Broadcast Media
Advance Publications Corporation
The image that mass media cultivates is that they reflect popular culture. The truth is that they aren't reflecting it at all. They are creating it and in so doing, they are manipulating your perception of the world. Whenever the trashiness of the media is discussed on television, they never fail to mention that we own the airwaves that the public gives the broadcasters for free so we can control them. This is an incredible fraud because most people these days have cable TV. Cable TV is exempt from the laws that pertain to over the air broadcasters. Since we receive over the air broadcasts on our cable, we don't differentiate. This means that ABC, CBS and NBC have different rules to play by than FOX. [Something just occurred to me as I wrote this. Remember the Janet Jackson boob incident? I'd bet the family farm that this was a dirty trick by a non-over the air broadcaster to cause embarrassment, fines and sanctions to NBC; cause them to lose viewers and most importantly ultimately their contract to present sporting events. Notice that News Corp. (Rupert Murdoch) has both teams and sports channels.]
Another image that the mass media cultivates is that they present news and information. The truth is that they have become the gatekeepers of information rather than the presenters of information. Personally, I don't know anybody who is interested in the seemingly endless coverage of the Scott Peterson or Kobe Bryant cases. Thousands of hours of TV time are given to analyzing every aspect of these cases - over, and over and over again. We are told that they cover it because people are interested. I say, Oh Really? How do we know that? The Neilsen Ratings, of course. But how do we know that they are being truthful? They depend on the corporations presenting the crap. What if Neilsen is no longer independent and truthful? What if they make more money by perpetuating myths of ratings rather than the real thing? Why would they do that? The answer is to create perceptions of the world that they want you to have.
The Control of the American News Media
A covert policy, formulated by Ronald Reagan in conjunction with the CIA, was termed “perception management” and was formalized on January 14, 1983 when President Reagan signed the National Security Decision Directive No. 77. The Reagan White House and the CIA felt that a resurrection of anti-war activism in the United States as had occurred during the prolonged and futile Vietnamese war could curtail or halt the Reagan/CIA policy of “aggressive containment,” specifically in Central America.
This project was also called ‘public diplomacy’ and while it was ostensibly created to develop American public support for Reagan’s foreign policy, it also was constructed to effect control over the opinions of the American public through control of the American media, both TV and press reportage.
Under the "perception management/public diplomacy" program, the CIA was instructed to take a number of steps to bring the American public's perceptions into line with an official governmental policy.
The first step in this program was to fully analyze the cultural, ethnic, political and religious backgrounds of the general population and attempt to discover what themes resonate best with the greatest number of Americans. When this had been achieved, the next step was to create specific themes to address these cultural weak spots, or "points of public concern".
This sounds more like a policy of the Soviet Union or Communist China than it does the United States but the Iran-Contra scandal nearly brought down the Reagan Administration. Leaders in power are all the same, they want to stay in power. The media - TV and press exposed the corruption of our foreign policy and as such, they represented a threat to that power and the ability to abuse it. Their solution was covert control of the media and the management of your perceptions of the world.
Think about what you see on TV that passes for news - especially cable news. You get a 10-15 second sound bite that gives the headline. Then the news analysts supposedly arbitrate 'debates' between so called experts who frame the issues for you. The debate is normally 3-5 minutes. Of course, without factual details it is not really possible to really make a judgment about the issue, all you can do is choose a side from the limited amount of information you are given. Since the producers of the program select the 'experts' and the amount of time spent on the issue, you have no way of knowing if the 'experts' are truly on opposite sides or even if they are presenting the most critical elements of the debate. It is in that way that your perception of issues are molded. This gives the image of an objective presentation, however if one of the 'experts' lies but the other 'expert' isn't given time to refute it, the lie stands. This is true of one on one interviews as well. If the interviewer just ignores lies (which they do all the time), the lie becomes truth to people who are unaware that they are being manipulated.
Equally important, are the stories that are not covered on television. "The truth is out there" to quote Mulder but most people don't have the time to seek out information on stories that they aren't even aware exist. In fact, while researching Roger Ailes, I just came across this story on Afghanistan. It turns out that we bought off the warlords - the CIA paid them $70 million in cash rather than defeating them. I'm sure the reason was for expedience so that they could move on to Iraq and all that oil. I have no doubt that it's true because the warlords are back in power now so the entire Afghanistan war was just a 'really big' show.
In looking at media and mind control (i.e. the manipulation of perception) I found some fascinating information. Here is one - in particular, click the link and scroll down to persuasion techniques and read it.
Now think about the Fox News lineup - O'Reilly, Hannity and Colmes and Greta Van Susteren. And you probably thought they were just trying to appeal to different audiences in different time slots huh? If you still have doubts, consider the fact that Roger Ailes is an expert at mind manipulation. "He has been described as "the amusingly ferocious Republican media genius" and a "pit-bull Republican media strategist turned television tycoon." Roger Ailes is the President and CEO of faux news on Fox.
The Program on International Policy Attitudes (PIPA) recently published a study on viewer misperceptions of the war on Iraq. The following is a summary of their findings as presented in handy little graphs by the TurnOffYourTV website.
Clearly, the Fox News viewers are way behind the curve in knowing the truth about Iraq. I believe this study primarily because members of my own family are Fox News watchers who STILL believe that Iraq had WMD and that they were a terrorist nation in spite of my best efforts to convince them otherwise.
Even with this study though, I don't know that I believe it entirely. PIPA itself became suspect when I checked to see who is behind them. The following are the PIPA Foundation Sponsors:
Rockefeller
Foundation
Rockefeller Brothers Fund
Tides Foundation
Ford Foundation
German Marshall Fund of the United States
Compton Foundation
Carnegie Corporation
Benton Foundation
Ben and Jerry's Foundation
Americans Talk Issues Foundation
Circle Foundation
If you check my page Treason Lobbies and look up MALDEF, you'll see that these same foundations are big supporters of MALDEF - the treasonous group that is working to eliminate the differences between a citizens of the United States and illegal aliens. My guess would be that these foundations use PIPA is to see the degree of success they are having with their own propaganda campaigns.
This is just a skim of the surface of the Information and Propaganda war on the American people and the complex nature of the methodologies and the players. A government 'Of The People' would not allow this to happen to us. We lost it the minute Reagan approved government manipulation of perception. He declared open season on your mind.
Additional Reading
Goebbels' Principles of Propaganda