inspite of being a wanker:
Secrets and LiesThe DoD's disgraceful plot to plant rosy stories in the Iraqi press.
By Christopher Hitchens
This time, someone really does have to be fired. The revelation that Defense Department money, not even authorized by Congress for the purpose, has been outsourced to private interests and then used to plant stories in the Iraqi press is much more of a disgrace and a scandal than anyone seems so far to have said.
1. It helps discredit free media in Iraq at a time when that profession is very new and very hazardous (and one of the unarguable moral gains of the original intervention). In a situation already dominated by rumor and conspiracy-mongering, and in a country rife with death squads, it exposes every honest Iraqi reporter to the charge that he or she is an agent of a foreign power. Who at the Pentagon could possibly have needed to have this explained to them?
2. It comes on the heels of a credible report about a threat, from President George W. Bush, to bomb the Qatari headquarters of Al Jazeera. The British government, from whose inner circle the relevant memo has been leaked, might have taken credit—in that Tony Blair appears to have dissuaded Bush from this course of criminal insanity—but instead has threatened to use the Official Secrets Act against the newspaper that published it, thus somewhat strengthening the supposition that the story is true. Since certain people and places associated with Al Jazeera have been hit in the past, it appears more plausible than ever in retrospect that some deliberate "targeting" may have been involved.
...
4. It is not just a matter of lying to the Iraqis and to neighboring countries, bad as that would be. The feedback must also have been intended to deceive the American taxpayers whose money was used for the fraud in the first place.
http://www.slate.com/id/2131566/?nav=tap3Bingo on the last one...
The Iraqis KNOW what's going on for the most part, it is essentially the US administration producing propaganda that 'echoes' back to the Homeland.
A Blast From The Ancient Past:
Reuters
February 25, 2002
U.S. Planting False Stories Common Cold War Tactic
... "You would try and recruit a journalist and he would become an agent of influence," a former U.S. intelligence officer said.
The foreign journalist was either paid or acted out of hatred for a regime that harmed his family, "and he would plant stories which were favorable to your side," he said.
...
While the battlefield for the war of false words was traditionally the CIA's domain, a public debate over the issue of government-planted lies erupted this month after reports surfaced about the Pentagon's new Office of Strategic Influence.
Some of the reports said the office would be used to plant lies in foreign news outlets to influence public opinion abroad to further U.S. goals in its war on terrorism.
The flap forced top defense officials to publicly state they would never knowingly lie to the media, and left the U.S. intelligence community privately shaking its head at the folly of the military for trying to tread on its turf. "
http://www.fas.org/sgp/news/2002/02/re022502.htmlWhen do you think professional journalists might wake up? I mean they slept through the ethical debate on 'embedding' and ignored 'Gannon', don't take seriously top level discussions that Bush is trying to kill them and now this?
No wonder they rank lower than lawyers...
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