Another case of American media self-censorship

Media Matters - ABC's World News only network news broadcast to report on subpoenas for former Bush aides

This is a disturbing story. Only one American news network reported that two former aides to Dubya had been subpoenaed to appear before the House and Senate judiciary committee over allegations of corruption in the appointment and firing of federal prosecutors. The Bush White House is being protected from public scrutiny by the media watchdogs.

This is a good example of how the force of the so-called 'Fourth Estate' in journalism has been fundamentally weakened over the past 10 years or so. The traditional media watchdog role was to bark and bite at those in power who abused the trust of the citizenry. That's the historic foundation of the Fourth Estate model.

Today the role of the Fourth Estate in most cases is to sit quietly at the master's feet, licking its own scabby ar*e.

American Media Wars over Iraq coverage

Media Matters - O'Reilly: CNN, MSNBC "delight in showing Iraqi violence" and "are actually helping the terrorists"

The American Fox Network - "fair and balanced", yeah right - is well known for its patriotic support of Dubya and the American debacle in Iraq, but now the wonderful Bill O'Reilly has had a go at his colleagues on other networks over their Iraq coverage.

The fight was triggered by some research that Fox shows less footage of Iraq and covers less Iraq-related news than some of the other networks. This might come as a surprise to many, but the logic is quite simple: If your side's losing the war, bury the news in other stuff and boost other news that puts your guys in a better light.

O'Reilly's response was to blame the other networks for over-cooking the Iraq story and taking some delight in covering the war because it puts Bush in a bad light. When your light's that sh*tty, it's good to keep it out of sight under a big bushel barrel.

Here's a sample of Bungle-Oh Bill's reasoning:

Discussing the study during the June 12 broadcast of his nationally syndicated radio program, O'Reilly claimed: "The terrorists are going to set off a bomb every day, because they know CNN and MSNBC are gonna put it on the air. That's a strategy for the other side, the terrorist side. So I'm taking an argument that CNN and MSNBC are actually helping the terrorists by reporting useless explosions." O'Reilly later stated: "I'm not gonna cover every bomb that goes off in Tikrit, because it's meaningless."

Yeah, meaningless in the context of the Bush regime's total denial that it's responsible -- "now look at the mess you've gotten us into, George," -- for the daily horror of Baghdad and Tikrit. It's the old "oxygen of publicity" argument, which I've never been that fond of.
It goes something like, the media's responsible for terrorism because they give the terrorists what they want - the "oxygen" of publicity. This is based on the mistaken assumption that the terrorists don't have any kind of legitimate political agenda, which the anti-imperialists in Iraq certainly do.

I admit that Islamic fundamentalism is a problem, it's a politically-bankrupt ideology that cannot ultimately lead to the real liberation of Iraq, but I also work off the principle that a defeat for US imperialism -- by any means necessary to paraphrase Malcolm X -- is good for the planet as a whole.

We can deal with the Imams once Bush is out of the way.

Here's some more of Malcolm. For the record, he was murdered by members of the Nation of Islam, he was not a deeply religious Muslim, he was killed because he had broken politically with Elijiah Mohammed:

"If violence is wrong in America, violence is wrong abroad. If it is wrong to be violent defending black women and black children and black babies and black men, then it is wrong for America to draft us, and make us violent abroad in defense of her. And if it is right for America to draft us, and teach us how to be violent in defense of her, then it is right for you and me to do whatever is necessary to defend our own people right here in this country."
-- Speech, Nov. 1963, New York City.

The Myspace President

Obama in website battle with blogger

Well at least the phony American presidential election campaign period promises to be interesting. Last week I mentioned how Republican candidate John McCain had become a reluctant download star on the YouTube website. Now it seems that Democratic hopeful Barak Obama has got himself into a fight with a former fan.
Joe Anthony had set up a 'tribute' page for Barak on MySpace, but now the candidate has wrestled control away, with the help of the MySpace spat-sorters.
Mr Anthony was demanding tens of millions of dollars to hand over the site, but Barak's team got it for free.
Nice one Mr Presidential-hopeful. You need the votes of the young and black Americans who hate George Bush, but you can't keep your hands of the kids' toys. Shame on you. A bit of trust would be a useful character trait for a controversial candidate. Now you just look like a suit from Sony.
Seriously though, if the US presidential campaign was based on popularity, in the same way as MySpace page rankings, some 12-year-old from Butte, Montana would be the perfect choice. She couldn't do a worse job than the incumbent and the candidates are all looking greedy and ungrateful, just like in every other presidential election since... When? Well, way before the Vietnam war anyway.
Who was the last American president who wasn't a rich, white and almost-dead male? Yep, tough question.

Ok, ok, I know you want to check out Barak's pages. Just how cool can this guy get, click through here to find out.

With friends like these

McCain Launches Candidacy With Bush Critique - New York Times

Ah, spring has sproinged in the northern hemisphere and eager-beaver presidential candidates in the USA are ramping up their phony election campaigns before the primaries kick off in fall.
It's heartening to know that even Republican old boots like John McCain are campaigning against George "Dubya" Bush.
Let's just hope it does them no good at all. They're all tarred with the same brush.