With a straight face and ominous overtones, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein detailed the indictment of 13 Russians in a massive conspiracy to interfere with the United States elections in 2017. This was the bombshell announcement that the political class in DC and the punditry in the establishment have been holding their breath for. With his revelation of a most sinister and diabolical scheme to unravel our Democracy, Rosenstein launched a thousand ships of chicanery that begat the most extreme form of yellow journalism I have ever witnessed in my life.
Within minutes of Rosenstein’s announcement, mainstream media reporters and journalists jumped to their cameras and Twitter accounts to willingly pass along a complete non-story as the next coming of the Pentagon Papers. Counting the number of corporate media dissemblers who ran with this most farcical story is like counting the number of times Donald Trump refers to himself or quantifying the amount of empty words that used to freely tumble out of Obama’s duplicitous lips.
By the way, I’m not writing this to discredit the notion that Russia tried to influence our elections. I accept that to be 100% true. The lie is not in the facts but in the presentation. Here is what they are not telling us in this completely bogus narrative. Every nation tries to influence the election of other nations—it’s called geopolitics for a reason. Those with inferior armies influence the governance of greater powers through bribes and cash diplomacy (see also Hillary Clinton). On the other hand, superpowers influence the internal affairs of lesser nations by subtle forms of destabilization or through outright invasions. What we call “shock and awe” and “defending freedom”, other nations call American interference sponsored by Boeing and Northrup.
A half-truth is the worse lie of them all. Half-truths are what the shills in corporate media have perfected. This evening, I made the mistake of not immediately turning off NBC once the Olympics ended. For this most egregious lapse of judgement, I was treated to Doreen Gentzler of NBC’s local news as she stated, “tonight, the story of a massive Russian conspiracy to hunt down America”. I froze like a deer in headlights unable to flip to another station—I was stuck, stunned and bewildered. She went on to justify her most hyperbolic of statements by citing Rosenstein’s edict without a hint of challenging his cockamamie bulletine.
Reporters are supposed to keep the powerful in check and question authority. Alas, reporters are now recorders who dutiful pass on leaked “news”, disinformation and outright propaganda as they keep the public in the dark of confusion. As if Doreen was not bad enough, Chuck Todd saw her bullshit and raised her a whole heap of manure. Using cadence and pauses for effect, Chuck injected hysteria and abject sensationalism in ways that would have made William Randolph Hearst proud. The irony of all ironies, our government is livid that Putin tried to influence our elections while overlooking the inconvenient fact that it was George Bush and Bill Clinton’s interference in Russia’s internal affairs that gave rise to Vladimir to begin with.
I’m not sure what bothers me more. Is it the fact that people in positions of power can so easily lie or is my frustration that we so quickly fall for their hustle? Just this morning, Andrea Mitchell interviewed Congressman Adam Schiff about Russia hacking our elections at an event hosted by the Council of Foreign Relations. Andrea Mitchell, a corporate hack who presents news through partisan prisms at the gathering hole for parrots and sheep that is MSNBC, interviewing the neoliberal Schiff with a logo of CFR in the background is the perfection of chutzpah. How the hell do they pull this off with a straight face!
For the record, the Council of Foreign Relations have more blood on their hands than Pol Pot as they roil nations globally and keep overturning governments throughout the world. After all, it was the most brutal bombing of Cambodia—a plan hatched by former CFR Chair Henry Kissinger—that led to the rise of the Khmer Rouge and paved the way for the death of over 1,000,000 people. The Council of Foreign Relations is the most bipartisan of organizations in DC; there you will find both Democrats and Republicans who willingly partake in plotting genocides and maiming humanity as they profit through carnage.
Ponder this for a moment. The big news of the day is that 13 Russians colluded to tip the scales of our elections even though Rosenstein noted in the same news conference that the outcome of the vote was not materially impacted. If Russians using fake accounts and leveraging social media is sold as a most nefarious plot to infiltrate governments, what are we to make of the Voice of America? VOA has 1,078 employees with an annual budget of over $800 million dollars. VOA is government funded with the explicit mission of “spreading Democracy”. When the US government uses media to foment revolutions, it's advancing the cause of freedom. When Russia does the same, it's akin to another attack on Pearl Harbor. Click To Tweet
This level of mass deception is allowed to take place because there is no longer a check on power. The line between media, government and corporations has been blurred to the point of non-existence. There exists an axis of the gluttonous as self-serving serpents slither back and forth to enrich themselves. People keep going through the revolving door that sits at the nexus of the media-fed-corp complex—incestuous relationships are more common in the District of Caligula than potholes. Just two weeks ago, NBC announced the hiring of ex-CIA chief John Brennen to be a national security and intelligence analyst. Brennen pulled off the trifecta! He made a fortune as a CEO of a defense contractor, gained massive influence as CIA chief and now has the honor of furthering the insidious legacy of Zbigniew Brzezinski.
Of course, you won’t hear of these bothersome details from your favorite mainstream media toady. Corporate journalists and reporters traded in their souls a long time ago in order to be kissed by fortunes and embraced by the good graces of their plutocratic masters. Instead of pushing back on false narratives and challenging people in positions of power, they just pass on propaganda and spin up public angst for the sake of retweets and clicks. What you witnessed today was a massive campaign of disinformation where one person in power told a half-truth and mainstream media turned to a mix of chutzpah and hypocrisy to amplify state sponsored propaganda. #SpecialFarce
“A lie told often enough becomes the truth.” ~ Vladimir Lenin
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Teodrose Fikre
Originally from Ethiopia with roots to Atse Tewodros II, Teodrose is a former community organizer whose writing was incorporated into Barack Obama's South Carolina primary victory speech in 2008. He pivoted away from politics and decided to stand for collective justice after experiencing the reality of the forgotten masses. His writing defies conventional wisdom and challenges readers to look outside the constraints of labels and ideologies that serve to splinter the people. Teodrose uses his pen to give a voice to the voiceless and to speak truth to power.
