In more than 10 years, the stench from the journalistic crimes carried out by Judith Miller and Bill Keller in promoting the lies used to justify the Iraq war to the public has still not left the offices and newsroom of the New York Times. Now it is at it again in Syria, functioning today as an even more open and direct propaganda arm of the US government.
As the drums of war begin to beat once again in Iran, Syria, the South China Sea, and other potential hotspots and flashpoints around the globe, concerned citizens are asking how a world so sick of bloodshed and a population so tired of conflict could be led to this spot once again.
Two months after the Nuremberg hangings, the United Nations General Assembly passed Resolution 59(I), declaring: “Freedom of information requires as an indispensable element the willingness and capacity to employ its privileges without abuse. It requires as a basic discipline the moral obligation to seek the facts without prejudice and to spread knowledge without malicious intent.”
The BBC reported again on Monday 6 May that ‘Western powers have said their own investigations have found evidence that government forces have used chemical weapons’. Again, this is simply not the case. ‘Western powers’, regardless of their true intentions, have in fact been very cautious in public about how precisely they present their claims, underscoring the lack of conclusive evidence they have found and that there exists the possibility that chemical weapons had been used by the Syrian government. This misrepresentation by the BBC emerges in a context in which the use of chemical weapons has been signified by the UK and US as the point at which they may become militarily involved in the Syrian conflict. As such these details, so easily misrepresented by the BBC, are of high consequence.
In a criminal trial, doubt simply has to be reasonable to prevent conviction. But where has reason gone in this episode? The ridiculous William Hague, who seems to have become sabre-rattler in chief just as this country has sunk to the level of a third-rate military power, talks and acts as if the matter is settled. Our Prime Minister has abandoned one of his holidays ( and who can blame him? It appears to be taking place solely for PR reasons) to hurry back to London for a meeting of the grandiosely-titled ‘National Security Council’. Not only is this name copied from the Americans. It is a body which we managed very well without for many centuries of free and independent (and secure) existence. Do these people think they are in an episode of ‘The West Wing’, that seductive drama of power-pornography, in which minor politicians imagine themselves as mighty political hunks?
I continue to be amazed with the ease with which the dividing line is blurred between what is real and what is fiction in the reporting on Syria by the Western media by Ajamu Baraka (A Voice from the Margins) The press in the U.S. continues to dutifully report on the “objective diplomacy” by the Obama administration to broker a […]
by Dr David Hookes Dear BBC News Your coverage of the alleged poison gas incident, which has led your news bulletins today, is a complete disgrace. You, at the start, concede that the video footage cannot be verified but by the end of the report you are assuming, with NO evidence, that it was most likely the Syrian Government. Pictures […]
The tempo of events in Syria has accelerated in recent weeks. The government forces have scored significant battlefield victories over the rebels, and this has provoked a mixture of war provocations and peace offers from the U.S. and its anti-Assad allies by Shamus Cooke With Obama’s blessing Israel fighter jets recently attacked Syria on three occasions; in one massive air strike […]
This is the North Korean viewpoint of western societies.
As NATO terror front collapses in Syria, US attempts to justify intervention by drumming up familiar WMD lies by Tony Cartalucci The last two weeks have seen a series of victories for the Syrian Army across Syria. It appears that 2 full companies of so-called “Free Syrian Army” fighters have been annihilated near Damascus, while government forces have restored order […]
“This is a story about an extreme miscarriage of justice. It involves the CIA, the US Army and a shitload of cocaine.” by Liat Clark “If you want to, you can question anything to death,” says director Eric Stacey, his melodic Californian drawl coming slow and steady down the line. “But my point of view is, if enough people are writing […]
Who’s Investigating the FBI Investigators? by Dave Lindorff I’m not a conspiracy-minded person, but something definitely stinks about this whole Boston Marathon bombing story. From what we’re reading about the case, the FBI had for two years been investigating Tamerlan Tsarnaev, the 26-year-old older brother killed during a shootout between police and the two brothers, Tamerlan and 19-year-old Dzhokhar. They […]
