Supporting information for the 'Propaganda or Need to Know' Video

I'm not going to try to hit every assertion, or even every critical assertion. Some require more research than I'm prepared for, and some are general observations of series of events that are in themselves so surrounded by biased, partisan interpretations, that it would take much effort just to try to establish a clear, objective case for them, either individually or as a whole.

As an example, this includes claims such as, "Now both parties embrace both "big government" and "big corporation"." Though we could look at the behaviors and voting records of democrats and neo-cons, and their lobbyists, etc., this would take a good deal of research itself. Those that have been objective enough up until this point may have realized some truth to this statement anyway, and so a lot of the statements made in the video must just be left up to the viewer's discretion without further, clear supporting information.

I aim only to show that many of the main ideas hit in the video are supported by credible sources and information, as increasingly few as those appear to be today.

Assertions from the video:

Claim: Bias shields us from facts, prevents rational thought

From the video:

Brain scans revealed that the politically biased are virtually addicted to lying to themselves to maintain their view that their party and leaders are flawless.

People of both political "sides" are equally affected by bias.

When viewing truth that doesn't suit our ideals, most of us deny it and go on as if it never happened mainly because few of us even understand the way bias affects us and makes us completely irrational.

[...and from a bit later in the video...]

That's right, when biased people deny they also get a sort of rush

Supported.


From MSNBC, Jan. 24, 2006 (source):

Political bias affects brain activity, study finds
Democrats and Republicans both adept at ignoring facts, brain scans show

Subjects were asked to evaluate statements by President George W. Bush and Democratic presidential nominee Sen. John Kerry, seen here after a debate on Oct. 8, 2004. Both Republicans and Democrats ignored information that could not rationally be discounted, the study found.


Democrats and Republicans alike are adept at making decisions without letting the facts get in the way, a new study shows.

And they get quite a rush from ignoring information that's contrary to their point of view.
[...]
The study points to a total lack of reason in political decision-making.
[...]
The researchers will present the findings Saturday at the Annual Conference of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology.

Emphasis mine. The study was apparently conducted by Emory University.

Continued from the video:

Millions of Americans suffer from [political bias], and nationalism bias runs even deeper.

Based on the study cited above, showing that individuals will ignore information contrary to their political beliefs, it is not unreasonable to say that individuals will also ignore information contrary to the beliefs they hold of their country, which can be seen as political from an international perspective, as feelings of nationalism seem fundamental to most Americans regardless of their individual political affiliations.

A definition of "nationalism" offered by the American Heritage (note the name!) dictionary is "[d]evotion to the interests or culture of one's nation." (source)

As the previously cited study shows, many will ignore this information because of bias. We should agree that more Americans are going to believe that the US is the greatest nation on Earth, than Australians are going to believe that the US is the greatest nation on Earth, or Canadians, or Vietnamese, or Chinese, or Iraqis, Iranians, etc. Psychologically, why is this? Is this a coincidence, that most individuals that realize the US is the greatest nation on Earth simply happen to live there, or is the fact that they live there to begin with the reason so many feel that way? Consider that most Canadians have much pride in Canada, most Russians have much pride in Russia, most Brazilians will have much pride in Brazil. Why?


From the video:

Most of us live in a delusional reality based on denial as a result.

Consider the above. If most politically-motivated Americans ignore factual information contrary to their political opinions, then are not many Americans living in a world in which they are denying legitimate information because of their bias, and are deluding themselves as a result?



Claim: All media owned by 5 corporations

"Freedom of Press" = All media outlets owned by 5 Mega-Corporations.

...and that means your entertainment too!

Misleading, but fundamentally supported.

More than 90% of all mass media today is owned by five corporations. Therefore, the statement "All media outlets owned by 5 Mega-Corporations" is technically incorrect, but the overall point is still legitimate: news sources are becoming less numerous and are more controlled by a few very large corporations.


From the Corporate Accountability Project website (source):

In 1983, 50 corporations controlled the vast majority of all news media in the U.S. At the time, Ben Bagdikian was called "alarmist" for pointing this out in his book, The Media Monopoly. In his 4th edition, published in 1992, he wrote "in the U.S., fewer than two dozen of these extraordinary creatures own and operate 90% of the mass media" -- controlling almost all of America's newspapers, magazines, TV and radio stations, books, records, movies, videos, wire services and photo agencies. He predicted then that eventually this number would fall to about half a dozen companies. This was greeted with skepticism at the time. When the 6th edition of The Media Monopoly was published in 2000, the number had fallen to six. Since then, there have been more mergers and the scope has expanded to include new media like the Internet market. More than 1 in 4 Internet users in the U.S. now log in with AOL Time-Warner, the world's largest media corporation.

In 2004, Bagdikian's revised and expanded book, The New Media Monopoly, shows that only 5 huge corporations -- Time Warner, Disney, Murdoch's News Corporation, Bertelsmann of Germany, and Viacom (formerly CBS) -- now control most of the media industry in the U.S. General Electric's NBC is a close sixth.

Emphasis added.

Also from that page is this graph, illustrating the above information:




Note that these same corporations do own most or all of basic TV stations and therefore control most or all "programming". This can be confirmed with little research into the assets of the corporations listed above.



Claim: Polls show Americans know more about Simpsons than First Amendment

Polls revealed that Americans know more about the Simpsons than the 1st Amendment.

Supported.


From the BBC, March 1st, 2006 (source):

Simpsons 'trump' First Amendment

Americans know more about The Simpsons TV show than the US Constitution's First Amendment, an opinion poll says.


Only one in four could name more than one of the five freedoms it upholds but more than half could name at least two members of the cartoon family.

About one in five thought the right to own a pet was one of the freedoms.

Claim: Most don't realize freedom loss

Most dont even notice when they rape or manipulate our rights.

I'm not going to supply sources for this. But think about the bill that was recently passed that allows the president to now declare anyone, citizen or non-citizen, an enemy combatant and hold them indefinitely, as well as barring them from civilian courts. Did you hear of this? Considering the audience for this post, I feel as though more of us here have heard of this than "average" citizens. Ask others around you what they've heard of it. Surely this new power to the executive branch is a limit upon our freedom, as it is a provision on our civil liberties in the name of national security. Do you think this bill's passage is unusual today? What about the liberty-restricting provisions in the PATRIOT Act?


Fixed typo in thread title. Thanks Wizard.

[edit on 7-10-2006 by bsbray11]

Claim: Politicians benefit monetarily from disasters

Not only do politicians get payouts, but they usually own stocks in the companies (or have other incentives) that profit from their decisions and our problems

The bigger the disaster the more money they make

This includes 9/11, Katrina, Bird Flu, War in Iraq, etc.

Supported.

I will focus on one prominent politician, and leave readers to further research on other politicians' monetary ties to determine how true this statement really is (ie, bird flu and Donald Rumsfeld, for another prominent example within the Bush Administration).

Cheney's Halliburton stock options rose 3,281% last year, senator finds

An analysis released by a Democratic senator found that Vice President Dick Cheney's Halliburton stock options have risen 3,281 percent in the last year, RAW STORY can reveal.

Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) asserts that Cheney's options -- worth $241,498 a year ago -- are now valued at more than $8 million. The former CEO of the oil and gas services juggernaut, Cheney has pledged to give proceeds to charity.

[...]

“Halliburton has already raked in more than $10 billion from the Bush-Cheney Administration for work in Iraq, and they were awarded some of the first Katrina contracts," Lautenberg said in a statement. "It is unseemly for the Vice President to continue to benefit from this company at the same time his Administration funnels billions of dollars to it. The Vice President should sever his financial ties to Halliburton once and for all.”

Cheney continues to hold 433,333 Halliburton stock options. The company has been criticized by auditors for its handling of a no-bid [contract] in Iraq. Auditors found the firm marked up meal prices for troops and inflated gas prices in a deal with a Kuwaiti supplier. The company built the American prison at Guantanamo Bay.

Source



Caption from Raw Story reads, "The above graph released by Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) charts the value of the Vice President's holdings in Halliburton in the past year."

Halliburton and its subsidiaries received no-bid contracts in Iraq, for the Katrina clean-up, for building detainment camps, etc., with their stock value steadily increasing, and former CEO Dick Cheney coincidentally now in a prominent government position.





Claim: Bush has "challenged" over 750 laws

Bush has gotten away with challenging over 750 laws

Supported.

From the Boston Globe, April 30, 2006 (source):

WASHINGTON -- President Bush has quietly claimed the authority to disobey more than 750 laws enacted since he took office, asserting that he has the power to set aside any statute passed by Congress when it conflicts with his interpretation of the Constitution.

Among the laws Bush said he can ignore are military rules and regulations, affirmative-action provisions, requirements that Congress be told about immigration services problems, ''whistle-blower" protections for nuclear regulatory officials, and safeguards against political interference in federally funded research.

Claim: Bush and Kerry are both Skull and Bonesmen

Bush & Kerry have each admitted being members of the elite secret society known as "Skull & Bones"...

S&B has no more than 800 members at any given time

This fact actually made the "news", but everyone ignored it because Rep's & Dem's are equally biased.

Bush has 11 S&B members in his cabinet (but its only a coincidence)

Supported.

For those who weren't watching the news during the elections:

(CBS) As opposite as George Bush and John Kerry may seem to be, they do share a common secret - one they've shared for decades, and one they will not share with the electorate.

The secret: details of their membership in Skull and Bones, the elite Yale University society whose members include some of the most powerful men of the 20th century.

Bonesmen, as they're called, are forbidden to reveal what goes on in their inner sanctum, the windowless building on the Yale campus that is called the Tomb.

From CBS, June 13, 2004. (source)


From Indian Country Today, June 1, 2004 (source):

Last fall, in an interview with Indian Country Today, Robbins said for the first time in history the race for president could be between two Bonesmen. Recently, Robbins spoke of those odds on the radio program "Democracy Now."

"There are only 800 living members. Only 15 per year. It's staggering that two of them could be facing off for the presidency and so many of them have achieved positions of prominence."

Claim: Elections results can and have been hacked

It doesnt matter because its been proven that election results can and have been hacked

Supported.

From Newsweek (source):

May 29, 2006 issue - Just when you thought it was safe to go back into the voting booth, here comes more disturbing news about the trustworthiness of electronic touchscreen ballot machines. Earlier this month a report by Finnish security expert Harri Hursti analyzed Diebold voting machines for an organization called Black Box Voting. Hursti found unheralded vulnerabilities in the machines that are currently entrusted to faithfully record the votes of millions of Americans.

How bad are the problems? Experts are calling them the most serious voting-machine flaws ever documented. Basically the trouble stems from the ease with which the machine's software can be altered. It requires only a few minutes of pre-election access to a Diebold machine to open the machine and insert a PC card that, if it contained malicious code, could reprogram the machine to give control to the violator. The machine could go dead on Election Day or throw votes to the wrong candidate. Worse, it's even possible for such ballot-tampering software to trick authorized technicians into thinking that everything is working fine, an illusion you couldn't pull off with pre-electronic systems. "If Diebold had set out to build a system as insecure as they possibly could, this would be it," says Avi Rubin, a Johns Hopkins University computer-science professor and elections-security expert.

Here is the post from Black Box Voting (source), referenced above by Newsweek:

UPDATE Dec. 16: Volusia County (FL) joins Leon in dumping Diebold. Due to contractual non-performance and security design issues, Leon County (Florida) supervisor of elections Ion Sancho has announced that he will never again use Diebold in an election. He has requested funds to replace the Diebold system from the county. On Tuesday, the most serious “hack” demonstration to date took place in Leon County. The Diebold machines succumbed quickly to alteration of the votes. This comes on the heels of the resignation of Diebold CEO Wally O'Dell, and the announcement that stockholder's class action suits and related actions have been filed against Diebold by four separate law firms. Further “hack” testing on additional vulnerabilities is tentatively scheduled before Christmas in the state of California.

Finnish security expert Harri Hursti, together with Black Box Voting, demonstrated that Diebold made misrepresentations to Secretaries of State across the nation when Diebold claimed votes could not be changed on the “memory card” (the credit-card-sized ballot box used by computerized voting machines.

A test election was run in Leon County on Tuesday with a total of eight ballots. Six ballots voted "no" on a ballot question as to whether Diebold voting machines can be hacked or not. Two ballots, cast by Dr. Herbert Thompson and by Harri Hursti voted "yes" indicating a belief that the Diebold machines could be hacked.

At the beginning of the test election the memory card programmed by Harri Hursti was inserted into an Optical Scan Diebold voting machine. A "zero report" was run indicating zero votes on the memory card. In fact, however, Hursti had pre-loaded the memory card with plus and minus votes.

The eight ballots were run through the optical scan machine. The standard Diebold-supplied "ender card" was run through as is normal procedure ending the election. A results tape was run from the voting machine.

Correct results should have been: Yes:2 ; No:6

However, just as Hursti had planned, the results tape read: Yes:7 ; No:1

The results were then uploaded from the optical scan voting machine into the GEMS central tabulator, a step cited by Diebold as a protection against memory card hacking. The central tabulator is the "mother ship" that pulls in all votes from voting machines. However, the GEMS central tabulator failed to notice that the voting machines had been hacked.
The results in the central tabulator read:

Yes:7 ; No:1

Note that the above test proves that Diebold machines can be very easily hacked.

From Thom Hartmann of the Common Dreans News Center, November 6, 2004 (source):

When I spoke with Jeff Fisher this morning (Saturday, November 06, 2004), the Democratic candidate for the U.S. House of Representatives from Florida's 16th District said he was waiting for the FBI to show up. Fisher has evidence, he says, not only that the Florida election was hacked, but of who hacked it and how.[...]

The State of Florida, for example, publishes a county-by-county record of votes cast and people registered to vote by party affiliation. Net denizen Kathy Dopp compiled the official state information into a table, available at ustogether.org... and noticed something startling.

While the heavily scrutinized touch-screen voting machines seemed to produce results in which the registered Democrat/Republican ratios largely matched the Kerry/Bush vote, in Florida's counties using results from optically scanned paper ballots - fed into a central tabulator PC and thus vulnerable to hacking – the results seem to contain substantial anomalies.

In Baker County, for example, with 12,887 registered voters, 69.3% of them Democrats and 24.3% of them Republicans, the vote was only 2,180 for Kerry and 7,738 for Bush, the opposite of what is seen everywhere else in the country where registered Democrats largely voted for Kerry.

In Dixie County, with 9,676 registered voters, 77.5% of them Democrats and a mere 15% registered as Republicans, only 1,959 people voted for Kerry, but 4,433 voted for Bush.

The pattern repeats over and over again - but only in the counties where optical scanners were used. Franklin County, 77.3% registered Democrats, went 58.5% for Bush. Holmes County, 72.7% registered Democrats, went 77.25% for Bush.

Yet in the touch-screen counties, where investigators may have been more vigorously looking for such anomalies, high percentages of registered Democrats generally equaled high percentages of votes for Kerry. (I had earlier reported that county size was a variable – this turns out not to be the case. Just the use of touch-screens versus optical scanners.)

More visual analysis of the results can be seen at us... together.org/election04/FloridaDataStats.htm, and www.rubberbug.com/temp/Florida2004chart.htm. Note the trend line – the only variable that determines a swing toward Bush was the use of optical scan machines.

Claim: Our government had prior knowledge of 9/11

Our government had prior knowledge of 9/11

...they had approx as many TIES, indicators and ways to stop 9/11 as this video has talking points...

...and allowed it to happen!

This is one of those issues that is still hotly debated. However, it is known from the 9/11 Commission Report and other releases that the United States did receive various warnings from various sources that were not acted upon, and ignored.

Global Research hosts this page detailing various warnings prior to 9/11.



Claim: History Channel says FDR allowed Pearl Harbor

Even the History Channel says that FDR allowed Pearl Harbor to happen... because he too had prior knowledge.

False.

The History Channel did air a program looking into FDR's prior knowledge of Pearl Harbor, presenting different expert opinions and information relating to the event. This program is summarized here.

From that web page:

The attack on Pearl Harbor shook the nation to its roots. But to some, official explanations of misguided assumptions and missed clues did not account for the enormity of the catastrophe. CONSPIRACY examines alternative theories about the events leading up to December 7, 1941.

Was a plot hatched in Washington to solve FDR's ""problem"" of convincing a reluctant country to fight the Nazis? Did FDR send a secret cable just days before the attack ordering Pearl Harbor chiefs to stand down? Did U.S. intelligence intercept a message from Tokyo asking its spies in Hawaii to map the harbor for an imminent air attack? More than six decades later, the controversy still bubbles, and our experts probe for substance beneath the sensational assertions.

The History Channel itself does not appear to take a position on the issue.



Claim: Pearl Harbor was investigation 9 times

Pearl Harbor was investigated NINE times

..but 9/11 only ONCE.

Supported.

From CBS News, April 5, 2004 (source):

There were nine investigations into Pearl Harbor, if you include the immediate query done by Naval leadership. The most public, but not the most comprehensive, was the Roberts Commission, convened 11 days after the day of infamy.

The only official investigation of the events of 9/11 was by the 9/11 Commission, which released a single report.



Claim: NSA Spying on Myspace

Theyre...now spying on social networks (Myspace)

Unsupported.

From SecurityProNews, June 9, 2006 (source):

The race to develop and deploy standards of presenting information online could eventually replace the myriad incompatible formats used by competing social networking and other websites. That could play into the data mining plans of the federal government as described in a New Scientist report.

Attitudes toward discussing one's personal life, particularly among younger Internet users, have shifted to a much freer way of thinking. Many people post personal and even intimate details along with the mundane happenings in their lives.

Quite a few people who indiscreetly posted details that would have been best kept private have experienced real world repercussions, like losing jobs. Soon those details could become part of a much broader look at people's lives.

The report noted that the National Security Agency has been investing heavily into data mining technology. Couple that with the Resource Description Framework (RDF) under development by the World Wide Web Consortium, and creating detailed pictures of people's lives from their online behavior will be a reality.

There are various articles online discussing the possibility, as indicated by various official releases, but the evidence of this happening already seems unavailable.


I'll return to this thread later with more info.

[edit on 7-10-2006 by bsbray11]

Interesting topic there Bray.

Nice job on the research man, its also interesting on how much the typical American don't know, not only that.. They don't even care.

That's why its up to us CT freaks to put things into the open I guess.

[edit on 10/7/2006 by ThichHeaded]

Dear Bsbray11:

Great Post! Only one comment at this point -- before those perfectionists on ATS tear you apart, correct that typo in your headline -- Propaganda!

Greetings,
The Wizard In The Woods

Claim: Constitutionalists, bloggers, protesters, activists are now terrorists

Post 9/11 Terrorists = "Defenders of the Constitution", "anti-globalization bloggers", "anti-war protestors", "property rights activists" & more

Misleading, if only by lack of clear expression of these sentiments on the part of the federal government.

Note the following Phoenix FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force flyer:






The flyer states, "The FBI's Joint Terrorism Task Force is attempting to identify criminal activities with domestic terrorists."

"In this regard, the purpose of this information sheet is to assist uniformed patrol officers in identifying potential domestic terrorism."

The flyer lists as potential threads " "defenders" of US Constitution against federal government and the UN (Super Patriots)", and people that "[m]ake numerous references to US Constitution", among others.

From Insecure.org (a web site dedicated to issues in network security, etc.) (source):

A disturbing flyer puportedly authored by the FBI's Phoenix anti-terrorism task force has been circulating in the conservative community. The flyer instructs the reader to report as a possible terrorist anyone who asks why they were stopped by police or anyone who dares to defend "the U.S. Constitution against federal [sic] government." See it for yourself:
www.keepandbeararms.com...
www.keepandbeararms.com...

So I gave the FBI field office a call. FBI spokesman Ed Hall confirmed the flyer was produced by the joint anti-terrorism task force in Phoenix. But he said it dealt with domestic terrorism: "That flyer was put out two years ago. Someone picked it up, and put it on the Internet like it was put out this week."

Hall admitted the section that said anyone spotting a defender of the U.S. Constitution "should call the Joint Terrorism Task Force" was perhaps a tiny bit ill-advised. "It could have been a bit better foundation worded saying you're not a right-wing extremist if you defend the Constitution... or if you ask a police officer why they're stopping you. There's some misinterpretation there."

Hall reportedly went on to say that not all Constitutionalists are suspect, but that some terrorists are Constitutionalists and therefore Constitutionalists are suspect terrorists:

He added: "Not that a person who defends the Constitution is a criminal or terrorist, or a person who [asks] you, 'Why did you stop me' may be a terrorist, but certain things, I don't want to use the word common, certain characteristics that these people who were legitimately investigated reflect it."

As for bloggers, a preparatory wargame known as "Cyber Storm" was executed and concluded on February 10, 2006, in which some of the attack scenarios involved "anti-globalisation activists, underground hackers and bloggers." From the Associated Press, February 12, 2006 (source):

WASHINGTON — The government concluded its "Cyber Storm" war game Friday, its biggest-ever exercise to test how it would respond to devastating attacks over the Internet from anti-globalization activists, underground hackers and bloggers.

Bloggers?

Participants confirmed parts of the worldwide simulation challenged government officials and industry executives to respond to deliberate misinformation campaigns and activist calls by Internet bloggers, online diarists whose "Web logs" include political rantings and musings about current events.

Though government agencies have not made direct suggestions that anti-war or anti-globalist bloggers are terrorists, the fact that such exercises are being performed indicates some concern over anti-globalist information spreading, apparently during a terrorist attack, and thereby associated with the terrorism itself.


Anti-war protesters are being monitored by the FBI, with local police officials being advised to report activity to their counterterrorism squads. From Eic Lichtblau of the New York Times, November 23, 2003 (source):

(11-23) 04:00 PDT Washington -- The FBI has collected extensive information on the tactics, training and organization of antiwar demonstrators and has advised local law enforcement officials to report any suspicious activity at protests to its counterterrorism squads, according to interviews and a confidential bureau memorandum.

Once again, there is no explicit statement that anti-war protesters are terrorists. However, again, the FBI is monitoring protests and protesters and asking local police to report activity to their counterterrorism teams.


Property rights activists are being alluded to as terrorists in a handbook for emergency workers in the state of Virginia.



The document can be found in PDF format here.

PrisonPlanet.com also notes a list of supposed suspicious paraphernalia listed in the document (source):

Presumably, tourists, journalists, hikers, bird-watchers, scuba divers, artists, painters, and anyone who takes a photograph is also now a terrorists according to the official list of terrorist paraphernalia provided.

- sketch pads or notebooks
- maps or charts
- still or video camera
- hand held tape recorder
- binoculars
- SCUBA equipment
- disguises

Note that this is from Virginia and not the federal government, and again, the statement is not explicit. However, the suggestion is there that those who are willing to defend their property against the federal government are suspect terrorists.




Note that a lot of the information after this gets really bizarre, to me at least, so I'm going to spend some time looking more deeply into what's presented in the video before posting much else.

[edit on 7-10-2006 by bsbray11]

Dear Bsbray11:

To be fair you did said that the NSA was not watching people on "Myspace".
But are you -- as best as you can tell -- sure that this is not yet happening? I may be beating a dead horse here, but it's important for me to know that the internet is still "secure", i.e. private. And if it indeed is, then how long will it be before we must expect that to change (because change it most likely will).

Perhaps there are some computer gurus on ATS who can reassure us.

Greetings,
The Wizard In The Woods

I was just trying to support the claims from the video with mainstream sources, "acceptable" to most people. I wasn't so much trying to prove or disprove the claims, you know?

Personally, I wouldn't know, but I wouldn't be surprised. Myspace is owned by Murdoch. I would say I wouldn't post anything too personal on web sites like that, but who cares when they could get anything they need if they really want it anyway (just my opinion). I wouldn't even put anything anywhere on a computer with Internet access if I didn't want feds to see it. I think the tech exists to take a "capture" of your whole hard drive if anyone so wishes, which could then be uploaded to a remote host over time or whatever so long as you don't keep close track over where your computer is sending info, and provided that the remote host is able to get around whatever security programs you may or may not have running. Goes along with what the video was saying about the feds having, or going to have more data than they can handle, but that's edging into the parts of the video that I think I'm having a hard time dealing with, lol.

Anyone with more info on DARPA tech as offered in that video, or any of that, please post it.