state "global warming is happening" , these Fox news and Rush radio propaganda group victims still believe "global warming is not happening." The victims of this propaganda group also believe that, the scientists who say "global warming is happening" are lying and involved in a conspiracy plot started by the worlds political left
I have spoken to many members of this propaganda group/ cult, who believe that global warming is not happening. And even though I tell them 10x "97% of climate scientists say "global warming is happening, and I can show you proof", they refuse to believe it. Once these US republicans get into this propaganda group/ cult they only trust information from Fox news and Rush radio.
Note: These think tanks created the lie "global warming is not happening", to increase the profits of large corporations like Exxon Mobile.
2. tax cuts for Americas rich, increase government revenues
(While all respected economists, even US republican economists state, "tax cuts for Americas rich do (not) increase government revenues.")
The above think tank created lie effects the propaganda group/ cult victims, in the same way as the think tank phrase "global warming is not happening."And I have also told these victims of this propaganda group, that "all respected economists state, tax cuts for the rich do not increase government revenues", and just like with global warming, these propaganda group victims do not believe it. They only believe information from Fox news and Rush radio. They believe any information (not) from Fox news or Rush radio are lies from a conspiracy plot created by the worlds political left.
The following are a few more examples of (economic) think tank phrases, that are lies and untrue, according to respected economists, but still victims of this propaganda group believe them as true.
These are only a few examples there are 100's more.
1.) tax cuts for Americas rich, and large corporations create jobs (economists say this is un-true, b/c small business creates most new US jobs, and also large US corporations are moving many US jobs to China for cheaper labor.)
2.) tax cuts for Americas rich stimulate the economy (economists say this is un-true, and it stimulates Chinas economy, thats were Americas rich create jobs to get cheap labor.)
3.) large US corporations are forced to pay too much money in taxes (While GE corp and many other large US corporations have a -0- % tax rate, and these same corporations get billions in tax refunds, these corporations tax rate is actually (negative) billions of dollars.)
4.) Americas rich are forced to pay too much money in taxes (While Warren Buffet has a 17% tax rate, and Americans who make $60,000 a year have a 30% tax rate, Americas rich have around 1/2 less the tax rate as regular Americans.)
5.) the death tax effects everyone (reality: it only effects the top 2% of richest americans.)
6.) the flat/fair tax is the best idea for all Americans (While the flat tax is actually a huge tax cut for the rich, and a huge tax increase for everyone else. source: Citizens for Tax Justice.)
7.) free trade creates better paying american jobs (reality: in 2001, economists estimated that 3/4 of American workers lost about 12% of their current wages because of free trade deals.)
8.) raising the minimum wage kills jobs and hurts low-income workers (reality: economists say this cant be proven, because states with high min. wages actually create more jobs.)
9.) higher wages mean higher prices (reality: the US department of agriculture did a huge study on this and found this un-true)
10.) low wages are offset by low prices (reality: economists say this does not happen.)
11.) free markets -not regulation- will keep intrest rates low (reality: economists say this is un-true)
12.) "free" trade laws make trade actually free (reality: these laws only give billions of dollars to Americas rich)
13.) we dont need policies that increase wages because wages are already growing (reality: When republicans said this, American workers wages just decreased by 0.6 %.
It seems that any untrue or unreal think tank created phrase, is believed by US republicans.
This US republican (propaganda group) media says, and repeats 10,000's of untrue, false, and untrue fantasy phrases about economics, science, US democrats, liberal organizations, and US democrats laws each year.
And because of the fact, their are millions of US republicans, this propaganda group/ cult, says and repeats millions and millions of lies and untrue things each year in America.
I challenge any forum member to post/ list any group of people, who have said more lies than US republicans, in a 15 year period.
I believe chances are, there has never been a group of people, in the history of all mankind, that has said and repeated as many lies and un-true things as US republicans, said and repeated in the last 15 years. But increased population and better media systems may be the reason for this, but maybe not?
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So now you've seen the power of conservative propaganda for setting America's agenda. This week we saw the annihilation of progressive ideas by the most sophisticated, deeply funded, and precisely orchestrated public relations system ever concocted.
And they are preparing to take things up a notch now that they've won. The gears are well greased and the engine is humming. Prospects are slim for President Obama and the remaining progressives in Congress. If we don't act now, 2012 will mark the end of the progressive rise to power in American politics.
Now is the time to respond with force.
We have to rally together and stop the message machine that aligns corporate wealth with the American story. The stakes are too high for us to ignore this threat any longer. Our enemy is not a party. It is a system designed to manipulate public perceptions about what it means to be American. And it is unraveling the tapestry of our culture and destroying our democracy.
I've watched the progressive leadership closely in the last five years as they have repeatedly underestimated this oppositional force and overlooked its fundamental threat to America's future. They have invested nearly all their time and money in candidates and policies, naively thinking that rational discourse would save the day despite a mountain of evidence to the contrary. Very little has been done to build the 21st Century communication infrastructure we need to counter the vast network of think tanks, media outlets, and cultural myths that preserve the status quo.
To give you a sense of exactly what we're up against, consider how the Tea Party Movement came into being:
- A group of billionaires organized by Koch Industries came together and designed the initiative;
- Spokespeople were planted in the mainstream media to suggest that it was time for a revolution reminiscent of the founding days of our country;
- A massive media platform including Fox News and conservative radio spread the meme to every corner of the country;
- Seed funding was provided to organize the first rallies, all the while painting it as a "grassroots movement";
- Narratives that had been planted by conservative think tanks throughout the last forty years were evoked as "traditional values";
- Real concerns by people suffering under corporate corruption were tapped to evoke strong anger and fear;
- People came out in droves to support Tea Party candidates who were actually in cahoots with their corporate benefactors.
All of the investments have paid off. The Democratic majority in Congress is gone. President Obama has been put on the defensive. And local initiatives across the country have advanced conservative policies into law at the city, county, and state level.
Put simply, we're getting our asses kicked.
Now more than ever, we need effective governance in the various sectors, including both public and private to save our country from collapse. Yet what we have is a deep collusion between wealthy corporatists and a significant cabal in government. Their collusion is profoundly anti-democratic and even anti-market (as demonstrated by the devastating impacts of their policies on financial markets in 2008). So what we're getting is a group of financiers who set up communication systems to manipulate public perception and drive boom-crash cycles in the economy to siphon all forms of wealth into their coffers.
We can't let this happen any longer. Now is the time to act.
Are you concerned about the future of America? Would you like to finally see the American people have a stronger footing than large corporations in our politics? Then you should invest wisely in the infrastructure that is capable of elevating progressive ideas so they dominate public discourse. Stop dumping all your money and time into reactionary campaigns to save progressive policy from the conservative hammer. Break out of the election cycle mold and build for the long haul. And start being strategically proactive by targeting the source of power our opposition holds – the Conservative Worldview.
When I was a fellow of the now defunct Rockridge Institute I saw the potential for decisive strategic action that reframes political debate. It was painful to watch progressive philanthropists turn their backs on this foundational work and pour all their money into the 2008 campaign. What would have happened if they had instead pooled a few million dollars to invest in the design of a communication framework that brings coherence to the progressive vision? How might this year's election have been different if progressives across the country were taught how to deconstruct conservative stories and challenge them in a manner that fundamentally weakens their influence?
It's getting late in the game and our side is way behind. Our only chance for a comeback is to respond directly to the conservative propaganda machine. Right now we don't have adequate capacity for getting our messages out to the public. And we rely too heavily on outdated tactics that repeatedly fail in the face of such a powerful opposition.
We have to be smart. We have to be organized. And we have to be strategic. It's now or never.
Are you with me?
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MyFDL
1:29 am in Uncategorized by Barefoot Accountant
I just watched Robert Greenwald's film clip, Koch Brothers Exposed, and was blown totally away at the operation of a brilliant propaganda machine, making that of Hitler and Goebbels in comparision appear infantile and primitive. This is a propaganda machine well thought out, organized, and orchestrated.First, the Koch Brothers and other corporatist interests fund millions of dollars to these right-wing think tanks of economists and political scientists, as the Cato Institute, Heritage Foundation, Mercatus Center, Reagan Foundation, et al, to write the script that these donors want to disseminate to the general public. These think tanks are sort of like screenwriters or script writers, composing and writing the dialogue that the donors want published to the American public.
Then attractive economists and political scientists of these organizations make guest appearances on the media, such as Fox Business, or the Kudlow Report, Neil Cavuto's Your World, and Fox News, reading the carefully crafted orchestrated scripts in an effort to get the word out.
The next step then is that the media mouthpieces, such as Lawrence Kudlow, Britt Hume, Gretchen Carlson, et al, start repeating this script as if it's gospel since it emanated out from these so-called think tanks. This is the important segment missing in the Hitler-Goebbels propaganda strategy. These supposed news reporters and journalists add a touch of credibility and veracity and objectivity to the propaganda. Robert Greenwald and Bernie Sanders refer to this phenomenon as the "echo chamber".
Lastly, our politicians then repeat almost word-for-word what has been said over and over by the think tanks and the media personalities on talk shows such as "Hardball" (which in my opinion should now be renamed "Softball"): e.g., last night Kay Bailey Hutchison just repeated their script on raising the Social Security age to Chris Matthews, who then exclaimed in his sycophant manner that she should run for President of the United States. Gosh.
For those of you interested in seeing this excellent clip by the Brave New Foundation on the "Echo Chamber", please see, Counter the Koch Billions. Protect Social Security. Will you help Senator Sanders expose the Koch Echo Chamber? Video Transcript.
For Cenk Uygur's interview of Robert Greenwald, the producer of this very important clip, please see, Social distortion. Does the GOP suffer from social insecurity? Cenk Uygur June 22 2011 video transcript.
Please get involved and organized now; tomorrow may be too late: the rich and multinational corporations are kicking our ass.
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CATO was making much hay a few days ago about budget problems in California, New York, and New Jersey, which can be explained, respectively, by the Governor's veto of an Assembly-passed budget a few months ago, the decline in tax revenues from financial services firms and continuing loss of upstate industry, and underfunded pension obligations whose origins date back to Christie's cocaine-inspired budgets of the mid-1990s.
Strangely (via Dr. Black), they missed the crises in a few other states, most especially including the state governed by Republic hero Mitch Daniels:
Republican Gov. Mitch Daniels has warned residents that most of the state's services -- including its parks, the Bureau of Motor Vehicles and state-regulated casinos -- would be shuttered unless a budget is passed today.Closing down the casinos? Now that is extreme.Mitch Daniels, doing for my old home state
Posted by Ken Houghton at 11:29 AM Comments (12)
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War and Peace : Skeptical Finance : John Kenneth Galbraith :Talleyrand : Oscar Wilde : Otto Von Bismarck : Keynes : George Carlin : Skeptics : Propaganda : SE quotes : Language Design and Programming Quotes : Random IT-related quotes : Somerset Maugham : Marcus Aurelius : Kurt Vonnegut : Eric Hoffer : Winston Churchill : Napoleon Bonaparte : Ambrose Bierce : Bernard Shaw : Mark Twain Quotes
Bulletin:
Vol 25, No.12 (December, 2013) Rational Fools vs. Efficient Crooks The efficient markets hypothesis : Political Skeptic Bulletin, 2013 : Unemployment Bulletin, 2010 : Vol 23, No.10 (October, 2011) An observation about corporate security departments : Slightly Skeptical Euromaydan Chronicles, June 2014 : Greenspan legacy bulletin, 2008 : Vol 25, No.10 (October, 2013) Cryptolocker Trojan (Win32/Crilock.A) : Vol 25, No.08 (August, 2013) Cloud providers as intelligence collection hubs : Financial Humor Bulletin, 2010 : Inequality Bulletin, 2009 : Financial Humor Bulletin, 2008 : Copyleft Problems Bulletin, 2004 : Financial Humor Bulletin, 2011 : Energy Bulletin, 2010 : Malware Protection Bulletin, 2010 : Vol 26, No.1 (January, 2013) Object-Oriented Cult : Political Skeptic Bulletin, 2011 : Vol 23, No.11 (November, 2011) Softpanorama classification of sysadmin horror stories : Vol 25, No.05 (May, 2013) Corporate bullshit as a communication method : Vol 25, No.06 (June, 2013) A Note on the Relationship of Brooks Law and Conway Law
History:
Fifty glorious years (1950-2000): the triumph of the US computer engineering : Donald Knuth : TAoCP and its Influence of Computer Science : Richard Stallman : Linus Torvalds : Larry Wall : John K. Ousterhout : CTSS : Multix OS Unix History : Unix shell history : VI editor : History of pipes concept : Solaris : MS DOS : Programming Languages History : PL/1 : Simula 67 : C : History of GCC development : Scripting Languages : Perl history : OS History : Mail : DNS : SSH : CPU Instruction Sets : SPARC systems 1987-2006 : Norton Commander : Norton Utilities : Norton Ghost : Frontpage history : Malware Defense History : GNU Screen : OSS early history
Classic books:
The Peter Principle : Parkinson Law : 1984 : The Mythical Man-Month : How to Solve It by George Polya : The Art of Computer Programming : The Elements of Programming Style : The Unix Hater’s Handbook : The Jargon file : The True Believer : Programming Pearls : The Good Soldier Svejk : The Power Elite
Most popular humor pages:
Manifest of the Softpanorama IT Slacker Society : Ten Commandments of the IT Slackers Society : Computer Humor Collection : BSD Logo Story : The Cuckoo's Egg : IT Slang : C++ Humor : ARE YOU A BBS ADDICT? : The Perl Purity Test : Object oriented programmers of all nations : Financial Humor : Financial Humor Bulletin, 2008 : Financial Humor Bulletin, 2010 : The Most Comprehensive Collection of Editor-related Humor : Programming Language Humor : Goldman Sachs related humor : Greenspan humor : C Humor : Scripting Humor : Real Programmers Humor : Web Humor : GPL-related Humor : OFM Humor : Politically Incorrect Humor : IDS Humor : "Linux Sucks" Humor : Russian Musical Humor : Best Russian Programmer Humor : Microsoft plans to buy Catholic Church : Richard Stallman Related Humor : Admin Humor : Perl-related Humor : Linus Torvalds Related humor : PseudoScience Related Humor : Networking Humor : Shell Humor : Financial Humor Bulletin, 2011 : Financial Humor Bulletin, 2012 : Financial Humor Bulletin, 2013 : Java Humor : Software Engineering Humor : Sun Solaris Related Humor : Education Humor : IBM Humor : Assembler-related Humor : VIM Humor : Computer Viruses Humor : Bright tomorrow is rescheduled to a day after tomorrow : Classic Computer Humor
The Last but not Least Technology is dominated by two types of people: those who understand what they do not manage and those who manage what they do not understand ~Archibald Putt. Ph.D
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Last modified: December, 01, 2017
