The Guardian’s interview with Tony Blair published today inadvertently offers two major insights. The first, smaller one is that, as this interview shows yet again, the Guardian and the liberal-left media in general remain in awe of the former British prime minister, despite his being an undoubted war criminal of the highest order as well as representing everything dysfunctional about the British […]
The problem is not just that foreign reporting is being stripped of financial resources as the media find it harder to make a profit from their core activities. It is, as Ed Herman and Noam Chomsky pointed out long ago in their book Manufacturing Consent, that the corporate media is designed to reflect the interests of power – and the corporations that control our media are power. They select journalists through a long filtering process (school, university, journalism training, apprenticeships) precisely designed to weed out dissidents and those who think too critically. Only journalists whose worldview aligns closely with those in power reach the top.
Something extremely dangerous is happening before our eyes as we watch British officials and the corporate media respond to today’s ruling of the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention, which found that Julian Assange is being arbitrarily detained in the UK. A major international institution upholding the rights of political dissidents around the world as they face illegal detention, abuse and torture […]
Excluding legitimate analyses of profoundly important events like those in Paris when they are most needed is not responsible, careful journalism. It is dangerous cowardice. It is most definitely not a politically neutral position.
An article in the Australian publication New Matilda gets to the real point about last night’s attacks in Paris – one that no one wants to talk about. What westerners feel right now is a powerful and very selective outrage that identifies with the suffering of people “like us”. We mourn the deaths in Paris while not even noticing those […]
Netanyahu’s hard line comes as his poll ratings have slumped following the upswing in violence, which has been accompanied by concerted attacks from rightwing rivals, including from within his own governing coalition. A survey of Israeli Jews at the weekend found 73 per cent were unhappy with his performance.
While the Guardian and Observer market themselves as caring about justice and equality, but do nothing to bring them about apart from promoting tinkering with the present, hugely unjust, global neoliberal order, Corbyn’s rhetoric suggests that the apple cart needs upending.
By the time politicians reach Westminster, they do not need to be recruited to a cabal. They have simply proven over a long period that they have a strong ideological fit with the institutions that govern us. If not, their careers would have stalled much earlier, in the lower rungs of these institutions, or they would have “dropped out”. The same processes select those who fill top posts in the media and other influential “professions”.
Israel believes it can tame Hamas’ political leadership, making them as cautious and subdued as Mahmoud Abbas’ Palestinian Authority in the West Bank. But it also wants to maintain the pressure on Hamas’ military wing by emphasising that it is little different from the beheaders of Islamic State.
Israel’s compulsive need to dominate Palestinians trumps all – even as it finally dawns on a few generals that Gaza’s endless immiseration is no policy at all.
As long as the media represent the span of interests of the 1% – from the psychopathic Murdoch empire to the capitalism with a little heart of the Guardian Media Group – our politicians will range from the Blue Tories of the Conservative party to the Red Tories of the Labour party. And we will remain enslaved.
Tired, confused, desperate and paranoid are just a few of the epithets that have been hurled at Netanyahu in the last days of the campaign.
In response, Netanyahu has concentrated on what he does best: fear-mongering.
“What the British government cannot tell the public is that the current growth model for the UK economy revolves around the endorsement and protection of financial sector fraud.”
The exposure of HSBC’s fraud in Britain could fundamentally jeopardise both the bank’s domestic and US operations.
