Osama Bin Laden is dead

[Amy B.]

listen to NPR or watch PBS, where there is much more critical analysis of what happened.

No offense, but give me a break. Just because they tow the OTHER party line doesn't make them critical of anything. I don't see any of those NPR listeners out in the streets raging against the wars (count em...4) or complaining that the first thing Obomba did when in office is order drone strikes on Pakistan (that's war number 3 for those keeping count). The lame-stream media, right or left, is simply the lap-dog of the state.
Government has had 6,000 years to get it right but only leads people into more wars while slowly (or quickly) bankrupting those same folks, who think that because they were born on the land mass that the government claims to own it must be all right to be pushed around by their 'public servants'. Time to move on to a new paradigm folks and stop defending the violence and wickedness of the state.
just sayin...

Way to completely miss the point of my post. 

[rab2591]

The Right and Left are two sides of the same coin.

I agree with a lot of what you're saying except I would qualify the above statement and suggest that the Left is not on the "same coin" as the right, in the United States. Rather, there is no left at the political level whatsoever, after years of  being de-legitimized and decimated. At one point in the US there was actually a Socialist Party of America, which itself was an amalgam of two left-of-centre political organizations. The party had a considerable degree of popularity. Today, it would be unthinkable to run as a Socialist and believe you had that capability of getting a million votes. So because the actual left has been destroyed in the US, the Democrats function as "the left" because, as a centre-right party, they represent the farthest you can go to left in the US that is acceptable.

I am also skeptical of your suggestion that infowars is a "decent news source" when it typically acts as an industrialized distraction machine which serves the interests of the powerful just as much as your mainstream news outlets.

In regards to the first paragraph, I'd also add that there is no real "right wing" party either - right wingers are people who want smaller government and less spending: GW Bush outspent every president before him combined and created a MUCH larger government...and Obama is on his way to outspending Bush (or possibly has already). Our political parties have become an illusion for the majority of voters who fully believe in their 'political party'.

On your second paragraph - infowars has been continually writing about the Fukushima crisis - which mainstream media has, for some reason, completely abandoned the story (radiation levels are way through the roof there and it has been spreading to America - with no end in sight). They also keep me informed on Libya, the debt levels, etc.

Relatively, every news source is designed as a distraction (whether sensationalist journalism to sell more ads, whether it's sensationalist journalism to sell us a political candidate) - every news site out there has an agenda - which is why I go to far-right sites, far-left sites, pro-America sites, anti-American-policy sites - and deduce what I can from what I read.

May I ask you where you get your news from?

[Chocolate Shake Man]

In regards to the first paragraph, I'd also add that there is no real "right wing" party either - right wingers are people who want smaller government and less spending

Well, that's not quite correct. I mean, yes, maybe some people who identify themselves as right wing (particularly in the United States, I would imagine) would say that they are in favor of a small government but that's not really what identifies the right on the political spectrum. If anything, government gets smaller the further to the left you go. The ultimate goal of Marxism and anarchism is to abolish state power completely. Ultimately the right stands for private power and if that means letting private power do what it wants, then they are non-invasive but if that means private power needs to be protected, then they are very much invasive. This is why someone like Bush spent so much money - because he was fulfilling his role on the right of protecting private power by invading two countries to control their resources on behalf of corporate interests. The terms "left" and "right" typically signify economic distinctions and there can be both big and small governments on either side. To be honest, it is somewhat a consequence of US ideology that has led to the right being misrecognized as the party of small government.

Relatively, every news source is designed as a distraction (whether sensationalist journalism to sell more ads, whether it's sensationalist journalism to sell us a political candidate) - every news site out there has an agenda

OK, but that's not what I mean when I use the word distraction. I'm suggesting that "infowars" have a tendency of wading into conspiracy theories which do nothing but distract the population and serve to reinforce powerful interests.

- which is why I go to far-right sites, far-left sites, pro-America sites, anti-American-policy sites - and deduce what I can from what I read.

To be honest, I don't quite agree that getting a wide range of information is necessarily helpful in coming to conclusions about issues. Yes, it is important to be well-informed but as an example (and, this is just to make my point on this clear, you may agree with me on this) I don't think it is particularly helpful to read an article about the dangers of global warming followed by an article that insists that global warming is not a man-made phenomenon. Yes, I believe both stories should exist and I wouldn't censor one, but I don't think I'm being particularly better informed nor do I feel I am better able to make a decision about the issue by reading both.

May I ask you where you get your news from?

Because of the nature of my job, I have the luxury of reading a lot of scholarly articles that deal with contemporary politics.

In fact, I mostly read mainstream news. They happen to accurately report a lot of information but they do it from an appalling point of view. If one has the time to actually educate themselves on politics (my leanings towards anarcho-syndicalism is a consequence of having read a lot of Bakunin, Kropotkin, and Chomsky) then you can engage critically with what you are reading.

[♩♬🐸 Billy C ♯♫♩🐇]

My stance on American politics can be summed thusly...

There are 3 sides to every story...yours, mine, and the truth.

[rab2591]

Very good first point. I have honestly never looked at it that way.

As I said about infowars - take the Fukushima crisis - If I were to watch nothing but mainstream news I would be at a complete loss about what is going on over there - because for some reason the media wont talk about it. MSM won't talk about the humanitarian crisis in Fallujah for some reason either....which should be HUGE news. I don't buy into most of the conspiracy theories touted on the site - I just go there to get news I would not find on MSM.

"[the MSM] happen to accurately report a lot of information but they do it from an appalling point of view" - however, the media is fairly bias in what they want to cover. Who owns NBC? GE. Does GE want nuclear power to go away? No. Thus NBC won't talk about how Fukushima is filling the ocean/air with deadly amounts of radiation....because it would probably create a lot of rightful backlash towards nuclear-power. This same thing happened with Toyota a while back - a few cars had brake malfunctions and for weeks I watched NBC/CBS/ABC lambast Toyota for it. The Ford F-150 currently has a recall for malfunctions with airbag deployment - and I've heard nothing about it on the MSM.

Granted, not every media organization is owned by an industrial-powered company....but many of the Big Six have fingers in many pies. My point is that it is good to get news from multiple sources - lest we're not being told the whole story.

[Jason]

My stance on American politics can be summed thusly...

There are 3 sides to every story...yours, mine, and the truth.

Four sides. Yours, mine, the truth, and what the government wants you to believe.

[rab2591]

Actually, I should clarify - I think of MSM as the televised Nightly News, or FoxNews, or MSNBC. You can find a lot of information on online-MSM sites.

I suppose I'm just cynical about the MSM and the way they report the news.

[Chocolate Shake Man]

As I said about infowars - take the Fukushima crisis - If I were to watch nothing but mainstream news I would be at a complete loss about what is going on over there - because for some reason the media wont talk about it. MSM won't talk about the humanitarian crisis in Fallujah for some reason either....which should be HUGE news. I don't buy into most of the conspiracy theories touted on the site - I just go there to get news I would not find on MSM.

"[the MSM] happen to accurately report a lot of information but they do it from an appalling point of view" - however, the media is fairly bias in what they want to cover. Who owns NBC? GE. Does GE want nuclear power to go away? No. Thus NBC won't talk about how Fukushima is filling the ocean/air with deadly amounts of radiation....because it would probably create a lot of rightful backlash towards nuclear-power. This same thing happened with Toyota a while back - a few cars had brake malfunctions and for weeks I watched NBC/CBS/ABC lambast Toyota for it. The Ford F-150 currently has a recall for malfunctions with airbag deployment - and I've heard nothing about it on the MSM.

Granted, not every media organization is owned by an industrial-powered company....but many of the Big Six have fingers in many pies. My point is that it is good to get news from multiple sources - lest we're not being told the whole story.

I absolutely agree. In fact, I would go one further and say that it is not simply a matter of being "owned by an industrial-powered company". Yes, that's a problem but an even more pressing concern is that all mainstream media is corporate controlled. Consequently, you're not going to get information in a way that threatens the legitimacy of corporate power. This is why, for example, mainstream newspapers have a Business section but they don't have a Labor section - or why 60 minute news programs devote time to stocks, the dollar, etc. but no time whatsoever to pressing working class concerns such as wages, or the growing disparity between the rich and the poor.

Because the news is owned in this way, we often get a lot of information but it is given in a particular way. So, for example, in the earliest days of the Iraq invasion, US forces bombed a hospital in Fallujah. The New York Times reported on it immediately - they certainly weren't hiding anything. With that in mind, though, neither the Times or any mainstream US source who reported on the incident (and most did) noted that this constituted a very serious war crime. To be perfectly honest, I would bet that most of the reporters didn't even know it was or, at least, wouldn't even allow themselves to entertain the thought. And the reason is simple: if someone else does it, it's a crime. If we do it, it's fine, because we have the right to do it. This is, quite simply, the unquestioned assumption that is made in every imperial and powerful state since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution. So, yes, lots of information is given but it is given from an appalling point of view.

Now, why isn't NBC reporting on Fukushima anymore? It could be because of the points you raised about nuclear power but, to be honest, I'm skeptical. There are lots of ways to report on the matter that would divorce the story from the kinds of political implications you mention. And, in fact, if this were completely true, NBC would have never reported on the story in the substantial way that they did in the first place. In fact, Fukushima has dropped off the radar for all mainstream media and they don't all have the same interest. My gut reaction (of course, I haven't quite considered this long enough to form a solid argument) is that the Fukushima story is a victim of the mainstream media packaging news like it's entertainment and, consequently, very few stories have a long shelf life unless they can be spun into a narrative with colourful characters, like the OJ Trial. The decision to turn the media into entertainment is very much politically motivated, of course because it stresses stories over analysis and, once you do that, corporate power (which doesn't stand up well to analysis) can hardly ever be challenged.

[Jason]

It is the USA's job to "point out the bad guy". In doing that, and giving the American public a "bad guy" to focus on, then everything is fair game for various forms of corruption. That's how we could get away with putting Japanese-American citizens in concentration camps during World War II, how we could justify removing Mossadeq, how we could get away with killing everything that moved in North Vietnam and Cambodia, how we could get away with giving Indonesia "aid" in effectively slaughtering East Timorese, how we could get away with funding the contras in Nicaragua, how we could get away with effectively circumventing democracy in Central and South America in the name of "democracy", how we could get away with bombing an aspirin factory in Sudan...the list goes on and on.

Chomsky argues that the USA is a leading terrorist state; I tend to agree with him.

[Mike's Beard]

As I said about infowars - take the Fukushima crisis - If I were to watch nothing but mainstream news I would be at a complete loss about what is going on over there - because for some reason the media wont talk about it. MSM won't talk about the humanitarian crisis in Fallujah for some reason either....which should be HUGE news. I don't buy into most of the conspiracy theories touted on the site - I just go there to get news I would not find on MSM.

"[the MSM] happen to accurately report a lot of information but they do it from an appalling point of view" - however, the media is fairly bias in what they want to cover. Who owns NBC? GE. Does GE want nuclear power to go away? No. Thus NBC won't talk about how Fukushima is filling the ocean/air with deadly amounts of radiation....because it would probably create a lot of rightful backlash towards nuclear-power. This same thing happened with Toyota a while back - a few cars had brake malfunctions and for weeks I watched NBC/CBS/ABC lambast Toyota for it. The Ford F-150 currently has a recall for malfunctions with airbag deployment - and I've heard nothing about it on the MSM.

Granted, not every media organization is owned by an industrial-powered company....but many of the Big Six have fingers in many pies. My point is that it is good to get news from multiple sources - lest we're not being told the whole story.

I absolutely agree. In fact, I would go one further and say that it is not simply a matter of being "owned by an industrial-powered company". Yes, that's a problem but an even more pressing concern is that all mainstream media is corporate controlled. Consequently, you're not going to get information in a way that threatens the legitimacy of corporate power. This is why, for example, mainstream newspapers have a Business section but they don't have a Labor section - or why 60 minute news programs devote time to stocks, the dollar, etc. but no time whatsoever to pressing working class concerns such as wages, or the growing disparity between the rich and the poor.

Because the news is owned in this way, we often get a lot of information but it is given in a particular way. So, for example, in the earliest days of the Iraq invasion, US forces bombed a hospital in Fallujah. The New York Times reported on it immediately - they certainly weren't hiding anything. With that in mind, though, neither the Times or any mainstream US source who reported on the incident (and most did) noted that this constituted a very serious war crime. To be perfectly honest, I would bet that most of the reporters didn't even know it was or, at least, wouldn't even allow themselves to entertain the thought. And the reason is simple: if someone else does it, it's a crime. If we do it, it's fine, because we have the right to do it. This is, quite simply, the unquestioned assumption that is made in every imperial and powerful state since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution. So, yes, lots of information is given but it is given from an appalling point of view.

The problem with America's philosophy right there in one sentence.

As an Englishman I can say we are quite lucky in that we have the BBC which provides very good comprehensive and impartial investigative journalism. To watch FOX News over here is like watching a comedy spoof news show, it is so blatantly Republican bias and reports everything with a flag saluting spin to it. An ego massage for the rich, predominately white, corporate America and brainwashing propaganda for dumbfuck rednecks who have no clue as to how the world really runs.

[grillo]

@ grillo
While I totally agree with you in principle, do you really expect a paradigm shift? As you stated, this crap has been going on some 6000 years (essentially Civilization) with no end in sight. Though there are many in this world that abhor violence and war, there are just as many (and in higher authority) who use it to justify their power and greed. I see this all as the nature of man. While I agree that man can change for the good, he can just as easily be corrupted. We have seen this happen over and over throughout history. I am just not convinced that enough human beings are on board for this change. As history has shown, it takes so very few to corrupt all that is good.

I definitely don't expect a paradigm shift in my lifetime, but i do hope that as more and more humans realize that violence and theft are hardly legitimate ways to organize society, a new (stateless and voluntary) society might emerge.