Name the war, and the American media loves the warmongers and bans the peacemakers, “the children of God.”
There is no clearer example than the grand media platform extended to John McCain and other war-hawks during the lead-up to the Iraq War, while others who saw through the war criminal George W. Bush’s Washington lies, that Saddam Hussein had WMDs and ties to Al Qaeda, or even questioned those lies, were blackballed.
We and many others knew the Iraq War was based on false pretense and mass media propaganda, such as those promoted by “The Paper of Record,” The New York Times: “U.S. Says Hussein Intensifies Quest for A-Bomb Parts;” “An Iraqi Defector Tells of Work on at Least 20 Hidden Weapon Sites;” “Defectors Bolster U.S. Case Against Iraq, Officials Say.” Indeed, numerous studies prove the pervasive media support for that war.
A Columbia Journalism Review study, as well work by the Poynter Institute for Media Studies, concluded that the number of pro-war editorials and Op-Ed columns among the country’s major metro newspapers outnumbered anti-war perspectives by a nearly 10-to-1 margin.
The predominance of pro-war coverage leading up to America’s initial attack directly affected public sentiment: Gallup recorded a 76 percent approval rate as the war started.
The facts of how the media worked with Washington to sell the Iraq War to the public, and how those who questioned it were minimized, is well documented in the book, “What Happened,” by Scott McClellan, George W. Bush’s former press secretary during the run-up to the Iraq War.
“We overplayed and overstated the case for war,” admitted McClellan, as we detailed in our June, 2008 Trends Journal, special edition, “TRENDS AND TRAGEDIES.”
“I was part of this propaganda campaign, absolutely,” he wrote saying he was a member of the “culture of deception,” and that “the media would serve as complicit enablers.”
And enable they did. McClellan’s book details how major media “stars” such as CBS’s Katie Couric admitted, “There was a sense, a pressure from the corporations who own where we work, and from government itself, to really squash any kind of dissent.”
Yes, they “own where we work” and they own who they are, too. Male, female, race, creed, color… Couric, like all the rest, are not “journalists” but merely Presstitutes who put out for their “Corporate Johns” who own where we work.”
Further, Jessica Yellen, an MSNBC correspondent at the time, said, “The press corps was under enormous pressure from corporate executives, frankly, to make sure this was a war that was presented in a way that was consistent with the patriotic fervor in the nation. The higher the President’s ratings, the more pressure I had from news executives to put on positive stories about the President.” By the indisputable facts we now know, “any kind of dissent” was squashed.
According to studies conducted by Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR), 64 percent of the sources mainstream media used to cover the Iraq War were pro-war, while total anti-war sources made up only 10 percent of the media’s reporting, of which only 3 percent of U.S. sources were anti-war.
FAIR also found that current or former government and military officials accounted for 76 percent of all 319 sources for news stories aired on network news channels about Iraq. And according to FAIR, for two weeks following Secretary of State Colin Powell’s error-filled speech to the United Nations in which he made bogus WMD claims for war against Iraq, U.S. TV networks banished contrary perspectives. Of the 393 on-camera sources appearing on ABC, CBS, NBC and PBS newscasts, only one percent were anti-war and just 6 percent were skeptical sources.
Among those not only blackballed but silenced was the popular TV talk show host, Phil Donahue, who was fired for expressing opposition to going to war against Iraq and got fired for having anti-war guests on his highly rated show.
At a network owned by General Electric at the time, for every anti-war guest voice he featured, he was forced by MSNBC to feature two pro-war advocates.
Also, a leaked internal memo warned that Donahue was a “…difficult public face for NBC in a time of war,” because he provided “a home for the liberal antiwar agenda, at the same time that our competitors are waving the flag at every opportunity.”
And Jesse Ventura, a popular former pro-wrestler and former governor of Minnesota, lost his MSNBC show because of his anti-Iraq War opinions, even though he had just signed a lucrative three-year contract at the time.
Back then and now, voicing anti-war opinions comes at a cost. Australian journalist Caitlin Johnstone was suspended by Twitter, for saying the world will be better off now that “warmonger” John McCain had died.
And yes, even I, who knew the Iraq War was based on lies, became persona non-grata in the media, because I would not sell out, or put out, like Presstitutes do.
As depicted in the movie based on my book, “What Zizi Gave Honeyboy: A True Story About Love, Wisdom and the Soul of America,” starring Doris Roberts, despite my being a print and broadcast media favorite at the time, I was among those banned.
In my Trends Journal, I had forecast that going to war in Iraq would lay a foundation for terrorism, and despite the political bravado, it would result in yet another costly, deadly American military failure. This was not what the war-promoting “waving the flag at every opportunity” media wanted to sell the public. Instead, the media mostly featured war mongers, like John McCain:
Meet the Press record holder McCain remembered as a passionate patriot. “McCain, who died Saturday at the age of 81 after a battle with brain cancer, appeared on “Meet the Press” 73 times over the course of his career, more than any other guest in the show’s history.”
—NBC, August 26, 2018
The media, in their demented definition of “patriot,” saluted John McCain, while true patriots who honor the Constitution of the United States and should be held up as examples to follow are banned by the press and deleted from history.
Throughout the weeklong coverage of McCain’s death, America’s top national Presstitutes, who front as journalists, from Dana Bash to Chuck Todd, and from Wolf Blitzer to Anderson Cooper, etc., repeatedly gushed, calling McCain, a “great, great man,” a “true American hero.”
At one point during memorial services, as it began to rain, Bash tweeted, “The angels are crying.”
What angels? Surely not the ones of the peacemakers, “the children of God.” Or, was it the tears of the millions of innocents murdered by his bombing runs and those slaughtered in all the wars McCain championed?
Again, these B-grade movie cartoon characters featured by the mainstream media are not “journalists.” True journalists are objective, and fact based. They do not characterize a person and/or event by labeling them with their personal feelings and opinions, as they did with the “great, great” McCain and the United States’ illegal, immoral, barbaric Vietnam War they proudly referenced in cementing his legacy as a “hero.” TJ
TRENDPOST
No clearer evidence is needed than what has been stated above, proving media bias supporting war is a fully developed and entrenched trend.
The media propaganda mill keeps spinning out its lies, and the vast majority of the public buy into those lies, obediently repeating what they have been told and “patriotically” giving up their lives and money in the march toward the next illegal and immoral war.
We forecast, considering the anti-establishment movements building around the world, that the opportunity exists for an expansive, cohesive movement which challenges the establishment media and its war mongering political monopolies.
Also, do your share to support and promote media sources, such as the Trends Journal, that provide you with factual data and analyses so you can “Think for Yourself.”