News media: discerning bias, propaganda, and lies - Page 4

On April 12 2017 18:52 maybenexttime wrote:
My point was that if it did not get banned for things I reported it for, then I find it unlikely they would ban it for anything, because it doesn't post anything worse than that.

Add to that the fact that Sylwia de Weydenthal, a pretty important figure in Polish Facebook (not sure what her position is called), is a fan of SokzBuraka,

On April 19 2017 22:57 LightSpectra wrote:
The NYTimes did report on the other side of the story: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/13/world/middleeast/assad-syria-video-faked.html

It's important for journalists to report both sides of the story, but that doesn't mean doing so uncritically. Otherwise you'd have nonsense like half an article showcasing the putative evidence for a flat earth and whatnot.

A Quick Turnaround Assessment of the White House Intelligence Report Issued on April 11, 2017

About the Nerve Agent Attack in Khan Shaykhun, Syria.

Theodore A. Postol, Professor Emeritus of Science, Technology, and National Security Policy, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Dear Larry:

I am responding to your distribution of what I understand is a White House statement claiming intelligence findings about the nerve agent attack on April 4, 2017 in Khan Shaykhun, Syria. My understanding from your note is that this White House intelligence summary was released to you sometime on April 11, 2017.

I have reviewed the document carefully, and I believe it can be shown, without doubt, that the document does not provide any evidence whatsoever that the US government has concrete knowledge that the government of Syria was the source of the chemical attack in Khan Shaykhun, Syria at roughly 6 to 7 a.m. on April 4, 2017.

In fact, a main piece of evidence that is cited in the document points to an attack that was executed by individuals on the ground, not from an aircraft, on the morning of April 4.

This conclusion is based on an assumption made by the White House when it cited the source of the sarin release and the photographs of that source. My own assessment, is that the source was very likely tampered with or staged, so no serious conclusion could be made from the photographs cited by the White House.

However, if one assumes, as does the White House, that the source of the sarin was from this location and that the location was not tampered with, the most plausible conclusion is that the sarin was dispensed by an improvised dispersal device made from a 122 mm section of rocket tube filled with sarin and capped on both sides.

The only undisputable facts stated in the White House report is the claim that a chemical attack using nerve agent occurred in Khan Shaykhun, Syria on that morning. Although the White House statement repeats this point in many places within its report, the report contains absolutely no evidence that this attack was the result of a munition being dropped from an aircraft. In fact, the report contains absolutely no evidence that would indicate who was the perpetrator of this atrocity.

The report instead repeats observations of physical effects suffered by victims that with very little doubt indicate nerve agent poisoning.

The only source the document cites as evidence that the attack was by the Syrian government is the crater it claims to have identified on a road in the North of Khan Shaykhun.

I have located this crater using Google Earth and there is absolutely no evidence that the crater was created by a munition designed to disperse sarin after it is dropped from an aircraft.

The Google Earth map shown in Figure 1 at the end of this text section shows the location of that crater on the road in the north of Khan Shaykhun, as described in the White House statement.

The data cited by the White House is more consistent with the possibility that the munition was placed on the ground rather than dropped from a plane. This conclusion assumes that the crater was not tampered with prior to the photographs. However, by referring to the munition in this crater, the White House is indicating that this is the erroneous source of the data it used to conclude that the munition came from a Syrian aircraft.

Analysis of the debris as shown in the photographs cited by the White House clearly indicates that the munition was almost certainly placed on the ground with an external detonating explosive on top of it that crushed the container so as to disperse the alleged load of sarin.

Since time appears to be of the essence here, I have put together the summary of the evidence I have that the White House report contains false and misleading conclusions in a series of figures that follow this discussion. Each of the figures has a description below it, but I will summarize these figures next and wait for further inquiries about the basis of the conclusions I am putting forward herein.

On April 20 2017 00:20 Velr wrote:
How is flat earth even, albeit very slowly, becoming a thing? It seems the "critical thinking" has taken over a bit too much people. Theres a diffrence between being critical and being diffrent for the sake of it.

On April 20 2017 00:20 Velr wrote:
How is flat earth even, albeit very slowly, becoming a thing? It seems the "critical thinking" has taken over a bit too much people. Theres a diffrence between being critical and being diffrent for the sake of it.

On April 20 2017 00:25 LightSpectra wrote:
Flat earthism, like fake news, is a symptom of a culture that doesn't trust its regular news outlets and continually fears "the establishment" is a gigantic conspiracy of malevolent Orwellians.

On April 20 2017 00:33 Velr wrote:
I just hear it mentionned more and more over the last few years, mainöy from US sources but well... I tought the stupid ended with "scientific creationism", turns out those guys now seem surprisingly sane.

MSNBC, the country’s most prominent liberal media outlet, has played a key role in stoking the frenzy over Trump’s alleged involvement with Russian meddling in the U.S. presidential race — in lock step with the Democratic Party’s most avid partisans.

Jennifer Palmieri, a senior member of Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign, captured the prevailing mentality when she recently urged party members to talk about the Russian “attack on our republic” — and to do so “relentlessly and above all else.”

And no leading media figuwhole hysteria in the media. Partly it’s the media’s fault. I believe partly, media, just like, in order to get a lot of views, a lotre has done so more than Maddow. In the period since Election Day, “The Rachel Maddow Show” has covered “The Russia Connection” — and Russia, generally — more than it has any other issue.

The Intercept conducted a quantitative study of all 28 TRMS episodes in the six-week period between February 20 and March 31. Russia-focused segments accounted for 53 percent of these broadcasts.

That figure is conservative, excluding segments where Russia was discussed, but was not the overarching topic.

Maddow’s Russia coverage has dwarfed the time devoted to other top issues, including Trump’s escalating crackdown on undocumented immigrants (1.3 percent of coverage); Obamacare repeal (3.8 percent); the legal battle over Trump’s Muslim ban (5.6 percent), a surge of anti-GOP activism and town halls since Trump took office (5.8 percent), and Trump administration scandals and stumbles (11 percent).

+ Show Spoiler +

Diplomats and bankers are getting most of the attention in the showdown over Russia. Email hackers too, of course. But in Washington’s Russian and Russian-American community, which is not enormous, there are also teachers and truck drivers, hairdressers and hockey stars. Now, even they are starting to hear questions.

Lily Rozhkova was a journalist in Russia before she moved to the United States in 1999. Most of her friends in Washington are Russian, and the relationship between the two countries has become the first thing they talk about when they all get together.

“We do worry about this,” she says. “We’re just trying to stay optimistic and hope that they just work on the situation and don’t make our worst fears happen.”

Rozhkova, 44, is a green-card holder who works at a real estate office in Virginia. She remembers that when President Barack Obama booted out 35 Russian diplomats and their families in December as a penalty for Russian interference in the election she heard jokes from American friends and colleagues.

“They said, ‘Are you a spy? Do you work with KGB?’ And I told them there’s been no KGB for years,” she said, with a laugh. “They were just making a joke, but that was all.”

As the news churns and allegations grow, however, Rozhkova says the talk is occasionally more serious.

“I would say they are starting to mention Russia more in the past couple of months,” she says. “Before the election, it was more of a joke, but right now the more they hear from TV and media, it’s like this joke, they’re starting to believe it might be true.”

Glenn Greenwald: As a Russian liberal or somebody in the circles of Russian liberalism, and somebody who has worked against the Kremlin and the Putin government, for their opposition, what is your view of, of what has happened in the United States as it concerns Russia? The way Russia has sort of taken center stage in American discourse, the focus on Putin and the Kremlin as kind of the cause or explanation behind many bad things, including the election of Trump?

As somebody who has been in the United States for awhile, has focused on US politics, what has this change been, and how do you view it?

Vitali Shkliarov: I believe it’s really bad right now. It’s the whole hysteria in the media. Partly it’s the media’s fault. I believe partly, media, just like, in order to get a lot of views, a lot of attention and audience, like trying to ride this horse and trying to play this card.

Partly I believe the Democratic establishment is a little bit at fault, has fault in all this rhetoric. I mean, it’s true that probably – even though it’s not, there’s no like real facts on the table – but partly the media says that Russian intervention in the highest of American culture, in the American Elections, and that this is a bad thing. Sure.

But, for instance, America does the same. Every country does the same. Like, we all know from the latest from Snowden that everybody does the espionage and it’s part of the job. So, so let’s not go crazy about it. To use Russia as a justification for bad and misery in Election, from the Democratic side, I believe it’s, it’s really dangerous, because, what’s happened if you’re starting to shake this board, like, you can shake it like to a certain degree, and, and at some point it’s going to turn around, and you’re going to sink.

GG: What do you mean by that?

VS: I believe that – look, the situation with Russia is really dangerous, first of all. So we, kind of are like in the Cold War 2.0 or 3.0 right now, because neither of the sides trust each other, so we don’t communicate. I mean like, Americans and Russians do not communicate anymore. So we cannot get rid of this 60, 70 years-old politics, of, like, that mutual deterrence, you know? That started actually with Truman, and it was probably really important back then, in 48 or like in 5os, but I will be living in the 21st century right now, and then so much has changed.

And I believe, instead of having, continuing trying to establish the politics of distrust, and this mutual deterrence, Russia and America should calm down and start to talk, because that’s, those are two major nations in the world. Sure. America has 27 percent of world GDP, and Russia has just, fairly two percent. Sure, they’re economically unequal but based on nuclear weapons, based on ego alone, politically like, those are two major countries, and I believe if this hysteria doesn’t stop, it’s going to lead to some bad events.

Partly because Russia is in the corner. Partly because Russia is economically, because of sanctions, because of political instability, in a country, on the knees, and in the corner, and Russia doesn’t have much to lose, and that’s what the American politicians underestimate: I believe the Russian mentality, when, when you look throughout the history, is, is shaped by all these losses, all these wars. And they are like more capable of taking a lot of pain, and a lot of like, sacrifice, and once, even as a little, teeny tiny cute dog, if you push them in the corner, you gonna start to bark and you gonna start to bite back, you know?

And I believe like, economically, in the media and in the perception, Russia is like, pushed in the corner right now.

On April 20 2017 00:24 xM(Z wrote:
that's not the other side of the story but merely a reaction based on confusion of Assad.
the other side of the story would be something like this https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B_Vs2rjE9TdwR2F3NFFVWDExMnc/view
for more context on that: http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2017/04/gaius-publius-new-evidence-syrian-gas-story-fabricated-white-house.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed: NakedCapitalism (naked capitalism)

The Trump administration wrapped up a weapons deal with the Saudi Arabian government this week that will be worth up to $350 billion over the next ten years. News of the deal came as Trump visited Riyadh and paid fealty to one of the United States’ most enduring allies in the Middle East.

The vast majority of the reports on the topic, however, omitted a rather key piece of context—namely, whom the weapons will be used to kill.

The famine and brutal two-year-long war in Yemen being waged by the Saudis that has killed over 10,000 civilians wasn’t mentioned once in reports of the $300 billion deal to Saudi Arabia by CNN (5/19/17, 5/20/17), Washington Post (5/19/17), The Independent (5/19/17), New York Daily News (5/20/17), CNBC (5/20/17, 5/22/17), CBS News (5/20/17), Business Insider (5/20/17), Time (5/20/17), Fox News (5/20/17), Reuters (5/20/17), ABC News (5/20/17), Fortune Magazine (5/20/17) or Chicago Tribune (5/20/17).

The arms deal was typically framed in vague “security” terms, with an emphasis on Saudi Arabia’s role in fighting “terrorism” (e.g., “The White House says the package includes defense equipment… to help the Arab nation and the rest of the Gulf region fight against terrorism”—Fox News, 5/20/17), despite the fact that the bulk of its military activity is focused on bombing Shia Houthi rebels in Yemen that have nothing to do with terrorism as such.

Indeed, the head of Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula claimed earlier this month his forces were “fighting alongside” the Saudi-backed Yemeni government. This detail was also omitted from reports on the arms deal, presumably because it would messy up the “Saudi Arabia–as–partner–in–War on Terror” narrative the press was uncritically echoing.

In his report on the arms deal, the Washington Post’s Steven Mufson (5/21/17) got quotes from the CEO of Lockheed Martin and reps from General Electric and private-equity firm Blackstone, but found no time to interview a human rights expert or aid worker or victim of Saudi bombing of Yemen; indeed, that bombing wasn’t even mentioned. Likewise, CNBC (5/22/17) issued a sexed-up press release Monday morning about how “defense stocks soar to all-time highs on $110 billion US/Saudi Arabia weapons deal”—with no mention of whom, exactly, said weapons were killing.

Many outlets went with the “jobs” frame, echoing the White House narrative that the selling of arms to a dictatorship waging a brutal war on a neighboring country was, in fact, good because it “created jobs.”

Glenn Greenwald: What's so strange about this is, in our own personal lives, if we have friends or family members who compulsively blame other people and look for fault in other people and never accept responsibility for their own actions and the way that it contributes to problems, we say "This is a real pathology, you need to start thinking about how it is that your own actions contribute to problems."

And yet the number one rule of media discourse, is that whenever there's violence or attacks, the one thing that we don't want to do is think about the role we played in provoking it. And what's particularly ironic about it, is that when it comes to other countries, we're really good at doing that. For example, if ISIS shoots down a Russian plane or someone inspired by ISIS kills a Russian ambassador in Turkey, instantly, overnight, every pundit, every media outlet blames the Russian foreign policy. They say the reason this happened is the Russians are bombing Syria, or because the Russians have provoked ISIS around the world.

We make that causal connection when it comes to our enemies, but to make that causal connection when it comes to ourselves... Uhm, you know, there are warnings that if the UK invaded Iraq, or if the UK began bombing in Syria they would have exactly the kind of terrorist attacks that just happened in Manchester. But to talk about the causal connection there becomes instantly taboo. And what that means is that we just don't examine the policies that are invoked in the name of stopping terrorism, but are actually doing more to fuel and provoke terrorism more than any other single factor.

On May 28 2017 17:13 iPlaY.NettleS wrote:
The situation should be better in a decade.Hard to see blatant propaganda outlets like The Guardian surviving much longer when they're losing over 100 million a year.CNN won't be around in a decade either and nothing has dropped more in circulation than the LA Times the past 25 years.

People are voting with their wallets and their TV remotes and what is termed mainstream media these days is increasingly not.Time for the dinosaur media to finally die off.