Freedom of The Press?
By Junious Ricardo Stanton

"The military has faced almost no public outcry at home about these killings. In fact, comments by Ann Cooper of the Committee to Protect Journalists have been used to discredit Jordan's statement at Davos. 'From our standpoint,' Cooper was widely quoted as saying, 'journalists are not being targeted by the US military in Iraq.'

But as CPJ's Joel Campagna acknowledges, the Pentagon has not been cooperative in the investigations of many of these journalist killings. The fact is that CPJ doesn't know that the military has not targeted journalists, and there are many facts that suggest that it has. These include not only the events of April 8, 2003, but credible accounts of journalists being tortured by the US military in Iraq, such as Salah Hassan and Suheib Badr Darwish of Al Jazeera [see Christian Parenti, 'Al Jazeera Goes to Jail,' March 29, 2004] and three Reuters staffers who say they were brutalized by US forces for seventy-two hours after they filmed a crashed US helicopter near Falluja in January 2004.

According to news reports, the journalists were blindfolded, forced to stand for hours with their arms raised and threatened with sexual abuse. A family member of one journalist said US interrogators stripped him naked and forced a shoe into his mouth. In many of these cases, there is a common thread: The journalists, mostly Arabs, were reporting on places or incidents that the military may not have wanted the world to see--military vehicles in flames, helicopters shot down, fierce resistance against the 'liberation' forces, civilian deaths."- Jeremy Scahill Shooting The Messenger

There is an old adage that says, "The first casualty of war is truth". Since George W Bush decided to launch his bogus War on Terrorism, Truth with a capital T has taken a major hit. The corporate mind control apparatus serves essentially as cheerleaders and megaphones for the Bush administrations lies about 9-11, the reasons for invading Afghanistan and Iraq and now offers its services in imperialist insanity by trumpeting the party line about Iran and North Korea!

Despite the fact that this collaboration has facilitated the deaths of over 1,400 US soldiers and countless others who have been crippled and maimed physically and psychically, the drummers for lies and perpetual war continue their steady rhythm. The flip side of the coin is this same media excoriates and demonizes anyone who refuses to go along with their war is peace, slaughter is freedom, invasion is liberation Bizzaro World scenario.

The US military along with its propensity towards overkill, cultural insensitivity and depravity adopted the same attitude as the fascist NeoCon/Zionist cabal calling the shots by targeting anyone in Afghanistan and Iraq who dares report anything contrary to the Bizzaro reality party line.

Early on in the delusory War on Terrorism when the campaign was still in Afghanistan I noticed the offices of Al Jazeera were targeted and bombed in November of 2001 by "Coalition" forces. Al Jazeera the satellite news network based in Qatar is called the CNN of the Arab world. Al Jazeera much to the chagrin of AmeriKKKa is an independent agency not beholden to Western purse strings. The network, given its unique mission was given access in Arab or Muslim nations and reports from an Arab perspective.

Unlike the US controlled corporate media that sanitizes, glorifies and promotes the war Al Jazeera shows the ugliness and collateral damage to innocent victims of AmeriKKKan imperialism. Obviously this does not sit well with Bush and Co, especially since Al Jazeera has 35 million viewers throughout the Arab world. The last thing the mind control apparatus wants are people seeing the truth.

Al Jazeera's English Website, once it went online, was routinely hacked during the early stages of the Iraqi invasion to prevent AmeriKKKans from seeing anything differing from the BizzaroWorld matrix.

Once the war spread to Iraq only embedded "journalists" under direct control of the US military seemed immune from danger of "friendly fire" or overt targeting by US forces. On April 8, 2004 a US tank brazenly fired on the Palestine Hotel in Baghdad where journalist were staying which also housed the offices of Al Jazeera and another Arab television station. The attack killed several foreign journalists.

The US military said the tank fired on the hotel because they received reports of snipers. A French television crew who filmed the event denied sniper fire! The whole flap with Muqtada al Sadr the fiery Baghdad cleric started when the US shut down his newspaper al-Hawaza supposedly for inciting violence! It is clear the US doesn't want independent Arab media or independent foreign journalists operating in Iraq.

The US military was accused by recently resigned CNN executive Eason Jordan in a exceptional moment of candor during a panel discussion at the World Economic Forum who stated he felt independent journalists were being targeted by the US military! Anyone looking at the facts would comfortably come to the same conclusion. Due to the fall out from Jordan's statements he has since resigned even though he has been with the CNN for over twenty years.

Seeing the way the US corporate media has given Bush and Co. a free pass beginning with the 2000 Presidential campaign, I am not surprised at all by the latest developments. If you are seeking Truth with a capital T, you cannot depend on the mainstream media.

As our Native American brethren stated 'the white man speak with forked tongue." If media is merely a conduit for communication then it follows the white man's media would only serve to propagate his lies. The truth of that reality becomes evident when people who attempt to provide an alternative to their lies are targeted.

© 2005 by Afromerica

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