THE MINISTRY OF PROPAGANDA

     With the proliferation of the Internet and its vast resources, the Special Interest groups running most Western Democracies have been obliged to invest considerable time and capital into disseminating disinformation. Fortunately for them, the monopolies they hold on public education and the media cartels---augmented by considerable drug proliferation---have softened the effete populations' intellects, making them susceptible to propaganda.

      But, thanks to the Internet, the truth occasionally leaks out and, as they say, 'goes viral.' The American public, which cares little for its freedom anymore, is growing more willing to embrace censorship. We've seen this trend growing for years, with speech codes, domestic espionage, and political correctness and such. The truth makes Americans feel uncomfortable.

       A free society doesn't practice censorship because it doesn't need to. When a population and its government are more concerned with things like Right and Justice than with profit and self-aggrandizement, there is no need to fear dissenting viewpoints or foreign propaganda. But our population and government fears them, and with good reason. Public exposure is not something they relish; and, to that end, a Bill was introduced into Congress yesterday called The Countering Foreign Propaganda and Disinformation Act. Introduced by Representatives Adam Kinzinger and Ted Lieu,  the Bill would create a new Federal agency, the Center for Information and Analysis Response. Among its other duties, the CIAR would dispatch American "information agents" into "countries deemed vulnerable to foreign propaganda and disinformation campaigns."

         This is quite ironic, given that foreign interests like Saudi Arabia, Dubai, the Japanese Empire, and foreign-run cults like the Moonies own considerable stock in the US News Media. Newscorp and Univision are owned outright by foreign nationals. Reuters is based in Canada.  So, which country is vulnerable to foreign propaganda and disinformation?

         Kinzinger and Lieu, of course, don't mean those foreign countries. Kinzinger thundered in Congress: "As Russia continues to spew its disinformation and false narratives, they undermine the United States and its interests in places like Ukraine, while also breeding further instability in those countries!"

          The American Media Cartels have been, among their usual anti-Russian farragoes, cultivating an idea among the Ameroboobs that Russia is covertly spreading disinformation. Actually, Russia does have an agency countering Western Propaganda, but the Russians are quite transparent about its existence. The American Media sneeringly refers to this agency as The Russian Troll Factory. Of course, the Media conveniently overlooks the fact that American spending on The Broadcasting Board of Governors---a government propaganda organ overseeing VOA and similar groups---is a whopping $750 million annually, compared to the $92 million Russia spends on its counterpart.

         With such a big pot of money at stake, it's not surprising to see that media conglomerates feature prominently in both Kinzinger's and Lieu's records of corporate donors. In his three terms in Congress, Kinzinger has raked in $41,000 from AT&T; $38,000 from Comcast; $29,000 from the National Cable and Telecommunications Association; and $28,500 from the National Association of Broadcasters. Lieu tagged $8,500 from AT&T and represents a district heavily related to Hollywood and other media interests.

        Could the CIAR operate in the United States? Up until recently, the Anti-Propaganda Act of 1948 made it illegal for the government to deploy propaganda domestically. But the Republican Congress and the Obama Administration repealed that law in 2013, enabling the VOA and other groups to operate as a competing news outlet. 

        How did the once-great American News Media go from a fearlessly independent enterprise of men and women working in the public interest to an international laughing-stock in just one generation? The decline began in the 1960s when Left-Wing radicals began flooding universities to escape their military obligations. Journalism schools naturally appealed to them, as the potential for controlling minds always interests the Cultural Marxists. Over time, with the aid of vested financial interests, professional, elite media figures were purged out of the Press and Political Correctness became the norm. When the 1947 Fairness Doctrine was repealed in the early 1990s, Infotainment, op-eds, and Yellow Journalism in general took free rein over the public discourse. Media outlets began being absorbed into Corporate Cartels. The rising American illiteracy rate spelled the demise of the printed press.  The Anti-Propaganda Act repeal was the nail in the coffin. Outright domestic censorship will be the next step---and that will be the official end of Freedom of the Press in the United States.

        But as long as this censorship doesn't affect Reality TV, soft-core porn, or sports, the Ameroboob won't mind.