Tuesday, February 20, 2018

When American Propaganda Attacks

Donald Trump is getting some well-deserved criticism for trying to co-opt the latest school massacre and make it all about himself. To wit: if the FBI wasn't so busy investigating him and his entire extended crime family, they would have heeded the numerous tips and warnings and stopped Nikolas Cruz in his maniacal tracks before he slaughtered 17 innocent people.

If only the mainstream media weren't also co-opting the latest school shooting by making it all about the Attack of the Russian Bots co-opting the latest school shooting!

In its latest front-page scare story designed to manufacture public consent for war on Russia, whose chintzy meddling marketing campaign against our "democracy"  has already been hysterically likened to Pearl Harbor and Nine-Eleven by war profiteers both in and out of government, the New York Times warns that the only thing we have to fear other than fear itself (oh, and assault weapons) are the Russian bots taking over Twitter.

The implicit message to all those disaffected young people complaining that nobody is protecting them is that their anger might be getting unduly stoked by Kremlin hashtags. Think twice before thinking for yourself and marching on Washington and other activist things. Be aware that every time you read about a rally or a march on Facebook or Twitter, it might be fake Russian news designed to divide you and sow your discontent to truly dangerous, foreign levels.

While CNN is moving quickly to co-opt the students of Parkland, Florida by casting the brightest of them in one of their "town hall" spectaculars this week, the Times was shamelessly melding the shooting story with the Russiagate story. Not only are the bloodthirsty, perpetual war-financed cable networks pouncing on the story, the Russian Bot Army is horning in on it.
The accounts addressed the news with the speed of a cable news network. Some adopted the hashtag #guncontrolnow. Others used #gunreformnow and #Parklandshooting. Earlier on Wednesday, before the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla., many of those accounts had been focused on the investigation by the special counsel Robert S. Mueller III into Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election.
“This is pretty typical for them, to hop on breaking news like this,” said Jonathon Morgan, chief executive of New Knowledge, a company that tracks online disinformation campaigns. “The bots focus on anything that is divisive for Americans. Almost systematically.”
Any news event — no matter how tragic — has become fodder to spread inflammatory messages in what is believed to be a far-reaching Russian disinformation campaign. The disinformation comes in various forms: conspiracy videos on YouTube, fake interest groups on Facebook, and armies of bot accounts that can hijack a topic or discussion on Twitter.

 Those automated Twitter accounts have been closely tracked by researchers. Last year, the Alliance for Securing Democracy, in conjunction with the German Marshall Fund, a public policy research group in Washington, created a website that tracks hundreds of Twitter accounts of human users and suspected bots that they have linked to a Russian influence campaign.
You can tell this is propaganda because the Times doesn't inform readers about the powerful plutocrats and corporations that run and bankroll these "research groups." The Alliance for Securing Democracy, as myself and a few others (notably Glenn Greenwald) have written before, is staffed by many of the discredited neoconservatives and liberal interventionists who made the fraudulent case for the US invasion of Iraq. It is funded not only by defense contractors, but likely also by a new State Department initiative called the Center for Global Engagement. Signed into law by President Obama in 2016, the Center is funded by public money and allows for the previously outlawed direct dissemination of propaganda by our own government to us, the citizenry. If the New York Times, whose torrents of Russophobic articles are now so intense that it's impossible to keep up with them all, is not also a beneficiary of this public funding, then they're being cheated out of a multimillion-dollar windfall. 

Is it a coincidence that the CEO of the Alliance for Securing Democracy, Laura Rosenberg, arrived at her job direct from Obama's State Department?

As The Nation's Adam Johnson reported in 2017, 
Originally created in March of last year for anti-ISIL messaging, the Global Engagement Center distributes “counter” propaganda, social-media messaging, and original journalistic content. The revamp would—according to the author of the NDAA language Senator Rob Portman’s office—“increase the authority, resources, and mandate of the Global Engagement Center to include state actors like Russia and China.”
What isn’t clear is if the Global Engagement Center, with all of its new “authority, resources and mandate,” will be used to target American audiences or pay American journalists. In 2013, Congress repealed major sections of the 1948 Smith-Mundt Act, which had previously instituted a ban on the State Department and related agencies from “propagandizing” directly to Americans. The 2013 changes, which were first reported by the late Michael Hastings in Buzzfeed, led to much confusion at the time as to what the repeal did and didn’t do (some thought it deeply pernicious, others not so much). Subsequent attempts to clear up the current law on targeting Americans haven’t resulted in a clear consensus, a problem that’s becoming increasingly urgent as the US government doubles its efforts to combat the much-publicized Russian propaganda machine.
How doubly ironic, therefore, that President Trump is wondering right out loud why President Obama himself was so sanguine and lackadaisical about this unprecedented Russian attack on our pristine electoral processes. If I had to hazard a guess, it was because the brilliant Obama didn't dream that the protectionist Trump would ever win, and that there would even be a need for an all-out effort to sway American public opinion on Russia as the default enemy du jour. After all, Obama's shtick back then was the "pivot to China" - code for choking off its economic growth via the US oligarchy-serving Trans-Pacific Partnership. Therefore, the US oligarchy has been forced to "pivot" to a new contrived arch-enemy - Russia - to avoid the rise of any more "axes of evil" to threaten the profits and power of the US hegemon.

***

Everything is fair game for domestic attack under the fig leaf of Russian meddling, and that includes the Black Lives Matter movement and other radical, youth-based movements. Special Prosecutor Robert Mueller thus dutifully added to his Narrative indictment the juicy bit about Russian trolls orchestrating and advertising rallies by black people against police brutality.

Times columnist Charles Blow dutifully enhanced this scare-narrative in his Monday group-think piece, which included a gratuitous dig at the "lionized social justice hero" Colin Kaepernick - he didn't vote! - as well as implicit criticism of activist-writer Michelle Alexander, whose New Jim Crow Blow huffily described as an "activist bible" for those millions of young black voters who didn't come out in record numbers for either racist presidential candidate and as a result, got us all saddled with the more loathsome and outspoken racist candidate. And Bernie supporter, the rapper Killer Mike? He had the nerve to not support Hillary even after she won the nomination!

It's malcontents and critics like these, Blow not so subtly implies, who created the vacuum necessary for the Russian bots and trolls to swoop in and keep all the black folks home on Election Day.

"There is no way to know how many black people would have settled on the exact same course of action without the interference," Blow concludes. "But what we do now know with absolute certainty is that in making their electoral choices, black folks had unwanted hands on their backs, unethical and illegal ones, nudging them toward an apathy built on anger.What happened in this election wasn’t just a political crime, it was specifically a racialized crime, and the black vote was a central target."

Judging from all the laudatory reader comments, Blow struck a real chord among the mostly white readership. Finally, somebody liberal and black was brave enough to let Kaepernick and Killer Mike and all those uppity Black Lives Matter youths have it. It's red-baiting and race-baiting at its finest. It's the new Democratic Party McCarthyism writ large.

My initial  comment, which made the above critiques, was axed by the Times censors. I had better luck with my second submission, published the following day:
This column strikes me as a veiled insult to young black voters, whom Blow casts as naive enough to be influenced by some truly cheesy Russian ads disseminated by only 90 underpaid trolls.

So easy to scapegoat "Russians" for "amplifying" the domestic discontent here in Exceptional USA. Given that this was the same tactic used by the US political-media complex against protests during the civil rights era and the Vietnam War, I'm kind of surprised it still has such influential staying power - until I remember Joseph Goebbels's maxim for effective propaganda: repeat it over and over and over again, and people will start believing it. The best part of this current Russophobic campaign is that it saves people the trouble of thinking for themselves.

Think about it for a minute. Young black people who didn't vote in the last election because they "felt like" it was no use are effectively being guilt-tripped for refusing to participate in a corrupt system in which the ultra-rich decide who can best represent oligarchic interests. Telling people that they were victims of a racialized crime by Russian trolls deflects attention from the real culprits, the oligarchs who run the place, named Koch, Adelson, Sinclair, and plundering corporations like Exxon-Mobil and six too-big-to fail/jail banks which effectively evicted and impoverished millions of black and brown people.

So hey, look over there at the evil Facebook ad of cartoon Hillary with devil horns punching out Jesus!



This ad, first released among a trove last November, displays "the sophistication" of the Russian influence campaign, according to the Washington Post. 

If this is the mainstream media's idea of sophistication, then we're in far worse trouble than I thought.

Or maybe not: the students currently fighting their own existential battle - their right to not get shot to death - sound a lot more savvy than their doddering elders. Just let Wolf Blitzer and the gang try and tell them it's partly the Russians' fault that one of their classmates snapped, and watch some real sophistication spring into action. I have an optimistic feeling that the students won't be co-opted gently into that premature night of total and permanent darkness and ignorance.

6 comments:

Comrade Pinko said...

First I'd like to express my sympathy to Karen Garcia for not getting the much deserved recognition and recommends from the commentariat at the NYT. I'm afraid many good people gave up and left long ago even before the NYT's latest entry into the lucrative propaganda market.

Need some related comic relief? Mueller just charged a lawyer with lying! Imagine that.

If these measures by Russian trolls were so effective, our own Government would be using them to gin up new wars while chilling our First Amendment rights to assemble and protest by insinuating guilt by association with the Enemy.

Charging 13 Russian trolls with "conspiracy to defraud the USA" is insulting. We were ATTACKED by financial bombs which exploded in every community in this country when banksters engaged in a massive criminal conspiracy to defraud citizens and pension plans by using phony financial instruments to swindle and gambled themselves into riches. They're still enjoying the payout from their crimes while far too many are still struggling with lifelong debt. To add insult to injury, there's the 10 trillion debt to restore them to good health that our grandchildren are responsible for. Just think - they now pass their financial stress tests while the rest of us have heart attacks.

The same rubble of war resulted from their financial attack - abandoned homes, traumatized families, broken communities, wiped out savings, loss of jobs, loss of hope, loss of health, and even loss of lives. Opioid deaths are collateral damage.

Can we please remind the media and everyone else where the discord and division comes from? Our own Gov't failed to protect us and help us to recover, betraying us every step of the way. Worse still, they claimed they never saw it coming.

Trump's victory was almost entirely based on acknowledging that pain and betrayal during his campaigns. Hillary denied it, saying we were already "great because we're good", and she would stay the course. It should not surprise us then that the same corporate media and Democratic Party that supported her are still denying the source of the frustration and anger in this country. No wonder they want to blame Russia.

Jay–Ottawa said...

Pssst, Comrade Pinska!

All bad talk on Russia in newspaper make hard to find vodka now in store. They stop stocking vodka, say un-American. Today I lucky to find big bottle Beluga, but cashier take name, passport number and scan iPhone. Something happening, no? On way home, policeman stop me, me official diplomat, make me take off lapel pin with Russia flag.

Impossible to meddle in great American democracy anymore, and KGB on radio silence because fear they get slapped with indictment from FBI man. Putin have to call us diplomats home and surrender KGB chief to stand trial here.

Don't worry; I wear American flag lapel pin now. It give me full immunity on street or football game. Tomorrow, I buy 10 kilos potatoes and, for next party with Comrades Pompeo and Trumpski, I make vodka in bathtub.

Anna Imaradicalova said...

Very funny, comrade Jay. I really needed the laughs. Spasibo!

Now that we've made contact here, I have to change my name again per spy tradecraft.

Nancy Pelosi's Heels said...

The US spent $5 billion in Ukraine to sway their people into rebellion against a legitimately elected government. Could we just stop this charade of an investigation into Russian meddling and start offering the bots some good money? It might just go away -- but that's not the point, okay, I get it.

Another brilliantly researched and presented post by K. Garcia. Thank you for your continuing commitment.

Anna Imaradicalova said...

Well that was quick. Right after plastering their digital front page with Russia!Russia!Russia!, the NYT abruptly changed course and not a word about Russiagate can be found today. I'm suffering withdrawal symptoms! The closest they come is mentioning a lying lawyer that was incidentally caught up in Mueller's net. Instead of throwing that leech back, they decided to serve him up as if he were King Salmon.

I don't suppose this abrupt change in NYT coverage is related to a critical mass of people questioning what Obama and The Regime (Intelligence Community/MIC) knew and when they knew it. No, it's probably due to Donald Trump also chiming in. That's clearly NOT the direction The Regime wants their propaganda scheme to take. Quick! Bring in new CIA screenwriters! If they're done with the new Black Panther movie, that is.

This bad tv show referred to as Russiagate is looking more like 'Halley's Screwball Comet' - "Look, there's Halley's Comet! No wait, don't look there, look here!" It's all over the place.

We've seen enough to know that, as Karen said, the media has been keeping the high beams on so bright that we can't see through the fog of disinformation. But now that people are adjusting to the glare and catching sight of a broad outline, if not details, skepticism and mocking are increasing. Recent NYT comments reflect that, and considering that Situational Awareness is part of National Security efforts, especially when it comes to discord and division, there must be some awareness that things might get out of hand. So NYT suddenly shuts off the lights. Someone realizes that amplification works both ways.

Former members of the The Regime, i.e. CIA's Director Woolsey, now admits they meddle in elections but only for good cause such as 'democracy'. No one asked, so he couldn't deny, also meddling domestically 'for a good cause'. It never even crosses the media mind. But I'd ask "What difference does it make?!" They always practice on foreigners and bring it home eventually.

In the whole wide world, can you imagine more valuable real estate and center of power of a global military empire to control than of the USA? Why wouldn't they meddle? Oligarchs expect it. Why isn't anyone even asking? Because they'd lie.

Remember that miraculously meteoric rise to power that Obama enjoyed? You think the banksters alone could take a young, unknown, largely absentee-voting, half-black Illinois state senator into the White House in just over a decade? Talk about booster rockets! Just saying, but I've read that The Regime recruits at Ivy League schools like Columbia and Harvard because the Ivy's produce so many clean, slick, charming, lying lawyer types. Where else would they find their spooks?

That's my report from here at Red Square. Signing off now.

Pssst, don't tell Mueller where I am or I'll have to change my location and name again.

Anna Imaradicalova said...

As I was speculating about who in Congress would introduce legislation titled something like the 'Protect Our Elections Act' (so our elections could be more easily stolen by our own oligarchs instead of Russian ones), I was wondering if the CIA had anyone inside Congress.

Well, sure enough. There's former CIA agent (former as in "Once a Marine, always a Marine") Rep. Bill Hurd (TX) elected in 2015. Very impressive guy. African-American Republican, one of only two in Congress. Educational background in computer science and international relations. Worked undercover abroad for the CIA and was also stationed in D.C. where his job was to brief Congress. As the story goes, that's when he discovered that Congressmen didn't know their ass from their elbow, I mean Sunni from Shia, so he decided to run for Congress himself.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Will_Hurd

The more I think about it, the more I'm looking at Russiagate differently. I don't see it leading to impeachment of Trump or even war with Russia. What I see is a likelihood of a coup of democracy itself, i.e. a takeover of our election systems so that they are centrally controlled and overseen by the Regime (Intelligence Community + Pentagon aka Deep State) for National Security reasons.

That must be why we're not hearing much talk, except at the local level, about paper ballots even though that seems like the obvious no-brainer solution (but no money to be made). Could this end up with the Feds withholding funds or using other sticks to ensure that states run elections using some kind of new system devised by them? They did make all the states adopt REAL ID secure drivers licenses, a 'component of a holistic national security strategy' according to Homeland Security. Holistic.

I was assuming legislation like the Patriot Act would be needed, but I haven't heard of anything yet, which seems strange given urgency due to the alleged ongoing Russian attacks and meddling in our midterms. Or maybe they don't need to manufacture consent anymore, just as they won't have to actually count our votes in the future *wink*wink*.

Surely in this dangerous environment, there needs to be new, more powerful (secret) tools to protect (control) our Democracy (Plutocracy) and ensure unity (ban open dissent and punish discord) to prevent Russians and other enemies (Truth) from influencing our free (bought) elections.