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When did our fucking generals become propaganda ministers?

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tjwash Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Mar-08-06 12:42 PM
Original message
When did our fucking generals become propaganda ministers?
Edited on Wed Mar-08-06 12:43 PM by tjwash
Yeah, I know, I'm a bad person because I am not supporting the troops by fawning over everything that some jerk-off in a uniform actually says.

"I would say they're going very, very well from everything you look at. No matter where you look at their military, their police, their society - things are much better this year than they were last."
Gen. Peter Pace meet the press

Yeah Pete, everything is just fucking great you tool.



"The press had better hope we win this war, because if we don't, a lot of people will blame the media."
General George Casey, saying for about the hundredth time now, that it is the presses fault that Iraq has turned into an un winnable vietnam-style quagmire.

:rant:

I can almost agree with George Casey's fucked up saying above, but not for the same twisted reasoning that he is using.

Remember right after 9-11, and how the chimp could absolutely do no wrong in the eyes of the people, and the world? Remember how this group of thieves used it to their advantage, invaded, and stayed in Afghanistan just long enough to get the pipeline construction started, and went went straight over to Iraq, where all the oil was? Remember you couldn't even turn on the TV, without every stinking channel on TV feeding us "weapons of mass destruction", "smoking gun in the form of a mushroom cloud", or how they would insert any of a hundred canned phrases about terrorism and append "Iraq", and "Saddam Hussein" at the end of it every time?

How every news channel, paper, and website could not wait to rush us to war, and acted like it was some sort of a fucking pep-rally, and that we had all better jump on the bandwagon, join the team, and come in for the big win, and don't get left behind.

Remember How these whores gave huge coverage to "pro-war rallies", that only a hundred or so freepers would show up, but buried it on page 12, and peppered it with snide comments, when hundreds of thousands of us got in the streets to protest what we saw coming? How the sons of bitches crucified, and smeared us relentlessly, and how we got used to being accused of such quaint, cliche things as "being un-american", "giving aid and comfort to the enemy", or being "terrorist sympathizers" when we dared to open our mouths and object to this rush to quagmire.

So yeah, I can almost agree with that, it could be the presses fault. If the press actually made the decisions, moved the troops, and made the decisions, which, in that manner it isn't.

The real thing that has my panties in a bunch, however, about the way the press rushed us into this, is that it could have been stopped in 2004. The American people could have tossed this entire, corrupt bunch of thieves out on their ears, if the press, and the "liberal media" JUST WOULD HAVE DONE THEIR JOBS. They are at fault, in the way that propaganda was shoveled 7 X 24 about "Swift Boating", "Osama Bin Laden wants you to vote for John Kerry <or insert whatever Democrats name here>", and a hundred thousand other sound bites spoon fed to ma-and-pa naascar.

In that way, I could almost blame the press for keeping the U.S. in to what has turned into a completely un-winnable situation, when we had a chance for our voices to be heard.

I just needed to get that off of my chest.

/rant

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Clark2008 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Mar-08-06 12:44 PM
Response to Original message
1. Most always have been - the truly great ones are those
who don't always toe the militaristic propaganda, generally Republican Party, line.

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tjwash Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Mar-08-06 12:45 PM
Response to Reply #1
3. You actually have my favorite general in your sig-line.
:toast:
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Clark2008 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Mar-08-06 11:39 PM
Response to Reply #3
20. And you have my favorite journalist in yours.
:hi:
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Captain Hilts Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Mar-08-06 12:46 PM
Response to Reply #1
4. Before the 1950s, most refused to vote
My mother worked in the Sec. War/Sec. Army's office, and none of the honchos voted.

A friend of mine was related to George C. Marshall and she said he voted for the first time in 1952.

Marshall also refused social invitations to go to Hyde Park. "You can't disagree with a man when you're in his house."
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Captain Hilts Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Mar-08-06 12:45 PM
Response to Original message
2. At the SOTU, Pace and the army CoStaff stood and applauded...
while the others reamined seated.
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Tierra_y_Libertad Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Mar-08-06 12:48 PM
Response to Original message
5. They're reserving their jobs in the "defense" industry after retirement.
aka - The Military Industrial Complex
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soothsayer Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Mar-08-06 12:51 PM
Response to Original message
6. I enjoyed his hypnotic, mesmorizing soft way of speaking when he
made that statement. I think he was putting the koolaid drinkers into a trance.
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paineinthearse Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Mar-08-06 12:51 PM
Response to Original message
7. I believe it happened as a result of Rummy's "transformation" program
...at a point after Gen. Shinseki was forced out.
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catmandu57 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Mar-08-06 12:53 PM
Response to Original message
8. When they sacked the real generals
for telling the truth, then replaced them with toadies.
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Solly Mack Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Mar-08-06 12:54 PM
Response to Original message
9. Officers have always been political. Always. And the higher
they advance, the worse they become. Propaganda is anything but a small part of their political activities.

Officers who don't want to play the game rarely make it beyond a certain rank. Part of the game is spouting whatever the CinC demands of them.
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shaniqua6392 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Mar-08-06 12:55 PM
Response to Original message
10. The press can hardly be blamed.
The ones who are in Iraq can not even leave the green zone. So, I find it hard to believe that we are only getting the bad news from the press. The media is not liberal. They are the right wing propaganda machine and what little news we get from them is probably a bunch of crap. I personally believe that things are much worse in Iraq than our media lets on. And they do not even cover Afghanistan at all unless one of our troops are killed. We are actually at war in TWO countries, yet no one even thinks about our troops in Afghanistan. I would be impressed if the media actually told us the truth.
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tjwash Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Mar-08-06 01:47 PM
Response to Reply #10
16. The truly sad part is...
Edited on Wed Mar-08-06 01:49 PM by tjwash
...the region is just so completely destabilized now, I am not really sure what can be done now.

It's already devolved into chaos and civil war, even thought the press keeps putting off actually calling it that.

We are screwed, 100% on this, no matter what we do.

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bunkerbuster1 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Mar-08-06 12:56 PM
Response to Original message
11. Casey, define "a lot," please.
If by "a lot of people will blame the media," you mean the usual suspects in the RW echo chamber, well duh. Of course they will.

so fucking what?

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tabasco Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Mar-08-06 01:01 PM
Response to Original message
12. All the generals with an ounce of moral courage are retired.
Edited on Wed Mar-08-06 01:02 PM by tabasco
All the yes-men are promoted. This is how the Bush corporate cabal operates - like a gangster syndicate.

I got to know Pete Pace several years ago. He was a yes-man then, and he is a yes-man now. He is very intelligent, but lacks humanity.

On edit: It will take our military decades to recover from the damage done by the corrupt Bush administration.
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wtmusic Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Mar-08-06 01:04 PM
Response to Original message
13. If those Sunnis would stop reading the New York Times
and listening to Air America everything would be just...peachy.
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peacetalksforall Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Mar-08-06 01:19 PM
Response to Original message
14. It is sick - polish public realtion efforts to get away with killing. nt
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bowens43 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Mar-08-06 01:27 PM
Response to Original message
15. somewhere around 1775
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Metta Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Mar-08-06 02:37 PM
Response to Original message
17. Who better in a police state to do the p.r.?
Fortunately, they're painfully obvious. :thumbsdown: :donut:
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LaPera Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Mar-08-06 02:41 PM
Response to Original message
18. They have ALWAYS loved war-why do you think they chose a career
Edited on Wed Mar-08-06 02:45 PM by LaPera
in the military---These basically fragile egos, who believe they are real men, macho, who love the weapons as their toys, love the power and image of uniform and the more decorations, the more they drool...not to mention the hundreds of billions of dollars thrown at them every year...They love war and are always itching to use their new weapons & toys!!!
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rman Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Wed Mar-08-06 02:57 PM
Response to Original message
19. since forever
At least since "THE ART OF WAR" by Sun Tzu
http://www.chinapage.com/sunzi-e.html

"18. All warfare is based on deception."


Public opinion is one of their enemies.
Or at least it can be an obstacle to them.
And they know very well how to deal with that.
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Mayberry Machiavelli Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Mar-09-06 12:23 AM
Response to Original message
21. It sure didn't start with shrubco, although the high up generals in
shrubco are certainly major propagandists.

Remember Westmoreland and "light at the end of the tunnel?"

I'm sure a cursory glance at history will show many examples from the Civil War, the World Wars, and since the beginning of war and militaries.
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