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White House under investigation by congress for propaganda

Started by Michalson Mar 16, 2004 at 7:31 AM 29 replies 3.5k views
Original Post
Michalson
Michalson
The General Accounting Office (a branch of Congress) has opened an investigation into fake news stories produced using taxpayers money to help Bush win relection. A front company called Home Front Communications was hired to create fake news reports, in which an actor played "Karen Ryan", a reporter. "Karen Ryan" proceeded to report on the glorious new medicare law signed by Bush (with photoshop image of Bush signing the law in front a of cheering crowd), in one spot also talking to a "pharmacist" and "customer" who also praised the magnificant leader. These video spots where then distributed to local news stations where reporters recieved the scripts they where instructed to read before playing the clips.
quote:
One such script In December, President Bush signed into law the first-ever prescription drug benefit for people with Medicare. Since then, there have been a lot of questions about how the law will help older Americans and people with disabilities. Reporter Karen Ryan helps sort through the details
The prepared scripts ensured the clips where perfectly blended into the news broadcast. Only people who positively knew there was no reporter by that name in the service of station would know they where watching a propaganda. Pick your news source[Google News] Of interest is how this shows the current administration is shifting the dirty work from 3rd world countries to America (perhaps some sort of very small job creation program). Where as in the 80s Reagan/Bush relied on arming and assisting countries like Iraq to fight their oil wars, and training people like Bin Ladin in how to carry out terrorist attacks against super powers to fight the cold war, Bush now directly sends US troops in, apparently unconcerned for the backlash. Back when Bush Sr. was in power it was Kuwait that had to produce fake news clips and get them aired on US television (even though several top White Official did visit the set, they never payed or directed it). Now it appears this is being done on home soil. Any thoughts on this movement?
Hitchhiker90
Hitchhiker90
Well this simply isn''t true. The U.S. government is for the people by the people. They have no reason to lie.
Hitchhiker90"There's one bitch in the world, one bitch with many faces" -- Jay"What are you people, on dope?" -- Mr. Hand
aidan_walsh
aidan_walsh
Yeah, and the US Government is broken into two parts, one of whom is investigating the activities of the other...

Sounds like they''re working in the peoples interests to me...

SketchSoft OFFLINE | SketchNews OFFLINE | NewKlear Studios
www.aidanwalsh(.net)(.info)
Lord Bart
Lord Bart
Well,

As far as I can tell from reading about this is.

They did not lie about anything.

Yes Bush sign law to give new drug benefits to 65 and over and disable.
Yes the new law help pay for drugs.

Yes made the Ad look like a real news story.
But I have seen many Ads do this already.

Is it showing Bush in a good light, yes.
But why not he pushed for this law.

Now the issue I really have is why do ads for any government program.
Why are we (our government) wasting money doing this for any program?
That is the job for the private news, to keep government honest.

But no most of our news is center around sex, death, scandal, what the government does wrong.
Nothing about everyday things or about what the government does right,
or new government programs to help people.

Just seem like a waste of our/mine money.

Lord Bart
Michalson
Michalson
You do realize these "ads" where aired right in the middle of real news programs, with forced lead ins by the real news anchers? This wasn''t a case of "there''s an ad for coke, there''s an ad for Bush, there''s an ad for Pepsi". It was "news story, fake news story, news story". Besides, under federal law it is quite illegal to use federal money for a parties "publicity or propaganda purposes".
Zul
Zul
I love the GAO. They couldn''t have picked a better group to investigate the administration. GAO reports are the most pragmatic outlook on laws and policies available. When Congress or the executive issues a decree, the GAO will actually tell you what it will take to set it in place, how long, how many people, and how much money. They don''t bullshit.

I''d like to say that this latest move surprises me, but it doesn''t. It''s like the saying about lying. When you continually lie to people, you have no choice but to keep lying, because once the truth gets revealed, the entire chain of lies unravels and everyone hates you. Well, I hope that chain gets smashed into a million pieces in the very near future.
oh hai
robinei
robinei
Political commercials suck.

You should do like us and ban them altogether.
anubisX
anubisX
i honestly can''t imagine that this is true. coming from germany i find it offensive that they now talk about music events and the oscar on some news shows, but this is ridiculous. boy am i glad that political adds are forbidden here
Forcas
Forcas
Fool me once, shame on you...
-Forcas writeln("Does this actually work?");
Eelco
Eelco
quote:

Well this simply isn''t true. The U.S. government is for the people by the people. They have no reason to lie.

you know what they say: ignorance is bliss.
LessBread
LessBread
I read about this. It sucks. It makes me wonder how many other news stories are really fake news stories...
"I thought what I'd do was, I'd pretend I was one of those deaf-mutes." - the Laughing Man
Doc
Doc
quote:
Original post by Michalson
Of interest is how this shows the current administration is shifting the dirty work from 3rd world countries to America (perhaps some sort of very small job creation program). Where as in the 80s Reagan/Bush relied on arming and assisting countries like Iraq to fight their oil wars, and training people like Bin Ladin in how to carry out terrorist attacks against super powers to fight the cold war, Bush now directly sends US troops in, apparently unconcerned for the backlash. Back when Bush Sr. was in power it was Kuwait that had to produce fake news clips and get them aired on US television (even though several top White Official did visit the set, they never payed or directed it). Now it appears this is being done on home soil.


Does anyone wonder anymore just why so much of the world dislikes USA?
yspotua
yspotua
There is no such thing as an honest politician.
bastardos
bastardos
quote:
Original post by Doc
quote:
Original post by Michalson
Of interest is how this shows the current administration is shifting the dirty work from 3rd world countries to America (perhaps some sort of very small job creation program). Where as in the 80s Reagan/Bush relied on arming and assisting countries like Iraq to fight their oil wars, and training people like Bin Ladin in how to carry out terrorist attacks against super powers to fight the cold war, Bush now directly sends US troops in, apparently unconcerned for the backlash. Back when Bush Sr. was in power it was Kuwait that had to produce fake news clips and get them aired on US television (even though several top White Official did visit the set, they never payed or directed it). Now it appears this is being done on home soil.


Does anyone wonder anymore just why so much of the world dislikes USA?

I am sure that Osama Bin Laden was very incensed by the fact that the administration produced fake video clips.

.bas

[sPiKie] mmorpg isnt hard in vb
.basprintf ( "And for the %dth time, I'm not American!", ++lIdiots );My homepage
raquel
raquel
Has anyone actually seen this on TV?
Lohrno
Lohrno
quote:
Original post by bastardos
I am sure that Osama Bin Laden was very incensed by the fact that the administration produced fake video clips.


If you love Freedom, Justice, and Liberty, then you should be incensed by this...

-=Lohrno
JTippetts
JTippetts
quote:
Original post by yspotua
There is no such thing as an honest politician.


Heh heh. Not necessarily true. For instance, the mayor of the town where I live is pretty damned honest. It just seems that there is an inverse relationship between the power of a politician and his level of honesty. Power goes up, honesty goes down. I do know a couple Wyoming district representatives, and they are good, honest people. However, politicians much higher than that I suspect of corruption most foul.

Golem
Blender--The Gimp--Python--Lua--SDL
Nethack--Crawl--ADOM--Angband--Dungeondweller
Zul
Zul
quote:
Original post by Programmer One
I only watch one news show: The Daily Show.


And coincidentally, there was a story about this last night on the Daily Show.
oh hai

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