News Anarchy?????

Gillmor mentions the topic of news anarchy in the introduction of the book he says it would be a bad thing in short. This news anarchy thing to me is very troubling to me since I honestly don’t know what the hell it means.

If you look up the definitions of anarchy (Anarchy) it seems as if news anarchy would be a good thing. Since the general definition of anarchy usually refers to a group who lacks any governmental or political coerciveness or control whatsoever. Going by the literal definition of anarchy it seems as if news anarchy would be the ideal kind of news. But I know this is definitely not what Gillmor was saying is bad in the book.

He says that if we had news anarchy then everybody would just be shouting out their opinions all day and we would have no real source of news. My issue here is that the entire book tries to tell us that we are the new media, however when he says that if there was no big news companies there would be no “credible news context” and he refers to Americas putting out news on their own like this “Instead of journalism organizations with critical mass to fight the good fights, we may be left with the equivalent of countless pamphleteers and people shouting from soapboxes. We need something better.” It seems contradictory to the entire book when he says these two quotes in the introduction.

Furthermore his other reason why news anarchy would be bad is that we wouldn’t have any financial backing to do serious investigative journalism or “fight the good fight”, so by this basis that the only reason why MSM is credible is because they have all that money to support their research and do better investigative journalism. Many Americans have a decent amount of money and care about fighting the good fight why wouldn’t they back it. Also just out of curiosity how often to we see journalists fight the good fight? If MSM is choosing when they can fight this “good fight” then it’s not really such a good fight at all.

My issue with blogs has always been who cares millions are written and few are looked at or cared about. Blogs are just people ranting and anything they say will not make a real difference in the world. My opinion on blogs has changed since I started my political science course and started to learn about blog’s then I got a blog of my own. My new opinion at first was reinforced at when I read the first couple of chapters of Gillmor’s book but as most people I do I skimmed through the introduction. Luckily we discussed the book in class and I realized that this introduction is very contradictory to the whole point of the book.

So when I went over the introduction diligently my new opinion on blogs were crushed. How could we make a difference with our writing if without big media making the “real news” ours own news would be the equivalent to star magazine. If our blog’s are equal to that of shouting from soap boxes then why I or anyone should else bother. If this new media isn’t strong enough according to Gillmor to stand on its own feet without traditional MSM than why make such a big deal about it. If we were so great then we would be able to survive without the big guys.

Gillmor says similarly to this in chapter three , he says that if a bloger backs up his points with facts then his blog might get national attention. If we are able to decide what should be news now with blogs then why wouldn’t we be able to survive without MSM feeding us the information they want us to know. If there was no MSM and only blog’s then everyone would be able to choose on his/her own without any manipulation or bias of what the news is. Why would that be a bad thing?

It seems as if the anarchy he speaks out against is what our political science class dreams of. A MSM free world we would be able to choose what news is, no more nonsense from Fox CNN and the rest of the big boys. The choice is ours without any outside persuasion. So I ask again why is this bad a bad thing?!?!?

Correct me if I am wrong but from what it seems to me that whole point to this book is to show how we are the new media and should take initiative. If this is true then we are in a position that we have never been in before. Creating news now is not only exclusive to journalists, it is for everybody. Is this not anarchy of news? I don’t know.

In fact as I said before I have no idea what he means exactly when he says news anarchy, and as you see when I came up with what I thought it meant it didn’t really help. It only confused me even more but if we follow my final conclusion of what news anarchy is then were do we draw the line of what is anarchy and what isn’t and how can it be bad anyways.

I think it would be impossible to think that he would refer to news anarchy as everyone just reporting news as they please with total chaos and no validity. Because that is obvious bad and Gillmor would have no reason to tell us that its bad since we do believe it or not contain some intelligence and can figure that out on our own.

So my final definition of news anarchy is this, news anarchy is news that is free of all MSM and is totally independent. There would be no main source of news rather there would be a bunch of independent sites which are all equal in their validity .It is for the people by the people this is equivalent to blogs. Using this logical definition I ask why is anarchy bad at all.

However if you don’t like my definition and choose to explain news anarchy as a bad thing as Gillmor does then I will ask you the same question that I E-mailed him. Given today’s “new media” with all its freedom and independence when exactly do you declare the news to be in a state of anarchy?

Something New!

I know nobody has written their blog’s yet so if any of you look at my blog before you write yours please listen to this. There was an article in CNN (CNN) and I am sure all the other news station, Bush is saying he will not Pull out of Iraq until “mission is complete”.

Yes I know this looks juicy and you might be able to have some fun with it but I beg you not to blog about it for a couple of reasons.

1. Writing about this makes you the ultimate cliché

2. I am so sick of hearing Bush is an idiot ect... it’s getting old and annoying and although I know that hes not the brightest of the bunch hearing about it everyday just gets annoying.

3. this is way to easy to write about and most likely you will just say the same thing that the rest of the blogers in the world are saying, don’t you want to be a little bit original. This is a class that is teaching us to think on our own, so surely an article in which you will just be writing based on the current popular dissent for Bush is a little sad.

So I ask for my sake your sake originalities sake and anyone else’s please pick something semi-interesting or just not this, because I really cant take much more the same thing being said everyday.

So I ask for my sake youroriginalitylities sake and anyoane else's please pick something semi-interesting or just not this, because I really cant take much more the same thing being said everyday.

My Plea

Like the entire class my blog’s are written in regards to what is written in the syllabus, but now we are nearing the semester we are deemed independent enough to write a blog on our own terms. At first I was exited but then I was told it had to be a little bit relevant to the course. I was a little scared being the fact I am not one who contains much political knowledge, but there is a quote someone once told me “When in doubt always look towards thy Kramer” and like he always does Kramer came through.

Michael Richards who famously played “Kramer” on Seinfeld has moved on to stand up. Not much Hs been said about his stand up actually until now. Michael Richards was performing his stand up act at the Laugh factory in California, and was heckled by two African Americans who additionally came in late and made quit an entrance. His response to this was a racial outrage repeating the n-word several times. (Richard's Article on CNN: Richards Rant Video )

This would not have been so widely publicized if not for a camera phone that one of the people in the audience pulled out as he started his rant. Dan Gillmor could not have categorized this action better in his introduction; he calls them “the former audience”. He says that it used to be that people were mere consumer of the news but is now learning how to join it and make it. Due to this new kind of media America was able to see the video firsthand rather then read about fourth hand with many changes to the story pending who it was written by. This former member of the audience gave us the story the way it happened.

Furthermore Gillmor says in chapter two that “Pictures are a part of journalism, and most organizations employ professional photographers. As camera’s become just one more thing we all carry everyday, everyone’s becoming a photographer. We haven’t begun to think through the social implications of this fact, but the implications for journalism are serious.”

This is just one of the many examples how journalism is changing by the day as Gillmor said in the paragraph above. We no longer just read and watch the news we make it and all of us being part of this new culture should recognize this as a responsibility not a commodity.

Now that I got the class requirement’s out of the way I can actually say what I wanted to originally.

First things first to say that Michael Richards is a racist would be ludicrous. Many African Americans were in the audience that night (including Sinbad) and if he was such a big racist he wouldn’t walk into a club with such a large population of people that he can’t stand because of their color.

As everyone knows in comedy clubs when you say a comment to the comedian on stage or make any other disturbance during the show you are likely to be the next victim of his routine. So when these two men who walked in late made a ruckus and then made a comment to the comedian of course they were going to get a verbal spanking.
Anyone who would have done this would have received the same treatment. If the guy was a fat guy he would have said hey fatty or if was Jewish he would have called him a dirty Jew or some other racial slur. The point is that he would have said this to anyone and he didn’t just say this because these two men were black. He was going to say something out of line to anybody who would have done this.

Comedy clubs are notorious for having an anything goes type of atmosphere because it’s all in good fun hence the name comedy club. When Michael Richards said the n-word about ten times he was just saying an absurd comment to get a rise out of the audience.

Although his alibi is that he has anger management issues, but I don’t I buy it. I think that he is just pulling this anger management act so he won’t get sued for all he’s worth by Ms. Allred.

I think he was most likely drunk as many comics are during their routine and just went a little overboard. His first racist joke he said was funny and even after he said the n-word people laughed, but he had impaired judgment as most people do when they have a little alcohol in them. In fact after the second or third time he said it he said “you see now I said something crazy” implying that he didn’t mean it to be racist he just wanted a rise out of everyone.

Michael Richards has been in comedy for over twenty years why all of a sudden would he become a racist, all comics have their trademarks and racist was never his. Do you really think he thought this is a good way to re-invent himself?

He was so clearly drunk and some things he didn’t mean to say what he said as most people don’t when they are drunk. Give the guy a break he said a stupid thing while he was drunk we have all been there. Should we really start labeling people by what they say when they are drunk! If Albert Einstein was hammered and he said 2+2=35 would anybody say he’s a moron! No, because everyone would just say he said a dumb thing he didn’t mean that he didn’t mean to while he was drunk as did Michael Richards so America give the guy a break because we’ve all been there and know very well he didn’t intend for this rant to come out the way it did.

But I am not his lawyer and this is not what I think the main issue of this article is. The rest of the blog will explain the bigger problem at hand.

When you go to a comedy club you should not go in looking for a lawsuit, because if everyone went in like this there wouldn’t be any comedians. Did Richards go a little over board? Yes but is he a racist? Certainly not it was all meant in good fun and was taken a little over board, it’s a damn shame these “victims” couldn’t understand that.

Unfortunately they did not take this as a joke and now Jessie Jackson and the NAACP got involved. They of course are turning it into another “America hates Blacks” issue. Even worse these “victims” brought in Gloria Allred to sue for “hate speech” as she says (Richards Victims ).

In situations like these it becomes quit evident what is really going on. These two men really didn’t endure that much suffering however like any normal American they were given an opportunity to sue and become famous and took advantage of it.

The part that really drives me nuts here is that whenever a black comic says a racist white remark nothing is ever made of it. In fact if you watch the video the African American called Richards a “white ass cracker” I don’t really know what that that means but I am pretty sure it is nothing nice about our fellow white people. However nothing was said about that, in fact it seems quit evident that a black man can make all the racist white comments he wants in or out of a comedy club and never receive a consequence.

This is a major issue regarding who free speech restrictions apply to who it doesn’t from the current scuffle it seems rather palpable.

Free speech is either for everybody or nobody, if one person can’t say a word then nobody can. The separations of who has free speech and who doesn’t is unfair and I don’t know how much more this one sided fight can go on. If the blacks say they can say white comments as a joke then how come whites can’t say black comments as a joke, what is offensive to them is offensive to us as well. Even worse when it’s not a joke and an African American makes a racist white comment nothing happens.

I am not saying that I should be able to say the n-word all the time (nor would I want to) since they say it and since they say racial comments about me. Nor am I saying that black comics are to offensive to white people and should stop. I am simply saying that if a word is derived racist by both sides it shouldn’t be said by both sides and if a African American comic can poke fun at white people (as they so famously do) then white people should be to do the same without being sued.

Being the fact that I am Jewish which is a ridiculed minority as well, I like to think that everyone in America has the same freedoms and restrictions regarding the first amendment and the rest of the bill of rights.

This leads me to my redounding question, why can African Americans say what ever they want while everyone else gets brought to court? What is the difference! For people who have made it their life’s goal to be looked at as equals it seems sort of hypocritical that they want this special treatment.

Apparently there is a big difference; African Americans as it seems from this event are more sensitive than everyone else in the world. Don’t get me wrong I am not the least bit racist, some of my favorite comedians are black (Chris Rock, Richard Prior and I prefer them over many other comics I would say they are in my top 5) and I have no hate towards African Americans whatsoever.

However I am a believer in fair game and if something is out of bounds for a white man to say than the same thing should be for a black man. There are never lawyers brought in when Chris Rock makes a white joke that’s out of line, so when a white comic makes the same mistake why the big fuss?

The answer to this reoccurring question is that there shouldn’t be one. Comedy clubs are a place were jokes are told, everything said in the club should be taken as a joke. Everybody not only African Americans must understand this. So I will put it in very simple terms, when something is said by a comedian in a comic club while he is on stage at this comic club it is a joke. Whether or not you think the joke was in bad taste is for you to decide but if you are offended you should not sue rather boo.

So I ask on behalf of all those who enjoy standup comedy the way it is, please please realize were you are and what is the point of this sacred room, do not sue for every little thing you do not like or are offended by, stand up comedy will be ruined if we start restricting it. Everywhere In America people have to watch what they because someone might get “offended” and sue for “harassment”, please do not take away the one place on America were nobody gets offended.

Bush VS Clinton = Fair Fight?

I couldn’t really find any negative reviews so I wrote my own I with the personality of one who lacks a vast political knowledge and writes solely based his devoutness to the Bush administration.

The only problem with doing this is that I really enjoyed this excerpt from the book and felt that the media’s idleness during the war was beyond comprehension, it also showed more in depth how bad it really was. I only currently realized the media’s lack of action since all the things they obvious doubts they should have asked about the war are turning into big issues right now. So although I understood what they did I never really understood in what ways it was done. In respects to that I fell the book was terrific. Regarding its goal of this information I will express my feelings toward that later on in the blog.

Despite my fondness of this book I figured it would be a lot more fun to pretend I was someone who would hate it. So I introduce you to my Alter-ego Christopher O’Brien.

Review of Lapdogs: Christopher O’Brien

This article was obscene to me, as I read the first page I was struck with extreme disgust for this anti-American. Eric Boehlert says in this article that American journalists took a nap during the war on terror coverage failing to ask any important questions regarding Bush’s reasons for declaring war. What exactly did he want them to ask, where are the weapons of mass destruction, are there weapons of mass destruction, why not go after Osama instead of declaring war against Saddam! Clearly not of these questions were asked because they were fairly obvious and would have been a waist of breath for our great leader to even answer them.

Why cant this man understand that maybe people actually do love their country, and at during such war which happens to be an emotional time for everyone (I would hope), people tend to be citizens first no matter what their current occupation is this would even apply to journalists. Nobody has a problem when a sports analyst roots for his team during the playoffs, why such hostility towards our liberal media, why can’t they be fans once in a while also. Just because you’re a journalist doesn’t mean you can’t be patriotic

One thing that really shocked me was that he had the audacity to bring up the story of Cindy Sheehan. He says that although Cindy Sheehan put together many anti-war protests the media seemed to give her little press coverage. This was a habit of the press whenever there was an anti-war protest, to either downplay it or not play it at all. Well first of all why would the news want to show a bunch of hippies crying for piece when more important things in the world are going on in the world like the war itself? Secondly in regards to Cindy Sheehan, is it really a wonder that the media ignored her little protests. There have been many wars all over the world no matter who wins or loses them they all have one thing on common, casualties. So do I feel bad for this grieving mother yes of course I do, but does every mother do this when her dies? Surely not. Cindy Sheehan was most likely pro-war before her sons death and would have still been had her son not died, and now that her son dies certainly does not give her the right to jump ship.

This is why the media has given this women little press, they understand she is not in a proper state of mind right now and later will regret what she has done once her grieving period has passed. Therefore when she wises up she wont have to constantly be reminded about her mistake’s because nobody really paid attention to them.

Our country has been a country at war therefore we all must come together. This means that despite our differences with each other we must forget them and invest all our hate against the enemy. This doesn’t mean media likes Bush better, it simply means that this is a time of unity not controversy. I am very sorry Mr. Boehlert cannot understand this.

Being our country’s state over the past couple of years it is rather preposterous to compare its media coverage of the president to any other one’s. I don’t understand why Boehlert is so obsessed with this conspiracy theory of media-bias towards Bush. Bill Clinton received plenty media bias in his day if not more. If you forget about his sex scandal was the media really so awful to Clinton? The correct answer to this question would be no, to add it seemed as if the media was relatively find of our former president. It is inconceivable to me how anyone can make this accusation and even more so write a book that tries to legitimize this paranoid conspiracy theory.

To sum it up Eric Boehlert is just an angry anti-American man. He is ungrateful to a country that is simply trying to protect him form terrorists world wide. He is angry because the journalists love their country and he hates it. This real purpose of this book can be explained by an age old quote “misery loves company”. Eric Boehlert is a miserable and angry man he wrote this book hoping people would share his unexplained negativity, hopefully for America’s sake he will not succeed.

Although I disagree with many of the things Christopher O’Brien said he did make one valid point. When he said that this is country is in a significantly different circumstance then when Clinton was President I thought he couldn’t be more right.

This book and specific article is one that has “evidence” that the media was warmer to Bush than it has been to Clinton. I while agreeing with many of his points regarding the media’s lack of initiative and courage during the war on terror, disagree with the point its trying to bring out. It is unfair to the media to say that they favor Bush and were much worse to Clinton.

As said before these two presidents were leading the country at two very different times, if Bush had a sex scandal right at the beginning of the war not much would be made of it and same would have gone for Clinton had he been president at the time.
Furthermore its not like the media has been so pleasant to bush, the guy choked on a pretzel and the media made it seem like he is the biggest moron in the world, they turned his one cocaine indecent into him being addicted to it, they said he was an alcoholic so many times that alcoholic is usually the first thing people put together with name Bush, and they still never shy away from drawing comparisons to Bush’s brain and a peanut. Yes Bush did have a nice two or three years that the media hasn’t harassed him because of the war, but now that we are failing to realize a point to the war the hostility towards our president is back and stronger than ever.

Bill Clinton however didn’t really have to endure much suffering from the media. His incident happened in 1998 which was at the tail end of his term. Yes he had to go through a rough couple of years but let me stress they were only a couple of years and before them the media was rather warm to him. Additionally the type of negativity he received wasn’t nearly as bad as the kind Bush got and will get. The worst thing that can be said about Clinton is that he cheated on his wife and has a very technical meaning of the term “sexual relations”. Despite this the media still toted him as a family man and had constant press on how Hillary forgave him. I would say that’s a lot better than having your IQ compared to that of mouse.

Bush has had two or three pleasant years from the media only because of the war and most presidents who enter a war after a result like 9/11 will receive the same kind of comfort that the media showed towards Bush. Clinton received six pleasant years from them and one really bad year, his last year though wasn’t so bad because much focus turned to Hillary with her campaign.

Again this book while having many good points regarding the media’s inability to accurately cover the war is immediately diminished because of the point it used to bring out. I may seem redundant but its strengthening my point so I don’t care(no this is not a propaganda tactic), it is pointless to compare Bush’s regime to Clinton’s being the fact that one was president of war and one was a president during prosperity.

A sufficient way to compare the media coverage of them would be to look how the media treated bush before the war and how they treat him now that the war is over. Surely it will be quit obvious to anyone that aside for the war years the media has been extremely critical of bush while Clinton despite his one scandal was treated very nicely by the media. If you go by that then it seems that Clinton was treated better.

So technically yes bush received better treatment, but this would only be if you pick out specific years of the two presidencies and compare them. Which as you can see is pointless, because if you compare every presidents media treatment to that of Clintons scandal year then every president will look like the media is in their back pocket.

Do not Restrict the Words Just Watch Them.

Usually in life when thinking about the present it usually causes you to refer back to the past. Today’s topic is free speech and if limits should be placed on it during war time. This an issue that America has been dealing with ever since the late 1700’s starting with Alien and Sedition Acts .These laws made it a crime to write, print, utter or publish anything false, scandalous and malicious against the government of the United States, house of the Congress of the United States or the president of the United States. Violations of the first amendment like this continued with the civil war, WWI, and WII. During these wars if you wrote or said anything negative against America regarding the war you were likely subject to a penalty of prison or a fine. These were all blatant violations of the first amendment.

Now America is faced with a new war time issue, the patriot act. My knowledge of the patriot act is not vast, but I do know at any time the government wants they can hear my conversations. This is quit scary in many ways but I do not think it is in any way a violation of our free speech. If you’re a terrorist then yes it violates your right to tell your comrade to blow up the plain over the telephone. However this does not restrict our freedom of speech.

Through out this war people have been speaking out against it and no consequences have been given out for it (as far as I know, which I probably don’t so feel free to argue). In fact I think that you will find more anti-war demonstrations than pro ones(well at least on cranky docs).So we see that our speech is very free, the fact that the government has the ability to hear what we say doesn’t mean they are controlling it.

The point of this blog though isn’t whether or not we have free speech during war time, rather it is whether or not we should be able to use it to its fullest extent during war time. My opinion on this isn’t really relevant to that of political reasoning. I do know that it is our right to speak out against the government as we please, so politically and technically I say no restrictions should be put on our speech during time of war seeing that it is our right to say whatever the hell we want.

However I do say we definitely should think very hardly before we exercise this right from an ethical stand point when we speak out giants the war. As we know many soldiers have died in this war on terror and many soldiers are still fighting it. This obviously resulted in many families grieving over lost son’s daughter’s sister’s brother’s mothers and father’s. These soldiers that are still fighting in Iraq would like to believe they are fighting for your protection and so do their families. If your relative or you were fighting in a war would you like hearing that the war they are fighting and dying for is a joke, I think not.

I am not saying we should not be allowed to say these things. I am simply to watch how they are said. So when I see a slide show like this (http://know-our-enemy.net/make-no-mistake/index.htm) showing a mother crying over her son’s grave and on top of this photo it says “mission accomplished. It doesn’t make me think about the negative effects of war rather I think that how this mother must feel when she sees the tears she is pouring out for her son are being used to mock thee very cause he died for. One should thus realize that our fine president and government do not really care for these anti-war ads and likely will never see them.

To end I will again simply say that it is always our right to say as we please, but when you say it during these emotional times consider whom you will displease.

English,Yay?

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/17B9CA05-C477-4881-AAE7-E0EE9E44985F.htm

This assignment was to write our thoughts of the Al Jazeera website. Al Jazeera claims to be the only politically independent television station in the Middle East. It now rivals the BBC in worldwide audiences with an estimated 50 million viewers.

Why do I bring this up? Well its sort of simple. Contrary to the majority of this class I dont check cnn.com or foxnews.com everyday. On a good week I will look at these wonderful websites two or three times, they are allcontrolledd by the big boys upstairs so whywaiste my time with a lie when I can check the score of the game thatisn'tt biased or misleading!(I just said that to get a reaction out of ya doc)

Ok ,so not really knowing adifferencee of how anAmericann news website would write aarticlee and how the Al Jazeera writes one, a certainarticlee on the website struckquitt aninterestt to me.

It said that the Al Jazeeratelevisionn station hasannouncedd it was going to be broadcasted inEnglishh. This by no means can be a good thing.

First of all this is a station that played Osama videos like fox plays Sienfeld reruns. They made their mark by showing brutal war footage. They also have an outstanding reputation of being quit bias. When I heard that their news station in the middle east was bombed, and someonee hacked into their website and made it onlyArabic. It made me realize how powerful media can be and how powerful this specific station is.

Knowing Al Jazeera's power the idea of them broadcasting on a nightly basis is absolutely horrifying.What'sts to stop them from distorting the news to make victims out of the Arab terrorists . Now regarding the middle east I can almost guarantee you that now matter how bad you think CNN is this will obviously be worse.

And the worst part is the flip sidisn'tnt much better. If they end up not being as Arab bias as originally thought, do you really think that Americaca will shy away from such an opportunity. If Al Jazeera is actually un- bias to the Arabs, then they very well could be a new tool of propaganda for our fine government.

To underestimate the significance of this news is something that would be as very naive. The current most powerful television station in the world is coming to a living room near you.Exited?

Ah an answer at last

http://www.calvin.edu/academic/cas/gpa/esser.htm

Growing up in a Jewish home with grandparents as survivors and going to a Jewish my entire life, I thought I was fairly knowledgeable regarding how the holocaust was started and what went on during it. I know that a lot of Jews were brutally murdered and that the way Hitler convinced Germany that Jews=dogs were by using them as a scapegoat, saying that they were the source of Germany’s current depression.

I thought this was his only tactic because I guess no one ever told me otherwise. But a question always lurked inside my head, how good the Germany all of sudden just say “hey Adolph is right they are the reason why I’m broke!” It just didn’t make sense to me. But I figured the holocaust is a sensitive topic and is not on of those things you generally start arguments over. So I let this question be for quit sometime.

But recently I have been thinking about this question again, only this time I have a correct answer that makes sense to me. What is this answer that I have been looking for ever since the third grade? Propaganda

To be short propaganda is the art of persuading or manipulating someone by any means possible to believe as you do. The Germans particularly Hitler were masters of it. You can see from the signs and visuals they use in their ads to intense rhetoric and myths they have in their articles and books.

An article I thought that displayed this best was displayed in opening chapter of a book Hermann Esser wrote. Herman Esser was one of Hitler’s early followers; the book is called “The Jewish World Plague”. It was written shortly after a mass display of Jewish violence and was saying how the Jews got what they deserved therefore not deserving any sympathy whatsoever for their demise.

Contrary to the three or four sentences I used to some this book up it is highly complex and filled with classic propaganda tactics. It starts off with the classic tactic of creating the enemy.

“The treacherous murder of the young German diplomat Ernst vom Rath in the office of the German embassy in Paris on 7 November 1938 by a 17-year-old Jew named Herschel Grünspan is rightly viewed by the entire German people as a contemptible sneaky attack on Adolf Hitler's new Greater Germany. Eighty million people were touched in the depth of their being; justified outrage erupted. According to their own figures, the Jews, who had been living very well among the German people for centuries, were worth a total of 8 billion marks. When the Reich government required them to pay a penalty of a billion marks, the Jewish-democratic world press howled as if Jews in National Socialist Germany were starving and going to the dogs.”

From this the common German is manipulated into despising the Jew, the tact’s that are used is fairly obvious to one who has a basic knowledge of propaganda. Distortion and myth are crucial in this first paragraph. The murder clearly was not out of cold blood and did not lack reason. Additionally on top of the massacre the Germans had on the Jews the Germans gave the Jews a fine for this incident. They said it was well deserved and the Jews have a lot of money anyways so why the big fuss. This emphasizing the old Jews is rich myth, and what was once envy of this successful nation turned quickly into resentment and hate.

He then proceeds on to the history of Jews saying guess saying how every country which they resided in the past has crumpled, Rome Spain ect… what he leaves out is the part that they were brutally persecuted. These countries most likely fell because many of their top officials were Jewish before they started with the persecution of them. When you lose a important part of your government staff it doesn’t really help you.

The most common thing he does though is refer to the Jews a poison. Which is a word that doesn’t really leave ones mind. .He seldom threw out phrases like these one referring to the Jews.

“It grows and grows like weeds in the state, the community and the family and infests the blood of humanity everywhere.”

“In brief, that is the pestilential nature of Jewry, against which every people, every state, every nation must, should and wants to defend itself if it does not want to be the victim of his bloody plague.”

“Jewry is the embodiment of materialism, the epitome of sensuality, of greed, of dishonesty, of selfishness, of heartlessness and the lust for power”.

By saying this he not only creates an enemy out of the Jews but makes a poison out of them. He creates the idea in the typical Germans head that you shouldn’t just hate the Jews but should beware of them.

After reading this excerpt from the book it became very clear to why the Germans followed Hitler’s words like hey were gods. He was a master propagandist and so were all his followers. He pounded the idea that Jew=dog so hard it was impossible not to follow.

So now my question is clearly answered in a very in depth kind of way. So now if you were to ask me how Hitler transformed Germanys will into his. I would obviously say propaganda. Yes it is not specific whatsoever so to rephrase the question, what was the most important tool of propaganda that Hitler used to make anti-Semitism a Semite in itself?

The answer in my opinion to this would be enemies. Enemies are good for numerous reasons they always make someone wrong, there is no better way to prove a point than to disprove someone else’s. More importantly it creates unity for example the quote “my enemy’s enemy is my friend” couldn’t explain this better. The best way people unfortunately come together is not their common interests but contrarily their common hates and dislikes.

In this introduction Hermann Esser not only makes an enemy of the Jew, but he makes them scared of the Jew. Usually one shouldn’t be scared of their enemies, but he portrays the Jews not as the kind of enemy that you would have to fight against. Rather he makes them equal to a flue which can kill you if you don’t take your medicine.Having them around whether they actively against you or are working for you is a danger in itself. Having a theory like this only gives you one solution, to get rid of the flu before it kills you.

This unfortunately brings us back to the scary reality that things like this can still happen today. Whether it is to exterminate the Jews, veto the two term presidential rule or to declare war on a country we really don’t know much about, the world is easily manipulated and controlled. Threats like these will always exists and unfortunately with the constant current advances in technology the possible evoloving nightmare can only get worse

Waiting On The World To Change

Cool song if you pay attention to the words, o yea john mayer’s pretty good too

Rhetoric

O’Shaughnessy says that rhetoric s one of the major role players on propaganda. As it is known, most of America doesn’t not think rationally therefore or persuaded with different uses of rhetoric to take advantage of this lack of thought. He says rhetoric is the subset of propaganda but it is important not to confuse it with propaganda. So the question no blooms what exactly is rhetoric? (As if the definition of propaganda itself wasn’t confusing enough to begin with.) Rhetoric as most would say is the art of emotional persuasion provoking irrational thought.

But what issues play a part in rhetoric to get these emotional thoughts to come about? A major part of rhetoric is metaphor. Since the goal of rhetoric is to drift the person away from the oppositions ideal or opinion and to bring them to theirs and theirs only. So what can cause this drift, a metaphor? As Gibbs said “metaphors de-familiarize the familiar to reorient thinking”. So once the person is successful in his metaphor the viewer/reader/listener is only focusing on the propagandist’s commands alone. This also touches up on the Orwell article we read when he said that to many writers’ use to many metaphors resulting in the reader not having any idea what the writer is saying.

Along with metaphors comes the tact of visual aid or a phrase. Because when both these are done they stick in your head. That’s why politicians are known to make al those classic phrases. This is also why the political ads are so absurd because when you see a crazy ad it sticks in your head.

Another main tool of rhetoric is perspective, it is always very important to know who you’re relaying the message to. That is way there is so many different kinds of these ads each tending to the interest of the area at hand.

So were and what does rhetoric do for us today? Rhetoric had evolved over the years. It started off only being in speeches because back than it was the bets way to persuade. One would say a use and emotional word during this speech so only that word would stick with you and effectively changing anything any rational thought that would be used. For example the speaker would use the word that would stick in your head for the rest of your speech like good, bad, evil, blood ect…

It then went to newspapers were they would uses these same tactics with images. the main goal is to get whatever your saying to stick in your head this is best done visually.

So now day’s propagandists are in heaven. Given the advancements of technology America had become slaves to the screen. Always susceptible to be victims of irrational thought. They first get us with the absurd message getting our emotions going then them plant the lasting image in our heads. Making it impossible for the average American to actually analyze what is taking place.

GOP?

I have to admit that this was my first year following the mid-term elections or for that matter anything remotely having to do with politics. Originally it was an occupational hazard of taking a political science class which kind of meant knowing politics.

As things progress, I’ve begun to realize how little I knew—and how little it mattered to me even though there are decisions being made that could change my life . Sometimes in class when someone would mention an issue or a name I didn’t know much about, I would almost feel like I spent the first 20 years of my life in a vacuum totally oblivious to events that affect ,my life

So when the mid-term elections began, I found myself constantly looking up things that were previously unknown to me. And I’m not just talking issues and agendas.

Case in point. One thing that drove me nuts was when people kept referring to the Republican Party as the GOP. I’ve been hearing the term for years and probably even used it a few times—all without ever knowing what it stood for—figuratively and literally. Rather than take the normal approach and simply look it up on line I felt compelled to try and “Figure it out” on my own. After all considering who they put in the White House, how hard could it be?

So I started guess and came up with many definitions. General Opposition Republic, Great Obtuse Rational, George Orwell Renaissance (tribute to 1984), Get On Policy, German Ostracizing Place, and or as my father constantly says Get Out President. After looking at all these explanations I realized none of them made sense whatsoever.

So I threw what little pride I still had in the garbage and chose to look it up on line. Needless to say I felt like I what I was doing was the equivalent to looking up the word President. To sum it up this was a Political Science low—but one that I learnt from just the same.

So I logged onto Google and typed in the phrase “What does GOP stand for” then clicked “I’m feeling lucky” and struck gold.

The date of the search was November (3rd last week). Coincidentally CBS news had an article about this on the same day 4 years ago. It said that the majority of America does not know what GOP stands for. This meant one thing for me…… I’m not alone!

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2002/12/03/politics/main531460.shtml

This was a mega relief for my political pride. But the article is as interesting as the saga itself. It said that the Wall Street Journal will stop using GOP when they refer to the Republican Party because many Americans don’t know what it means, therefore they will not know the article is about the Republican Party.

So what does GOP stand for? Well the widespread meaning is Grand Old Party. But Republicans say it means Gallant Old Party or Get Out and Push. These are stereotypical traits of the Republican Party. The Republican Party is a clichéd as old rich men drinking whisky (or bourbon) and laughing at the “working class”. They are also known for getting out there and just getting the job (aka their agenda)done. Whether its with campaigning when they make an ridiculously offensive ad, or with a policy they want, they get it their way because money talks way louder than democracy (except during this years election)

So to conclude I think we can realize the obvious from the acronym. The Republican Party insists on being referred to by this name, everywhere from their website to the White House. So we can see that the Republicans are indeed a Grand Old Party, unfortunately their interests are solely to benefit keeping the “guests” at this party “grand”. Hopefully the most recent election showed them that sooner than later would be a good time to start thinking about “expanding the guest list” --or soon they may not have much to “party” for.

Dirty Dirty Dirty

this is just hilarious

Propaganda

Is propaganda or merely a difference in perspective?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lglTUspyeus

The word “propaganda” is nearly impossible to describe. Though what it lacks in clarity it more than makes up in multiple definitions . As O’Shaughnessy says in his book; “it is inevitable that there will be no collective agreement about the definition of propaganda in the sense that we might accord on the meaning of many other words”. To make his point O’Shaughnessy spends the first part of the book quoting numerous explanations from scholars. Not surprisingly, they all seem to simultaneously agree and disagree with each other.

A major issue O’Shaughnessy raises is what exactly the goal of propaganda is; communication or persuasion? Though the bigger question is; “are all ads propaganda?” the answer is “kind of” but even that is really a “draw” .

I like to follow the opinion of the scholar Jacques Ellul, who says “All propaganda is necessarily bias, but not all bias is necessarily propagandist. While this view is a little controversial (not to mention convoluted) it raises many questions and hence many of the authors and scholars he references throughout the book don’t like it.

Despite this, I think it can best explain the ad that I’m choosing to write about, so with apologies to the opposition, I am going to stick by what Ellul said.

The ad I chose was a quite personal ad against Ron Kind. While Kind passed many bills regarding health research on some pretty outrageous topics, he never passed one for the soldiers to get more funding. By stating these two facts, the opposition reached the absurd conclusion that Kind would pay for anything sex related, but nothing to help the welfare of our troops in Iraq.

This is clearly propaganda. Even if you don’t prescribe to what Ellul said. How? Well first, let’s revert to Ellul’s definition, and we can clearly see that is a biased propaganda. But even if you don’t like what he said, there is still a sufficient explanation to proclaim this as propaganda.

O’Shaughnessy states that “propaganda is manipulative and generally attacks one emotional side”. Also he says that “it usually goes to persuade the ambivalent ones”.

Now let’s take all these into account the way the average viewer would.

The typical American doesn’t know much about the mid-term election candidates so odds are he is more than a bit confused. He turns on his/her television and sees a political ad saying that Ron Kind pays for sex, and not for soldier in Iraq. As chances are he (or she) cares more for the soldiers in Iraq than the masturbatory habits of adults—their conclusion about Kind is a foregone one, And given the almost surgical precision of the TV time bought to communicate that message, odds are its reaching viewers who will not just cast their vote for the opposition but voice their perceptions to anyone who’ll listen (and many who’d rather not).

You mind say, that the opposition’s campaign propaganda is the un-Kind-est of all

who likes bush?

Based on recent polls of the President’s approval ratings America is in no way a fan of the Bush administration or the President himself. In the most recent poll, the President had a 42% approval rating and 56% disapproval rating with 40% strongly disapproving and the rest somewhat. He’s not doing better among his fans as only 22% strongly approved with the rest “somewhat” approving.
(http://www.rasmussenreports.com/Bush_Job_Approval.htm)

At present and with less than a week to go to the midterms, most polls have Bush down by about 10 -15%. As you can see, a margin of error is irrelevant here as the core difference is so big. More important, all these low ratings bring up the question of why does America all of a sudden hate the President?

Seems like only yesterday that his approval ratings were swimming in the high 80’ and low 90’s. (http://www.usatoday.com/news/graphics/presidential_approval/flash.htm). But as the years have gone on America has grown to hate the President. His ratings have declined every year since 2001, so I ask again why?

Clearly there are many answers to this question and despite what the President would want you to think, most all of them are not attributable to the Democrat’s “Anti Bush” machine (especially since most people feel the Democrats have nowhere near the messaging machine” Karl Rove had put into place before the last election.

Let’s start with the basics, George Bush just barely won his first presidential election and some still feel that if the Governor of Florida didn’t share the President’s last name (not to mention mother and father) I’d be writing about the “Gore Whitehouse” today.

And it gets better, early indications made it seem that a second term for “Dubya” was far from a slam dunk. But thanks to Karl Rove’s prowess Bus became the only way to prevent a 9/11 repeat. He became so well liked that his approval ratings were dancing in the 90’s. He declared a war on terror, he went after weapons of mass destruction (real or imagined) with a vengeance that made us proud to be Americans. In fact many would say Osama Bin Laden was as responsible for the Bush re-election as Karl Rove was

So now its 2006 and look what happened! After a war that’s taking too long with too little results and gas prices that only recently “magically” came down America is no longer buying what the Republicans are selling.

The war on terror looks like it hasn’t had any definitive success—beyond avoiding a horrific repeat (FYI: the Republicans spin on that is “We can’t say why but we’re winning”)

The Katrina situation was terribly mishandled by FEMA--as Spike Lee showed so candidly in his HBO documentary. And on top of this, gas prices have hit record highs, though they have recently come down, Is it a coincidence that they came down right around the mid terms? You decide.

Bloggers and media have thrived on this down spiral of ratings. Some are happy and some giving their own reasons. (http://www.baltimoregroupblog.com/2006/05/11/isnt-that-sweet/) (http://www.rasmussenreports.com/Bush_Job_Approval.htm) . But overall the general census is quite pleased with this.

So what does Bush think about this hate for him? He says "If I worried about polls, I wouldn't be doing my job," he said in a March interview. (http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/02/28/bush.interview/). Even more recently he was reported saying that the Democrats were “dancing in the end zone” and not to worry the “Republicans will come out on top”, this in regard regards to his very low approval ratings and its affects on the upcoming elections.(http://news.aol.com/elections/dailypulse/103106/_a/whos-going-to-win/20061031104109990001?ncid=NWS00010000000001).

I find this funny because it seems as if Bush doesn’t care about polls. But in the 2000 election he cared very much about polls saying “The good news is that I'm leading in the polls," he told the group in his brief remarks before a closed session. "The bad news is the election isn't tomorrow." . He also said “After all, these are people who live by all these polls and focus groups. [They] must be seeing something in those polls and focus groups that make them nervous.” This is quite contrary to his views as of late.

(http://archives.cnn.com/2000/ALLPOLITICS/stories/07/13/bushpoll.lat/index.html).

So what’s the big deal? Bush has already been re-elected, unless Congress changes the law he’s not eyeing a third term—aside from paying back political markers and hoping to have a Senate and house he can work and play well with for the next 2 years, these ratings don’t really matter to him!

Too bad the same is not true for everybody around him. Due to these distinctive differences in the ratings it looks as if the republicans contradictory to what bush said will not come out on top.