12/30/2005

Runaway Bride Vs. Runamuck Presidency: The Year In Review?

I spent the morning combing through the archives at unbrainwashed as this is the time of year when the corporate media begins it's "Year In Review" nonsense about which stories they want you to believe were the top stories of 2005. A lot of links I posted, such as a Yahoo story about Binyahmin Netanyahu received an advance warning prior to the 7/7 London Bombings, or another story of how MI6 was running a terror drill similar to the events that unfolded that day at the same time, have now expired or vanished down the The Memory Hole. And I wondered, what will be considered to be the top stories of 2005 by the corporate media? What do you think were the top stories?
To myself, one of the top stories of 2005 was the Downing Street Memo, an official British document leaked to the press stating that American intelligence was being "fixed" around the policy of invading Iraq. One of the pieces of "fixed" intelligence was the forged Niger "yellow cake" uranium documents cited by the Bush administration as evidence that Saddam was planning on restarting his nuclear weapons program. When Joseph Wilson, who was sent to investigate these claims, refuted them in the New York Times, his wife's name was leaked to the media by members of the White House, an act of treason under Section 18 US Code 793 & 794, punishable by death. Will any of these be the top stories, or will they be replaced about a story about the runaway bride?
Another big story was Cindy Sheehan as she galvanized the anti-war movement by camping out side Bush's Crawford, TX ranch demanding to know why her son had to die for a lie. Will this be replaced by the Terry Schiavo story with no mention of anti-choice Republicans pandering to their constituency by introducing a bill that affected one person in the whole country?
Another big story was of course, Hurricane Katrina, but what will be the corporate media spin on that? A natural disaster made worse by the bungling incompetency of Bush appointees? Money needed to strengthen the levees being instead spent on the war in Iraq? Louisiana guardsmen who could have been there to strengthen the levee with sandbags instead being deployed overseas?
Will there be any mention of the Million Mom March? Or will there be more important stories about TomKat, Brangelina or any other combination of celebrity names? Will the big story be Britney Spears baby, or will it be about Bush's violating the War Crimes Act of 1996 by sending "enemy detainees" to secret torture prisons? Will any mention be made of the Bush regime's attempt to kill a bill introduced by John McCain that would ban the use of torure by the United States?
Will Bush's being sworn in for a second term be a big story, while conveniently avoiding the whole Ohio vote fraud thing. Will they sweep Tom Delay, Bill Frist, Bob Ney, Jack Abramoff, AIPAC, Randall "Duke" Cunningham, or any other Republican based scandal under the rug? Will the fact the Bush broke the law by spying on Americans get any mention, or will they instead focus on the War On Christmas?
Will the media report on the failure of the Iraqi parliament's inability to compose a constitution? How about the claim made by Iraqis that this months elections there were fixed? Will the war in Iraq be reported as a slow and arduous journey to democracy, or as another quagmire? Will they mention American use of weapons of mass destruction such as white phosphorous or depleted uranium?
More importantly, will the media report responsibly, or will they rewrite history to suit their corporate masters. I think we all know the answer to that.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Recall that history was re-written on the rationale for Vietnam, too. You won;t see the full story in a history book. This is the way it is. Do you think that they teach things with an eye for truth?

Lew Scannon said...

If they taught things with an eye for truth, I wouldn't be here!

Anonymous said...

Well its scary to think about the education system in general, and the role the system plays in propaganda.

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