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Tuesday, May 04, 2004

On the company that censored Nightline 

Of course you all remember last Friday's broadcast of Nightline when Ted Koppel read all the names of the US soldiers killed in Iraq? You don't?

Oh yeah, that's because Sinclair Broadcasting group wouldn't allow it's affiliates to air the program claiming it was partisan propaganda. Well they should know, because according to the Center for American Progress Sinclair has been pushing it's own political agenda.

SINCLAIR REQUIRES JOURNALISTS TO READ PRO-BUSH STATEMENTS: In September 2001, Sinclair Broadcasting required its affiliates to air messages "conveying full support" for the Bush administration. At a Baltimore affiliate, WBFF "officials required news and sports anchors, even a weather forecaster, to read the messages, "which included statements such as "[the station] wants you to know that we stand 100% behind our President." Several WBFF staffers objected on the grounds that reading the statements would "erode their reputations as objective journalists" because it made them appear to be "endorsing specific government actions."

SINCLAIR REFUSES TO AIR AD HIGHLIGHTING 2003 BUSH ERROR: In July 2003, Sinclair Broadcasting refused to allow WMSN TV – its FOX affiliate in Madison, WI – to air a DNC advertisement that featured a clip of President Bush making the false claim "Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa" in his 2003 State of the Union Address. Three other Madison stations, including ABC, NBC and CBS, readily agreed to air the ad. The Madison CBS affiliate, WISC, said the advertisement was "no worse than any other political ad."

SINCLAIR PRODUCES CENTRALIZED RIGHT-WING CONTENT FOR 'LOCAL STATIONS': In a controversial business practice, Sinclair Broadcasting has fired much of the staff for the local affiliates it owns, instead producing content for its local stations from a central facility outside Baltimore which it then airs on "local" news broadcasts. The centralized content features nightly commentary by Sinclair corporate communications chief Mark Hyman. Hyman regularly refers to the French as "cheese-eating surrender monkeys," the so-called liberal media as the "hate-America crowd," and progressives as "the lonely left" On one recent commentary, Hyman called members of Congress who voted against a recent resolution affirming the righteousness of the Iraq war "unpatriotic politicians who hate our military."

SINCLAIR AIRS FAKE NEWS BROADCASTS PRODUCED BY BUSH ADMINISTRATION: In March, it was discovered that the Bush Administration was producing "television news stories, written and paid for by the government, which have the appearance of legitimate news segments delivered by independent reporters," and distributing them to local newscasts as a way of promoting administration policies – including its ill-conceived Medicare prescription drug law. On the broadcasts, a public relations professional named Karen Ryan pretended to be a reporter. Among the stations which aired the administration propaganda as news: WPGH in Pittsburgh "the Sinclair Broadcasting station that fired much of its news staff in favor of feeds from a centralized newsroom in Baltimore."

SINCLAIR EXECUTIVES MAJOR BUSH CAMPAIGN CONTRIBUTORS: Sinclair executives have contributed more than $16,500 to President Bush since 2000. This year, Sinclair CEO David Smith gave President Bush the maximum $2000 contribution. Before soft money contributions became illegal, Sinclair Broadcasting gave more than $130,000 to the president's political allies but no money to his opponents.

Monday, May 03, 2004

The Carlyle Group 

Watch this Documentary. The first few sentences are in Dutch but the translation is below the video window. This is the kind of stuff you won't see talked about in the American media. It would also probably qualify as "conspiricy" theory by many. It's not. This is serious stuff but it's not a conspirircy theory and you would come across as dumb for dismissing it as such. What it describes is the close relationships between American government, American business and world politics.

One possible reason why some do dismiss it as conspiricy is because these types of relationships have ALWAYS existed in this country so people don't find anything new or disturbing about them. It's what the American government was designed for - to allow people to pursue business without interference from, and possibly with the aid of, the US government.

As for the moral or ethical questions behind it, people involved in organizations such as the Carlyle group don't believe in any moral law other than the law of the jungle which states that only the strongest survive. Responsibility to society doesn't even enter into their worldview. How can one argue ethics with people who don't hold any? Responsibility to society is not an American value. It's every man for himself.

Another aspect is the American way of doing buisiness. These types of questions aren't asked and these types of documantaries aren't shown because they are supposedly none of our business. Business and commerce come before people in this country.

Once you understand all of this about Americans, you won't get so frustrated when Americans act like the sheep that they are. Passive consumers are what we raise, not concerned, inquisitive, active and responsible citizens.

Sunday, May 02, 2004

Mayday and Haymarket 

Founded and forgotten in Chicago...

Hundreds of thousands of American workers, increasingly determined to resist subjugation to capitalist power, poured into a fledgling labor organization, the Knights of Labor. Beginning on May 1, 1886, they took to the
streets to demand universal adoption of the 8-hour day. Chicago was the center of the movement. Workers there had been agitating for an 8-hour day for months, and on the eve of May 1, 50,000 were already on strike. 30,000 more swelled their ranks the next day, bringing most of Chicago manufacturing to a standstill.

Fears of violent class conflict gripped the city. No violence occurred on May 1 — a Saturday — or May 2. But on Monday, May 3, a fight involving hundreds broke out at McCormick Reaper between locked-out unionists and non-unionist workers McCormick hired to replace them. The Chicago police, swollen in numbers and heavily armed, quickly moved in with clubs and guns to restore order. They left four unionists dead and many others wounded.

Angered by the deadly force of the police, a group of anarchists, led by August Spies and Albert Parsons, called on workers to arm themselves and participate in a massive protest demonstration in Haymarket Square on Tuesday evening, May 4. The demonstration appeared to be a complete bust, with only 3,000 assembling. But near the end of the evening, an individual, whose identity is still in dispute (possibly a police agent provocateur), threw a bomb that
killed seven police and injured 67 others.

Hysterical city and state government officials rounded up eight anarchists, tried them for murder, and sentenced them to death.

On 11 November 1887, four, including Parsons and Spies, were executed. All of the executed advocated armed struggle and violence as revolutionary methods, but their prosecutors found no evidence that any had actually thrown the Haymarket bomb. They died for their words — not their deeds.

250,000 people lined Chicago's street during Parson's funeral procession to express their outrage at this gross miscarriage of justice.

For radicals and trade unionists everywhere, Haymarket became a symbol of the stark inequality and injustice of capitalist society. The May 1886 Chicago events figured prominently in the decision of the founding congress of the
Second International (Paris, 1889) to make May 1, 1890 a demonstration of the solidarity and power of the international working class movement. May Day has been a celebration ever since.

So give thanks to the thousands of socialists, anarchists, and workers who died so that you only have to work 8 hours instead of 12-14 each day.

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The above came from a post I saw on another site and I just want to add that Parsons, whose family came to America on the Mayflower, fled to Wisconsin but voluntarily came back to face trial because he reasoned this was America, he was innocent, and a trial would find him innocent. When selecting a jury for the trial each potential juror was asked if they would find these men innocent or guilty. One man stated that he would need to hear all the evidence first before passing judgement. He was rejected as a juror and came to work the next day to find that he had been fired.

After Parsons and the others were sentenced there was a huge national and local public outcry. Their sentences would have been reduced if all of the major merchants of Chicago, the men who really ran the town, agreed to grant them clemency. All but one, Marshall Field, agreed. Because of Field's hatred of anarchists, who hated unions and labor organizations of any kind, these innocent men died for their political beliefs.

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