On Brexit, Trump and Reality –
Who's Winning, Losing and Why?
What role do the media play in
constructing our reality?
Is social media a force for good?
The following arises from an article by the British paper the Guardian complaining that the dissemination of social media news was undermining the democracy. The article “The Pedlars* of Fake News Are Corroding Democracy” is here, but read on for the moment:
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/nov/25/pedlars-fake-news-corroding-democracy-social-networks
*Pedlars might be spelled "peddlers"
Clinton and DNC Trumped by Own Dirty Tricks
I was one of a small group of
individuals who thought that the Brexit vote would have Britain leave
the European Union. I also was not surprised at the recent US
election result which saw Hillary Clinton trumped by her own
Machiavellian plans. This article from the US site Salon explains why
and how she tripped up:
Wikileaks release of the Democrat
National Committee (DNC) emails revealed the strategy employed to
ensure their candidate was successful. For it to be successful the US
media must play along with the tactics outlined by the DNC and
Hillary Clinton. Nothing like an independent press. From the article:
In its self-described “pied
piper” strategy, the Clinton campaign proposed intentionally
cultivating extreme right-wing presidential candidates, hoping to
turn them into the new “mainstream of the Republican Party” in
order to try to increase Clinton’s chances of winning.
The concluding passages of the story
indicate the bloody mindedness of the Clinton and Democrat elite and
the bastardy to the Bernie Sanders' campaign, the real people's
choice:
Sanders, a self-described
Democratic socialist, repeatedly warned in the primary that he would
have a greater chance of defeating Trump. Poll after poll showed that
he would have beaten Trump in the general election by wide margins.
Instead, his candidacy was repressed — and now Clinton has lost to
Trump.
Trump and Clinton were the least
popular major-party presidential nominees in U.S. history, according
to an August poll. An October report cited Sanders as the most
popular political figure in the country.
There has been an outpouring of
grief and anguish from the liberal and left types in the US over the
US election outcome that has brought Trump to the throne of Empire.
Many are crying about the new fascism that will sweep the USA and the
world. How true is this?
Trump is not ideal by any stretch of
the imagination. Nor was Brexit. However they both represent the
fruits of the elite's organising the World to maintain their
privilege and status, in the face of austerity, poverty, inequality,
war mongering, renditions, and ecological genocide. Where were the
cries of foul of Obama's terrible record on just about everything? He
extended the Terror War and introduced the National Defence
Authorisation Act an annual act to authorise defence spending. The
2012 act contained controversial provisions in subsections 1021–1022
of Title X, Subtitle D, entitled "Counter-Terrorism",
authorizing the indefinite military detention of persons the
government suspects of involvement in terrorism, including U.S.
citizens arrested on American soil.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Defense_Authorization_Act_for_Fiscal_Year_2012
Obama's Legacy Bigger Eternal War, Renditions, Drone Assassinations and NDAA
Such provisions breach all human
rights norms. This and many more points are made by Dolores Vek about
the previous Obama, Bush and Clinton presidencies, in the following
article castigating the alarmist liberals who feel suddenly
threatened by the spectre of fascism under a Trump presidency and a
GOP controlled Congress:
Delores offers in a passages, but
read the whole thing for the full picture if you have time:
I know it’s ancient history to
be talking about the Bush years, just like it’s hopelessly passé
to unironically talk about “imperialism” in 2016, but please
indulge me. I remember back when George W. Bush was president,
torturing people around the world, “shredding the Constitution,”
attacking Iraq and Afghanistan and threatening Iran with nukes. At
the time, it was pretty common, even popular and fashionable, to call
the president a fascist. Even on TV! Everyone who wasn’t a
Republican was radical: it seemed like Democrats and communists alike
could gripe over everything from a stolen Florida election to the
invasion of Iraq.
Then sometime around 2007, a
neoliberal and fundamentally conservative mediocrity named Barack
Obama showed up, and while he made a lot of noise about how different
he was, there was almost nothing of substance to back it up. Once he
was president, all the stuff that was proof of George W.’s fascism
became a trifling issue, a simple mistake, or a regrettable necessity
when Obama did it. As Obama continued George Bush’s legacy, and as
Dick Cheney came out in support of Hillary Clinton, liberals stopped
thinking of the Bush administration as a fascist criminal enterprise
and started seeing it through Sorkin-colored glasses, with a George
Bush-Michelle Obama hug at the twilight of the Obama presidency
marking the decisive transition.
The recriminations are not confined
to the US, with concerns about the Trump presidency uttered from all
corners of the world. Even the New Zealand Green Party refused to
support a motion in the Parliament congratulating Trump on his
victory. Would they have congratulated Hillary?
The Guardian's Offending Article
But what is the issue, why were
people so pissed with the establishment to vote for Brexit and Trump?
Well in Britain The Guardian's Andrew Smith has the answer, it's the
masses of people who gain their news and information from social
media rather than the traditional media sources (dominated by
capitalist owners), in his article published 7:34pm GMT Friday 25
November, “The Pedlars of Fake News Are Corroding Democracy.”
Andrew's thesis is of note: “If
most adults get their news from Facebook we need laws to make the
social networks accountable.”
He goes on to state;
The most interesting question
about 2016 is not why the Brexit result and Trump happened, but
whether historians will regard both as incidental; whether this will
go down as the year democracy revealed itself unworkable in the age
of the internet – in which reality, already engaged in a
life-or-death struggle with inverted commas, finally gave way to
“alt-reality”.
The results of these votes were
shocking, but not surprising. The rules of capitalism have been gamed
by the ruling kleptocracy and a lot of working people are angry. No
mystery there. In the past week, however, the collective postmortem –
on the left and right of politics – has focused on a concern with
far greater long-term impact: the accidental or deliberate
propagation of misinformation via social media. Many millions of
people saw and believed fake reports that the pope had endorsed
Trump; Democrats had paid and bussed anti-Trump protesters; Hillary
Clinton was under criminal investigation for sexually assaulting a
minor. About the only accusation not levelled at Clinton was
implication in the murder of JFK, and that was because Trump had
already used it against his Republican primary rival Ted Cruz. If
democracy is predicated on reliable information, it’s in serious
trouble right now.
Very few people saw this coming.
Back in the 1990s, at the height of the dotcom boom, the internet
pioneer Josh Harris tried to sound a warning – but at that early
utopian stage, when the web was assumed to be decentralising,
democratising, enlightening, almost no one understood what he was
saying. Later, in 2002, George W Bush’s own Voldemort, his deputy
chief of staff Karl Rove, chided a reporter by saying: “People like
you are in what we call the reality-based community. You believe that
solutions emerge from judicious study of the discernible reality.
That’s not the way the world really works any more.” The gnomic
taunt caused more bemusement than consternation at the time, but Rove
was ahead of the game.
The reference to Karl Rove's,
“reality based community” is of import and ought be considered
carefully for its implications for world events as they unfold, link
and quote below:
The aide said that guys like me
were "in what we call the reality-based community," which
he defined as people who "believe that solutions emerge from
your judicious study of discernible reality." ... "That's
not the way the world really works anymore," he continued.
"We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own
reality. And while you're studying that reality—judiciously, as you
will—we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can
study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's
actors…and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.
This process of actors initiating
events is not new, it is more a case of the reality is out in the
open for observation for any with eyes to see. Ideologues will
continue with their theories, however the history of the world
unfolds as particular actors move the chess pieces on the board.
For instance the Clintons and the
DNC thought they were moving chess pieces in a winning strategy, to
clear Sanders out and ensure the Republicans were stuck with a pig.
The problem they faced is that their own pig was too much for most
White Americans. Their play had insufficient power to create the
desired reality. So we get Trump as opposed to Bernie.
In hindsight is Hillary remorseful
and wishing that Bernie won the Democratic nomination?
So let's go back to the Andrew Smith
article, “The pedlars of fake news are corroding democracy.” I
read the article through with much interest. It contained many
trigger points for me as I surveyed its indictment of the gullible
and lazy who inform themselves using the new media platforms as
opposed to the sanitised version of news offered by the traditional
Fourth Estate:
Andrew might be having a go at the
new phenomenon known as the Fifth Estate:
Irrespective of who particularly he
is denigrating and suggesting should be regulated for truth, I found
his thesis more than a little infuriating, as my issue has been with
the role played by the traditional news media in the political
economy and democracy. The Free Press is an institutional and
important element in a well functioning democracy. Its supposed role
is to report news and hold the powerful to account for their
decisions and deeds, particularly governments and large corporate
interests when they trample the rights of the people and their
commons. It is now well known and well established that the corporate
media is often a tool for establishment and elite interests. Noam
Chomsky and Edward S. Herman's 1988 thesis, “Manufacturing Consent”
makes the case, and this page summarises the logic with remarkable
brevity relative to Chomsky's tome:
http://beautifultrouble.org/theory/the-propaganda-model/
My Comment Disappears - Guardian Censor Strikes
I might add that The Guardian is not
the worse offender in this regard, however the article was on their
webpage and so they got my ire. There were about 700 comments on the
article when I got to it Saturday afternoon NZ time, nevertheless I
felt motivated to make a contribution. You won't find it in the
comments section of the article because the moderator(s) removed it
for failing to meet the Guardian's Community Standards:
https://www.theguardian.com/community-standards
I reviewed the material in the
community standards and FAQs to see how my comment might have
breached their sensibilities, here's my comment:
26-11-2016 4:20pm..
I find the hypocrisy over the
top. The traditional corporate media is a concentrated power
structure that has never held power to account when it mattered.
Why don't we see the war? What
role does the corporate news media play in informing the democracy of
what criminal and genocidal shenanigans their leaders are up to?
What didn't the news media know,
that lots of citizen based journalists and writers knew? Are the
media corporations not getting the info? or choosing not to share it?
How much does a bomb cost a
taxpayer and how many are deployed?
And how many people on the
receiving end are munted? Dead not counting injuries and displaced:
The cover up of the 9/11 crime a
military exercise well executed was never allowed critique. Tony
Rooke's documentary of the collapse of building 7 and the apparent
collusion by the BBC in broadcasting the story 20 minutes prior to
the 5:20pm collapse is one of many proofs:
Add this to the pile of shit that
is the cover up which highlights the deep state corruption a subtle
fascism has been in place for a long time, subtle for the West,
genocidal for those in the the war mongers way to make profit and
loot resources:
So Afghanistan 7 October 2001
declaration of war. Why? The story was 19 Saudi Arabians organised
from a cell in Hamburg Germany hijacked 4 planes and smashed them
into US assets.. what did that have to do with Afghanistan? What was
the corporate media doing then?
What are the corporate media
doing about the escalation of the wars in Syria and Iraq now alleged
to be stirred by a mythic creature called ISIS?
MediaLens investigates Nafeez
Amhed's termination for exposing the Israeli despotism in Palestine
and the grab for resources:
.....and finally this, like it is
all the people's fault!! Particularly after you the corporate news
media have been sharing so much truth in a timely way so the
democracy is well informed to make the necessary informed choices....
....and expect us to be able to
take down the most powerful force ever created on the planet!
Working on it...
mirror mirror on the wall who's
the biggest whore of all? Who prostitutes truth for the powerful?
Press Complaints - Self Regulation at The Guardian
I've emailed the Guardian's
moderators seeking an explanation. I've followed this with several
follow up emails providing further context. I sense that no answer
will be forthcoming which motivates me to commit the saga to
posterity herein. To close the record I'll include those emailed
follow up comments and publish this online.
The one piece of hypocrisy that does
get me is the sub heading Andrew Smith used, “If most adults get
their news from Facebook we need laws to make the social networks
accountable.”
Now the funny thing is that The
Guardian is not a member of the Independent Press Standards
Organisation electing for to self-regulate through it's community of
moderators:
-----------------------------------------
A.
3:15am Tuesday 29 November 2016
Greetings
Guardian Opinion moderation,
Have
you reviewed my application? Swept under the mat? Brush off?
Hmmmmm....
Mirror
on the wall...
The
Sovereign is the Sun and the Moon is the people...
In
Astrology the Sun is Leo..
And
taken an active interest in the Chilcot Inquiry.. and read Noam
Chomsky's "Manufacturing Consent" a long time ago.
John
Kerry the US Secretary of State came to Wellington New Zealand and
placed a wreath at the New Zealand War Memorial Park Pukeahu ceremony
11:00am Sunday 13 November, he was unveiling a plaque which marks the
spot where the US War Memorial is to be built on the site..
I
happened to be there:
Lots
of links in the thread...
When
a person kills another in cold blood it is called murder. When a
country does it the crime is Aggression, established in the allies
conviction of the Nazis at Nuremburg.
The
Australian, New Zealand, Canadian, US and British media all enabled
the State to commit the crime of Aggression. If the news media had
done their job, hold power to account, there would have been no way
that the post 9/11 wars would have proceeded:
For
a look at Building 7 go to Tony Rooke UK Film-maker's
'Incontrovertible 9/11':
This
movie from Tony Rooke who got off the charge of not paying his UK TV
license fee. His evidence made an impression on the old Bailey:
---------------------------------------
You
may not like the facts.... you may not like the way I frame my
offering... you cannot say that my comments are out of context...
nor can you say that my facts are unsubstantiated... I have not used
uncouth language... I use strong language.... murder and genocide is
no light nor laughing matter...
I
suggest you have made a poor decision when you removed my valid
comment.
What redress do you propose?
-------------------------------------------------
B.
12:04pm Tuesday 29 November 2016
Dear
Guardian moderator
Further
to my application for a review of your moderation decision in respect
to my comment on your article:
User
name: Greg Rzesniowiecki
...this
just popped up in my twitter feed..
I've
been reviewing The Guardian's coverage of the Terror War and found
this article about the competitor Rupert Murdoch's media reporting:
Also
this on how the Guardian reported the war on Terror:
And
this which indicates advance knowledge by everyone of what was
coming:
Which
does lead me to a view that The Guardian's reporting of the War on
Terror and the alleged justification was not the worst of the media
reporting, so tacit acknowledgement to your organisation on that...
However
the article critical of Rupert Murdoch's news organisation makes my
case for me..
I
find this paper,
"REPORTING
AFGHANISTAN AND IRAQ: MEDIA, MILITARY AND GOVERNMENTS AND HOW THEY
INFLUENCE EACH OTHER by Greg Wilesmith Trinity Term 2011"
most
interesting as it is a serious effort to describe the news media
reporting by particular journalists on the Afghan and Iraq wars
themselves:
The
wars would not have been possible to prosecute if the media had done
their job properly.. extract from page of above report:
--------------------------------------------------------
"Indeed
through 2001 Bush administration had hundreds of warnings from the
FBI, the CIA and the NSA (National Security Agency) about the threat
posed by al Qaeda; its growing role in Afghanistan fighting with the
Taliban; running training camps along the Afghan-Pakistani border for
Islamic terrorists from around the world; and the strong links with
Pakistan’s ISI (Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate).
"Some
of this information was in the public domain in the US, courtesy of
serious newspapers such as The New York Times, The Washington Post,
The Wall Street Journal, The Los Angeles Times, the news weeklies
TIME and Newsweek and public radio and television. But on the
national network television, the news programs which were the major
source of information on international issues had been radically cut
back through the 1990s. A veteran CBS correspondent Tom Fenton
subsequently flayed the main US commercial networks:
As
surely as 9/11 pointed up the myriad failures of official agencies in
Washington, it also revealed the abject failure of the news media...
We had failed to warn the American public of the storm clouds
approaching our shores. And in failing to do so, we betrayed the
trust of the public.##
##Tom
Fenton, Bad News: The Decline of Reporting, the Business of News, and
the Danger to Us All (Regan Books: New York, 2005)"
"Australia’s
Prime Minister John Howard was in Washington at the time of the
attacks, having met President George W. Bush the previous day. He
immediately and without any Cabinet discussion publicly pledged that
Australia’s military would be available to the US. On his return to
Australia, Howard addressed the national security committee of
cabinet which agreed to invoke the US-Australia defence treaty ANZUS,
even before any formal US request, authorising Australian military
support in any conflict to come. Equally committed from the start was
the British Prime Minister Tony Blair. Alistair Campbell, Blair’s
powerful director of communications quotes Bush telling Blair that
9/11 was “a new war, the Pearl Harbour in the 21st century.”###
###Alistair
Campbell, The Blair Years: The Alastair Campbell Diaries (Arrow
Books: London, 2008)"
--------------------------------------------
Which
brings me to this... premeditation and planning...
Bush
telling Blair that 9/11 was “a new war, the Pearl Harbour in the
21st century.” Project for the New American Century (PNAC) report
"Rebuilding America's Defences"
I
reference that in my paper to the New Zealand Parliamentary select
committee in respect to its Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) treaty
examination from April 2016:
This
on the revolution coming in the art of war;
Absent
a rigorous program of experimentation to investigate the nature of
the revolution in military affairs as it applies to war at sea, the
Navy might face a future Pearl Harbor –
as unprepared for war in the post-carrier era as it was unprepared
for war at the dawn of the carrier age.*
and
Which
brings us back to the commencement of this part of the report to the
following statement which is the nub of the thinking.
Any
serious effort at transformation must occur within the larger
framework of U.S. national security strategy, military missions and
defense budgets. The United States cannot simply declare a “strategic
pause” while experimenting with new technologies and operational
concepts. Nor can it choose to pursue a transformation strategy that
would decouple American and allied interests. A transformation
strategy that solely pursued capabilities for projecting force from
the United States, for example, and sacrificed forward basing and
presence, would be at odds with larger American policy goals and
would trouble American allies.
Further,
the process of transformation, even if it brings revolutionary
change, is likely to be a long one, absent some catastrophic and
catalyzing event – like a new Pearl Harbor.Domestic
politics and industrial policy will shape the pace and content of
transformation as much as the requirements of current missions...**
This
is the point where one then introduces the catastrophic and
catalyzing event known as 9/11.
**
Pages 50 and 51 of RAD and 62-63 of the pdf.
US
advance knowledge of Pearl Harbour...
But
history never repeats....
Carry
on the charade....
Most
sincerely from greg
----------------------------------------------------------
What more can one say? Lots, but let's leave it there, case made - Hypocrisy rules!
Last word from the community opinion editor of The Guardian, just came in 12:14am Wednesday 30 November:
Hello Greg,
Looking at your comment I can see that it was removed by a moderator because it discussed topics which were not the focus of the article under which it was posted. In particular, it touched on September 11th conspiracy theories. Comments of this type have a strong tendency to derail conversations, and we generally block conspiracy theory comments unless they are made under an article discussing the subject.
Regards
Craig
Community Moderator
.
