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US MEDIA CENSORSHIP BY OMISSION! How MSM Distorts Israel (Friend) Vis-à-vis Palestinians (Foe), Demonizing Iranian Election (Major Story) & Ignoring Honduran Coup (Nonentity); Obama's Pakistan War!
US MEDIA
CENSORSHIP
BY OMISSION!
How MSM Distorts
Israel (Friend)
Vis-à-vis Palestinians
(Foe), Demonizing
Iranian Election
(Major Story) &
Ignoring Honduran
Coup (Nonentity);
Obama’s New
Empire War In
Pakistan (Shhhhh!)
- RI10
Tabacco: You know about “damning with faint praise” and Tabacco’s own converse “redeeming with faint censure”. Here we have a variation of those concepts similar to that old bromide, “If a tree falls in the forest and nobody hears it…”
We now have the Mainstream Media, by implication, inferring that if the Media doesn’t cover it, how significant could it be!
I ask you this, “Is the death of Michael Jackson the most important story of the past two weeks, followed by Sarah Palin’s abdication, whereas the Israelis’ Nuclear Weapons Program has been non-newsworthy for decades?” If your answer is, “No”, you understand the problem. If your answer is, “Yes”, then why are you reading this blog!
http://www.democracynow.org/2009/7/6/filmmaker_journalist_john_pilger_on_honduras
July 06, 2009
John Pilger on Honduras, Iran, Gaza, the Corporate Media, Obama’s Wars and Resisting the American Empire
Award-winning investigative journalist and documentary filmmaker, John Pilger, joins us for a wide-ranging conversation on Honduras, Iran, Gaza, the media, health care, and Obama’s wars in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Pilger has written close to a dozen books and made over 50 documentaries on a range of subjects including struggles around the world for a more just and peaceful society and against Western military and economic intervention. [Includes rush transcript-partial]
Guest:
John Pilger, award-winning investigative journalist and filmmaker.
Rush Transcript
This transcript is available free of charge. However, donations help us provide closed captioning for the deaf and hard of hearing on our TV broadcast. Thank you for your generous contribution.
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Related Links
* JohnPilger.com
Related Democracy Now! Stories
* “Resisting the Empire”: Documentary Filmmaker John Pilger on Struggles for Freedom in Israel-Palestine, Diego Garcia, Latin America and South Africa (6/7/2007)
*
AMY GOODMAN: From the events in Honduras, we step back to reflect how the media’s been covering the coup in that country. Last week, award-winning investigative journalist and documentary filmmaker John Pilger was visiting the United States. He was born in Australia but has lived in London since the 1960’s and began his career as a hard-hitting war reporter covering the Vietnam War. He has written close to a dozen books and made over 50 documentaries on subjects ranging from struggles around the world for a more just and peaceful society and against western military and economic intervention, films on East Timor, Cambodia, Vietnam, Iraq, Israel, Palestine, and the United States.
Well, last week I had a wide-ranging conversation with John Pilger on Honduras, Iran, Gaza, the media, healthcare and Obama’s wars in Afghanistan and Pakistan. I began by asking John Pilger to comment on the current mainstream media and how it shapes our perceptions and priorities.
JOHN PILGER: I don’t believe anything has changed. If it is going to change in the Middle East as in other parts of the world, I think one of the really significant and building areas of discussion- and data has been building for the last few years— is just the kind of information we get through the so-called mainstream. We have many alternative sources of information now, not least of all your own program, though I wouldn’t call that alternative.
Tabacco: John Hilger has defined it; now Tabacco will assign it a name:
All of this, it seams to me, has come together in the presidency of Barack Obama who is almost a creation of this media world. He promised some things, although most of them were amorphous, and has delivered virtually the opposite. He started his own war in Pakistan. We see the events in Iran and Honduras being quite subtly, but very directly influenced in the time-honored way by the Obama administration. And yet the Obama administration is still given this extraordinary benefit of the doubt by people, who in my view are influenced by the mainstream media. It is a time when I think, where either we are going to begin to understand how the media really works, or we’re going to let that opportunity pass.
AMY GOODMAN: John, talk about the contrast between the media coverage of the Iranian elections and the Honduran coup, and the response to it on the ground.
JOHN PILGER: Well, you know, you take the New York Times. The New York Times basically has said, in so many words, that the Iranian protests represent a mass movement, embracing the majority in that country. Now there is no doubt that among the people protesting, the many people protesting in the streets of Iran, are those who want another Iran, those who want greater freedoms, we have heard from that in the past, but without any smoking gun, without any credible information, without any evidence that that election in Iran was rigged. Rigged to get rid of something like 10 million votes. I mean, I don’t think anyone does in an election like in Iran or in the United States, there is a fraud. In most elections, there are. There may well have been extensive fraud in the Iranian elections. But the way our perception of those events in Iran has been manipulated is to suggest that this was a revolution that was set to overthrow the Islamic revolution of 1979. That is simply just not true. That has preoccupied the mainstream media. It has been on the front pages, and the top of the news and the networks.
Contrast that with Honduras, yes, it has been a news item, way at the end of Michael Jackson. As a main component of this news item has been the Obama administration’s alleged condemnation of the Honduran coup. But if you look at the condemnation, which is built on the fact they said, well they’ve tried to sway the Honduran military from staging the coup, and I have to say Hillary Clinton does not want to call it a coup because she called it a coup, the Foreign Assistance Act would kick in and she’d have to withdraw all the military support to the 600 US military personnel, who are based in Honduras. But she said and administration officials have said, “Look, we tried to persuade the Honduran military from going ahead with this”. Well, you turn that around, and that means they knew that a coup was coming. And just beggars’ belief that they didn’t play a major role in the events–that may well have gone out of their control, they may well have not wanted the coup in its present form, in its present crude form to happen, but they knew about it.
It is so parallels the 2002 coup against Chavez. Now that story, what really is the kernel of that news story, it is really what matters in that story, what did the U.S. play its traditional role or not, and why has the elected president of Honduras been kicked out of his country? That has been relegated. So, you have two news stories. You have the Iranian story of protests for freedom, that’s approved, that’s a worthy story. You have the Honduras story of our friends in the south just getting a little bit out of control, that is an unworthy story. Two different perceptions in two very, very important areas!
AMY GOODMAN:I want to play for you a clip of David Gregory on NBC. He replaced Tim Russert as the moderator of Meet The Press. And he was interviewing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the midst of the crackdown on the protest in Iran.
DAVID GREGORY: Does the United States have a unique role to play here in continuing to support this freedom movement as you call it in Iran? An obligation to support the protesters to really give them moral support at the very least?
BENJAMIN NETANYAHU: (NBC, Meet The Press, June 21, 2009) I think it is clear that the United States, the people of the United States, the president of the United States, free people everywhere, decent people everywhere, are amazed at the desire of the people there—and their willingness to stand up for their rights. I cannot, as I said, tell you what is going to happen. I’ll tell you what I would do, what we all would do in the face of demonstrations. As we speak, there is a demonstration right now outside my window, outside my office. Well, democracies act differently. They don’t send armed agents of the regime to brutally mow down the demonstrators. I’ll tell you what I did. I called in these demonstrators that happen to be representative of a non-Jewish minority in Israel, the Druze community, they have certain protests about the financing of their municipalities. I called their leaders in. I talked to them; I said, ‘How can I help you?” That is what democratic leaders do; that is what democratic countries do.
@Tabacco: First, Israel is no democracy! And kidnapping peacekeepers and humanitarian volunteers on their way to Gaza (in this instance American humanitarians) is not something democracies do either! See July 6th Headline below, “U.S. Peace Activists Head to Gaza as Boat Delegation Deported”
This is just one more instance of politicians lying in a self-serving manner to obfuscate their own abominations, patting themselves on the back for some perceived honorable act while casting aspersions on others.
Since, in this Post, both Israel’s Netanyahu and America’s Joe Biden are both guilty of these LIES, only the Brits of my Unholy Trinity are spared from exposure here. But their day will come – and soon!
AMY GOODMAN: Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. David Gregory didn’t ask him about, did not push him on this point of how the Israeli military deals with protests. But what’s your response to this, John Pilger?
JOHN PILGER: But no one ever presses an Israeli leader! Netanyahu or Olmert or any of them! They are given, Israeli leaders were given a legitimacy during what was unconditionally a massacre in December-January of this year. And the sum of that was to suggest, number one, that there was a war between Israel and Gaza, and there wasn’t. There was an assault on Gaza that was aimed at civilians, on a defenseless country, a helpless country, a trapped people. And the second impression was that, yes, Israel is a democracy. We will discuss this on television with you; we will discuss the finer points.
The way Israel is reported in the United States is media manipulation as almost a high art form. When people like Netanyahu, whose very utterances and his background would suggest somebody, I think it’s fair to say, not credible, but somebody of well, those of us who would say somebody would be a prima facie war criminal, is given this kind of legitimacy. Not even questioned, not even challenged about the events in this country and his own extreme utterances! Yes, we have cartoon figures like Lieberman who is—as foreign minister very important, but rather grotesque character in a sense.
AMY GOODMAN: Avigdor Lieberman
JOHN PILGER: He can be made perhaps or drawn out as the sort of strange bad apple in that barrel. I think it is that legitimacy that mainstream media gives one side. And the sum of that, as far as Palestine is concerned, is that there is no illegitimate occupation. There is no illegality. There is some illegality as Obama referred to in his Cairo speech about the continuing building of settlements, but there is no suggestion that this is the longest, most brutal, illegal military occupation in our lifetime.
AMY GOODMAN: Let me just go to that for one minute. President Obama in Cairo giving his address in the Middle East, talking specifically about the settlements.
BARACK OBAMA: The United States does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements. This construction violates previous agreements and undermines efforts to achieve peace. It is time for these settlements to stop.
AMY GOODMAN: That was President Obama in Cairo in his heralded address to the Muslim world. John Pilger, he says the continued expansion of settlements has to stop, your response? And then overall to his entire address!
JOHN PILGER: He said the continuing response, but what about all the settlements, the so-called settlements, colonies, that have so honeycombed the Occupied Territories over a period of almost two decades! I thought the most significant aspect of that statement was that he referred to the continuing settlements. So leave the ones that have already been built. Let’s stop building them now. Of course, the Israelis, ever resourceful in this area, got around this very quickly by issuing building licenses to those settlements that were about to be built and hadn’t been built as if they had been built so they wouldn’t fall into President Obama’s category.
This is not to suggest that there will be some helpful window dressing here and there, I don’t know. But, it seems to me that the pressure on Obama over the Middle East, as indeed over so many other issues, has been so minimal that he can simply perform as Bush-light.
AMY GOODMAN: He did however I believe for the first time for president admit the U.S.’s involvement in the 1953 overthrow of a democratically elected leader, and what was in Iran, Mohammed Mossadeq.
JOHN PILGER: But what a concession, Amy. (giggling) We get 1953, you know, 56 years ago. That’s easy! That is easy; but it is what has happened since then, the demonizing of Iran goes on, the lecturing of Iran, which is extremely politically complex society, goes on. And the policy is unchanged. The crime always is independence. Iran is an independent state and has almost miraculously maintained itself in forms that we might not approve of, certainly, but it has maintained itself as an independent, major state in the Middle East. That is absolutely intolerable to the U.S. State.
And Obama has not shifted from that at all. He has made a number of patronizing appeals to the Iranians, but now, as he is in effect saying, that the protesters should be allowed to control the streets of Tehran. Turn that around. What if it was suggested that protesters should be allowed to control the streets of Washington? But that of course is another side of double standards. I don’t believe anything has changed. If it is going to change in the Middle East as in other parts of the world, there has to be greater pressure from within the anti-war movement, within the peace movement, within all those groups that have allied themselves with the Democrats.
AMY GOODMAN: Renowned filmmaker John Pilger. We will continue with my interview with him in a minute. [Music Break]
AMY GOODMAN: This is “Democracy now!”, Democracynow.org, The War and Peace report. I’m Amy Goodman. We return to my interview with the Emmy-award winning filmmaker, John Pilger.
John Pilger you’re not an American citizen, but I’d like you to comment on American politics. With the election certification of Al Franken to be the 60th Democrat in the Senate, the Democrats have a super majority, a filibuster-proof majority. They can pass anything they want. The question is from foreign policy to domestic policy, what exactly President Obama will do with this. Primary on his domestic agenda is health care. You come from Britain, though born in Australia. What are your comments on how this debate is being carried out in the United States? More than 70% of Americans say they want a public plan, but it’s pretty clear that even people within president Obama’s own party are terrified, or at least getting millions of dollars from the health insurance and health-care industry. Explain your system in Britain.
JOHN PILGER: Amy, my impression gained over many years, and I do not think that I’d call myself honorary citizen, but I have certainly come to this country and lived in it for many years. My impression is that ordinary Americans are so far ahead of their politicians, so far ahead of their media, and so far ahead of all those who claim to be their betters and who bestow on them stereotypes that are almost contemptuous. Indeed you can go back to Madison, when he described he American public as at best meddlesome. I think if you look at the credible polls, say those done by the Pew organization, then you will see the majority of Americans are very dangerously subversive. I would say they may even be left-wing. This is a very worrying situation, of course. (giggling again) But the majority of them want the decency as you suggested, they want a universal health care system. Now I am talking about two-thirds. I think the figure I saw was 70-74%.
They want their country out of the colonial wars that they are fighting, the various wars, Afghanistan and Iraq. They want the government to take responsibility for those who cannot care for themselves. They want the “banks and the banksters”, as Franklin Roosevelt called them, brought to account. They have decent – I hesitate to call them radical views. They’re not radical views; they are just the views of decency, but they are views at huge odds with their government, be it a Bush government or an Obama government, and their views are at odds with the media that claim to represent them, to be their agents as it were. And to watch the so-called debate; it is not a debate, Amy; its a farce!
What Obama is moving towards is what Hillary Clinton tried to before she allied herself with some of the worst elements in the health insurance business. What he is moving towards is a very messy version of the old system that will allow the old pirates still to run it, that certain insurance will be guaranteed, yes, on a Medicare basis. But it will be a mess!
AMY GOODMAN: Could you explain, because it is so unusual to hear about what other systems are without them just been described as socialist, and so you end the discussion. Interestingly, Single-payer in the United States, most popular option and yet it is almost never mentioned in the media except by those who attack it. Canada has a system where the government pays for health care. In Britain, the doctors are employees of the state. Can you explain how the British medical system works and if it works?
JOHN PILGER: I have lived in the U.K. for most of my life and I have used the National Health Service and I regard it as a treasure. I regard it as— I’ve had some of the best care for not particularly serious ailments, but I’ve had the best care that I could possibly have. What happens is, you go to a G.P., a general practitioner—and you can choose which one you want to go to in your area – you sign nothing. They simply have your name and address, and you are seen by that doctor. If there’s something that is required, you’re referred to a specialist. Where I live in London, I’m surrounded by five of the world’s major teaching hospitals, all of them run by the National Health Service.
The way the National Health Service is represented in the United States is truly scandalous. That word “socialist” is pulled out. It is kind of infantile almost. Yes it is socialist, if socialist is caring for the majority of the people and taking away the fear of being denied health care that so many millions of Americans have, they have this fear. Then yes, it’s a vast community operation that is highly imperfect, it doesn’t provide enough care for the mentally ill, it doesn’t provide enough care for the aged. In some parts of Britain, outside the major urban centers, it is not as good as it is if you say go to London and you are near great teaching hospital as I am. But it is bereft of the kind of bureaucracy that means-test anyone coming into it. I don’t sign anything when I go into a hospital. I do sign when the doctors want to do something you have to sign a waiver, you know saying you understand it, and all that, but that’s it.
It’s so much part of people’s lives that one of the most conservative medical organizations, or at least it was in the world, British Medical Association, are the greatest champions of the national health service. Most of the research is done within the National Health Service. Why can’t there be something like this, not exactly the same, in fact, it could improve on it. France has the same. Italy has the same. Holland has the same. What is it about U.S. legislators that they appear to be so in bed with such powerful interests such as the insurance companies that they cannot represent their own people’s needs, their own people’s basic human rights?
Tabacco: It is self-interest. It is called LOBBYING. And it is LEGALIZED BRIBERY OF ELECTED OFFICIALS! That’s what it is!
And that is what it is. It is in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, actually. It is a human right to have this kind of medical care. It’s to take away fear. And all of us have experienced the fear of possible ill health. And I’ve interviewed so many people in the United States that I see them crippled, both by what is medically wrong with them, but by this terrible insecurity that takes over their lives, and the poverty then that consumes them as they try to pay for their medical care; its primitive.
AMY GOODMAN: I want to ask you about Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iraq, how you see especially in Afghanistan, Pakistan where President Obama says he’s expanding the war, how you see it ending? You’ve done more than 50 documentaries, many of them about wars around the world. Also, the response of the British people, how you see what is happening in Afghanistan and Pakistan?
JOHN PILGER: Obama has begun a new war. There is an Obama war and that is Pakistan. The shaking of the hornets’ nest, if you like, in Pakistan, which this administration has done willfully, is an historic disaster. The creation of up to 2 million refugees in the Northwest of Pakistan, caused by the attacks by the Pakistani government, egged on and paid for by the Obama administration, the use of electronic battlefield weapons such as drones and other unmanned vehicles. Drones have killed, according to the Pakistanis authorities, American drones launched from I believe near Las Vegas have killed something like 700 civilians since the inauguration of president Obama. So there is a new war. It’s a war in Pakistan. I believe there is a new jargon term in Washington called “Afpak”, which is, well it’s almost beyond commenting on.
The Afghanistan War, so called, is really about building as Gates, Robert Gates the Defense Secretary has said, has virtually admitted, is about building a number of secured permanent bases throughout that country and reinforcing the major facility at Bagram.
The United States has no intention of getting out of Afghanistan. It is building one of its fortress embassies in Kabul, just as it’s building a $1 billion embassy in Islamabad, just as it has built an enormous fortress in Baghdad. Whatever happens to American ground troops who eventually, yes, will be withdrawn, will make no difference to the significance of the American presence, the American, the violent American presence in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and in Iraq. These are seen as places where the United States will have a permanent presence to be able to—a strategic position—where it will be able to monitor, and perhaps influence, and perhaps control the influences of its imperial rivals. The Bagram base is being extended. It probably has a worse record, if that is possible, than Guantánamo in terms of its human-rights abuses.
Tabacco: Thus we have Hypocrisy from Democrats, who suggest “WITHDRAWAL” and Hypocrisy from Republicans, who object to “WITHDRAWAL”. This false contretemps allows both Democrats and Republicans to pretend to be at odds (as Dick Cheney has done recently) when both sides know it’s a moot point, except our actual presence there allows for continued military overspending, which pleases Disaster Capitalists in and out of government.
Unless there is an understanding of this in this country, unless people stop taking the pronouncements of governments at their word. When Obama went to Annapolis and said we’re getting out of Iraq and appeared to be giving a timetable, within a matter of weeks, I believe, General Casey, the head of the Army, contradicted him and said, “We will probably be there for another 10 years”. And other Pentagon generals put it even higher, 15 years.
No mention is made of the enormous American army of mercenaries, who are in all those theaters of war, and Special Forces. No mention is made of the Special Forces operation inside Iraq come inside—I beg your pardon, inside Iran. $400 million was allotted to that particular secret war by Bush, in one of his signing decrees, which money has gone to both the Kurdish and Baluchi separatist movements. The whole region is being crafted, if you like, for a very, very long American colonial presence. Eventually, it will not need a standing army there. That is the future in that part of the world, as I say, unless people become aware of that and start to bang on the doors of government, of Congress, and of power in this country to expose it.
AMY GOODMAN: Award-winning filmmaker John Pilger. You can get a copy of the show at Democracynow.org. Late breaking news, former Defense Secretary, Robert McNamara, died in his sleep this morning in Washington, D.C.
Tabacco: No, it’s not the murders involving former NFL QB Steve “Air” McNair.
It isn’t the abdication of Sarah Palin.
It obviously wasn’t Joe The Plumber.
Nor is it the dalliances of that GOP Carolina governor.
And it certainly isn’t the suspicious death of Michael Jackson!
All those stories deserve perpetual star billing in the Mainstream Media! Right? But a coup d’état in South America! How important can it be!
http://www.democracynow.org/2009/7/6/honduran_military_blocks_ousted_president_zelayas
July 06, 2009
Honduran Coup Regime Blocks Ousted President Zelaya’s Return; Troops Open Fire on Supporters at Airport Killing Two
One week after a military coup in Honduras, soldiers and riot police blocked the airport runway Sunday evening preventing ousted President Manuel Zelaya from returning to the country. Heavily armed Honduran soldiers also used tear gas and machine guns to disperse an unarmed crowd of tens of thousands of people who had come from all over the country, despite military blockades, to wait at the airport and welcome back their ousted President. At least two people were reportedly killed and more wounded. We go to Tegucigalpa to speak with Andres Conteris, who was at the scene. [includes rush transcript]
Guest:
Andres Conteris, Program on the Americas director for Nonviolence International. He is in Honduras as part of the Emergency Delegation to Honduras He worked as a human rights advocate in Honduras from 1994 to 1999 and is a co-producer of “Hidden in Plain Sight,” a documentary film about U.S. policy in Latin America and the School of the Americas. He also works at Democracy Now! en Español.
Rush Transcript
This transcript is available free of charge. However, donations help us provide closed captioning for the deaf and hard of hearing on our TV broadcast. Thank you for your generous contribution.
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* Full Democracy Now! coverage of Honduras Coup
AMY GOODMAN: A week after a military coup in Honduras, soldiers and riot police blocked the airport runway Sunday evening preventing ousted President Manuel Zelaya from returning to the country. Heavily armed Honduran soldiers also used tear gas and machine guns to disperse an unarmed crowd of over tens of thousands of people who had come from all over the country, despite military blockades, to wait at the airport and welcome back their ousted President. At least two people were reportedly killed and more wounded. After several failed attempts to touch down at Tegucigalpa airport, Zelaya’s plane eventually flew to Nicaragua, where he met President Daniel Ortega. He was accompanied by the President of the UN General Assembly Miguel D’Escoto Brockman on the plane. Zelaya then went on to El Salvador where he is due to meet the presidents of Argentina, Ecuador and Paraguay and the head of the Organization of American States. On Saturday, the OAS suspended Honduras. It marked the organization’s first suspension of a country in over 45 years.
For more from Honduras, we are joined on the line from Tegucigalpa by Andres Conteris. He is the Program on the Americas director for Nonviolence International. He worked as a human rights advocate in Honduras from 1994 to 1999. He is a co-producer of “Hidden in Plain Sight”, a documentary film about U.S. policy in Latin America and the School of the Americas. And he works with Democracy Now! in Espanola. Tell us what happened. You were at the airport?
ANDRES CONTERIS: Yes, I was at the airport and it was a day of mostly peaceful demonstrations. The estimates on the numbers were well over 100,000 people in the streets of Tegucigalpa going to the airport. The police would block the marchers, but then every half hour or so, they would retreat and therefore, causing a pause in the march but creating a sense of peace on both sides. So most of the day was very, very coordinated and there was no problems. The violence erupted later in the afternoon and it is very clear a sharpshooter was the one responsible for killing one of the protesters near the airport entrance.
AMY GOODMAN: So, tell us throughout the weekend how things went down, and what happened when president Zelaya, the ousted president, was flying over the airport!
ANDRES CONTERIS: Throughout the weekend, things have been getting more and more intense because first, the expected arrival of president Zelaya was last Thursday. He, himself, announced that. Then the OAS said they needed some time to give Honduras a chance to return to constitutional order and return him to power. So the OAS gave Honduras, the regime here, three days. Then Zelaya said he would come on Saturday and that was postponed until yesterday, Sunday. Throughout this time, the repression in the country has become more and more intensified. People from around the country have been trying to get to the capital to show their support for their president. Dozens of buses have been prevented from coming into the capital. One of the buses was machine gunned on its tires. Father Andres Temallo was beaten along with others while trying to come to the capital. This along with the fear and intimidation tactics that are used against human rights leaders and especially members of the press that are trying to get the word out about those in the country who are against the coup.
AMY GOODMAN: Andres, exactly what is happening with the media in Honduras right now?
ANDRES CONTERIS: The media overwhelmingly in this country is controlled by an oligarchy that is very supportive of this coup. And so they are only trying to get out the story about some of the demonstrations that have been in favor of Roberto Micheletti taking power a week ago yesterday. However, the press, who is trying to give a balanced approach and to give voice to those who are in the streets yesterday and the recent days, in addition to yesterday. They are finding—they’re facing incredible repression. There was a journalist on Friday murdered after leaving Radio America in San Juan Pueblo in the rural area in the north. Then there are two journalists who are in hiding. One is the head of channel 36 and the other is the director of Radio Global. Other journalists, who have decided to continue their programming, are facing death threats and fear and intimidation tactics. One journalist jumped three stories when the soldiers came to get him in Radio Global on the day of the coup. And the reason he did so is because he had been tortured in the 1980’s and he feared this would happen once again. He fractured his shoulder and has lesions around his body. Another journalist had his family threatened and just two days ago, his two sons on the street were threatened with a revolver a car with darkened windows.
AMY GOODMAN: Also a bomb on July 4th, Saturday exploded at Channel 11 in Tegucigalpa?
ANDRES CONTERIS: That happened at 9:30 PM at night. It was the first bomb that had been placed at any institution that actually went off. The material damage was severe, there was no one else hurt. Channel 11 has not been known as a channel that would give the side that is countered to this regime that is in power now, but they were attempting to do some small efforts to give a balanced approach. Even in doing that, that is what caused them to be a target of this bombing. Other channels closed, I said channel 36, also channel 45. In terms of radio, Radio Global in Tegucigalpa is the station that has most been under attack. I mentioned a man, who jumped three stories; the director is in hiding. Other journalists are under life threats. One of the radios stations in the countryside, Radio Progresso, this was shut down. Radio Progresso is a very, very progressive voice run by the Jesuit community. One station here in Tegucigalpa that carries the headline news for “Democracy Now!” was clearly forced to take headline news of “Democracy Now!” off the air because we have been reporting on the coup. So the press censorship has been very, very severe and intimidation and terror tactics against journalists have been incrementing.
AMY GOODMAN: Can you talk about the curfew? The sunset to sunrise curfew that has been imposed. Also, BBC reported that as president Zelaya, the ousted president was not able to land, his supporters at the airport began shouting, “We want blue helmets”, meaning UN peacekeepers.
ANDRES CONTERIS: Yes, the curfew was first imposed the night of the coup, in fact. The coup happened very early in the morning a week ago Sunday on the 20th of June. And the curfew was imposed that night from 9:00 p.m. until 6:00 a.m. That was put in place for the next few days and then the Congress passed a law that extended the curfew, but not only that, it limited guaranteed constitutional rights of freedom of gathering, freedom of association, and basically freedom to protect their very rights. In other words, once the curfew is in force, which was 9PM but yesterday was changed until 6:30 PM, until 5:00AM in the morning. During that time any house can be raided and all the constitutional guarantees of the citizens here are canceled. The international press has also received harassment, if they trying to report an anti-coup position. They have been threatened with leaving the country, especially journalists from Telesur and others from Venezuela.
AMY GOODMAN: Andres, very quickly, because we just have a minute, can you talk about the situation of the United States not calling it a coup in Honduras and the very close US relationship with Honduras, particularly the aid that is not been cut off, though military cooperation, the Obama administration has announced has been cut off?
ANDRES CONTERIS: The US policy towards Honduras has historically been one of having great deal of control and the U.S. policy continues to be that. It is very clear that the US is trying to associate itself with not only Latin America, but the entire world. But even though the United States is not following even U.S. law which says no aid, either economic or military, can go to a country when it is declared that a coup has happened. Both Obama and Hillary Clinton have said a coup has happened, but have not legally declared that the case. That means aid has continues to flow, even though the State Department has used the words, there has been a pause and even though the Pentagon has said that the associations between the U.S. Military and Honduran military have been minimized.
Even those symbolic efforts, even if they have happened, it does not mean the aid should continue to flow. And therefore the U.S. is in violation of its own law in continuing to support this regime. The history of the U.S. in this country is also full of repression. The School of the Americas trained the coup leader here, the general who took over. And Billy Hoya also related to Battalion 316, a death squad, which was founded during the time of John Dimitri Negroponte. Billy Hoya is a key security advisor to the so-called President Micheletti. So the ties of U.S. policy here continue to be damaging and the U.S. is not taking an active role in resolving this crisis.
AMY GOODMAN: Andres Conteris, I want to thank you for being with us. Speaking to us from Tegucigalpa. This is Democracy Now, the when we come back, John Pilger, the award-winning filmmaker on Honduras, Iran, the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq in more. Stay with us.
Headlines for July 06, 2009
http://www.democracynow.org/2009/7/6/headlines
Coup Regime Blocks Zelaya Return, Shoots Protesters
One week after the military coup that overthrew him, Honduran President Manuel Zelaya was prevented from returning to Honduras Sunday after the coup government refused to allow his entry. Honduran military forces blocked runways at Honduras’s main airport, forcing Zelaya’s plane to turn around and eventually go on to El Salvador. Heavily armed Honduran soldiers used tear gas and machine guns to disperse an unarmed crowd of ten of thousands of people who had come to greet Zelaya. At least two people were reportedly killed and many more wounded.
Obama in Russia for Nuke Talks
President Obama is in Russia today for talks on a new treaty to reduce U.S. and Russian stockpiles of nuclear weapons. Negotiators have agreed to a modest weapons cut but remain in a standstill over the fate of the proposed U.S. missile system in Eastern Europe. The Obama administration has refused to renounce the Bush administration-backed system even though it’s widely seen as ineffective in its stated purpose of missile defense and actually intended as a first-strike weapon against Iran. The U.S. is also rejecting Russian calls for a sharp reduction in the numbers of long-range missile launchers and heavy bombers under a new treaty. Obama meanwhile has won an agreement to let military flights bound for Afghanistan fly over Russian territory.
At Least 140 Killed in China Clashes
In China, at least 140 people have been killed and more than 800 wounded in the western Xinjiang region. On Sunday, hundreds of protesters clashed with police at a rally demanding justice for the killing of two Uighur workers at southern Chinese factory last month. The Chinese government says a group of exiled Uighurs caused the unrest, but protesters accused the police of cracking down on a peaceful gathering.
Report: Health Industry Employing Hundreds of Ex-Gov. Officials
Here in the United States, the Washington Post is reporting the nation’s heath care industry has hired more than 350 former government officials and members of Congress to sway health care reform efforts on Capital Hill. According to lobbying records, three out of every four major health care companies have at least one former government insider on the payroll. Nearly half held positions under key committees and lawmakers including Senators Max Baucus and Charles Grassley. Baucus is chair of the Senate Finance Committee which is largely steering health care reform efforts. Baucus’ aides recently held a meeting with a group of lobbyists that included two of his former chiefs of staff. The Washington Post says the health care industry is now spending $1.4 million dollars a day on lobbying, totaling $126 million dollars in the first fiscal quarter.
Judge OKs GM Bankruptcy Sale
A bankruptcy judge has cleared the way for the sale of the auto giant General Motors. Bondholders, unions or consumer groups could still appeal the ruling before it takes effect later this week.
U.S. Lost 467,000 Jobs in June
New figures show the unemployment rate has reached a 26-year high of 9.5%. The U.S. lost 467,000 jobs last month, the first time monthly losses rose since a peak of 741,000 in January.
Washington Post Cancels Sponsored Events With Journalists, Lobbyists, Lawmakers
In media news, the Washington Post has cancelled and apologized for a planned event series that would have brought together lobbyists, government officials, corporate sponsors and its own journalists. The so-called “salons” were to be held at the home of Washington Post publisher Katharine Weymouth. They were disclosed after the website Politico published details of a promotional flyer offering corporate sponsorships ranging from $25,000 to $250,000 dollars. The first dinner was scheduled to focus on health care. The Washington Post says it might still hold the events in the future, but maintains any discussions there would be ‘on the record’ and not private as the flyer claimed.
Palin to Resign Later This Month
Alaska Governor Sarah Palin has announced she’ll step down later this month. On Friday, Palin said she wants to avoid becoming a lame-duck governor after deciding not to seek re-election.
Alaska Governor Sarah Palin: “I promised efficiencies and effectiveness. That’s not how I’m wired. I’m not wired to operate under the same old politics as usual. I promised that four years ago and I meant it. That’s not what is best for Alaska at this time. I’m determined to take the right path for Alaska, even though it is unconventional and it’s not that comfortable.”
Palin ran as Senator John McCain’s Vice Presidential nominee in last year’s elections and is a considered a top Republican hopeful in 2012. Her replacement, Alaska Lieutenant Governor Sean Parnell, says he thinks Palin’s mounting legal bills over a series of ethics complaints forced her to step down. Palin’s legal team meanwhile has warned news outlets not to publish stories speculating whether she’s under federal investigation. The FBI says Palin is not under investigation. In a four-page letter, Palin’s attorney warns that media groups could be sued if they grant space to rumors that Palin is being investigated for alleged embezzlement in the construction of a sports arena.
Biden Suggests U.S. Won’t Stop Israeli Attack on Iran
Vice-President Joe Biden has said the U.S. wouldn’t prevent Israel from attacking Iran if the Israeli government decides it’s an existential threat. Biden made the comment during an interview with ABC News host George Stephanopoulos.
Vice-President Joe Biden: “If the Netanyahu government decides to take a course of action different than the one being pursued now, that is their sovereign right to do that. That is not our choice.”
George Stephanopoulos: “But just to be clear here, if the Israelis decide Iran is an existential threat, they have to take out the nuclear program, militarily the United States will not stand in the way?”
Vice-President Biden: “Look, we cannot dictate to another sovereign nation what they can and cannot do when they make a determination, if they make a determination that they’re existentially threatened and their survival is threatened by another country.”
Tabacco: VP JOE BIDEN IS LYING! The US does it all the time – it’s referred to as “Regime Change”. But, more often than not, it isn’t referred to at all as when President Aristide of Haiti was deposed by our “honorable” American government because he, Aristide, would not play ball with American Capitalists and privatize Haiti!
Were Biden telling the Truth, he would say, “We will not stop Israel from doing that which is in American Capitalists’ interests”. But Biden is not telling the Truth. Could he be a politician!
George Stephanopoulos: “You say we can’t dictate, but we can, if we choose to, deny over-flight rights here in Iraq. We can stand in the way of a military strike.”
Vice-President Biden: “I’m not going to speculate, George, on those issues, other than to say Israel has a right to determine what’s in its interests, and we have a right and we will determine what’s in our interests.”
Biden spoke during a visit to Iraq, where on Friday he was greeted by hundreds of Iraqi protesters in Baghdad calling for an end to the U.S. occupation.
Tabacco: Is Bush still president? No! But in spite of Wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan, the Military-Industrial Complex has no problem with increasing war munitions sales to the US government, which incidentally would bring them more PROFITS – War is not hated by everybody! Disaster Capitalists are still running your government, and
@U.S. Peace Activists Head to Gaza as Boat Delegation Deported
A group of around 100 U.S. peace activists have arrived in Egypt hoping to bring aid to the Gaza Strip. The activists are part of the group “Viva Palestina” which conducted another aid mission from Europe earlier this year. Their arrival in Egypt comes as Israel is set to deport today a group of foreign activists kidnapped in international waters last week as they tried to reach Gaza. The Free Gaza delegation included former Congress member and presidential candidate Cynthia McKinney and the Irish peace activist and Nobel laureate Mairead Maguire. Both McKinney and Maguire are among those expected to be deported today.
Tabacco: I’ll bet you didn’t hear this news about Israel’s illegal and immoral acts on CBS!
10 Killed in U.S. Drone Attack in Pakistan
In Pakistan, at least ten people were killed Friday in the latest U.S. drone attack. The bombing hit alleged militant hideouts in Pakistan’s South Waziristan region near the Afghan border.
Pakistani Attorney Files Legal Challenge to Drone Bombings
A Pakistani attorney meanwhile has filed a legal challenge seeking to have the drone attacks prosecuted under international law. The attorney, M. Tariq Asad, filed the petition to Pakistan’s Supreme Court last week. Asad wants the Pakistani government to submit a complaint to the World Court on the drone attack’s killing of hundreds of people in Pakistan.
Ex-Gitmo Prisoner Seeks Preservation of Abuse Photo
The former Guantánamo Bay prisoner Binyam Mohamed has filed a legal challenge seeking to prevent the destruction of evidence he says proved he was tortured in U.S. custody. Mohamed says the government is facing a pending deadline to destroy an image taken of him shortly after he was beaten by several guards. The image is to be destroyed since Mohamed is no longer jailed, but Mohamed says he needs it towards his lawsuit against the U.S. for unlawful incarceration.
2 U.S. Troops Killed in Afghanistan
And in Afghanistan, two U.S. soldiers were killed this weekend during an operation in the Paktika province. It’s the same area where a U.S. soldier disappeared last week and is now believed to have been captured by militants. The U.S. has meanwhile expanded its major attack in the southern Afghan province of Hellmand, site of the largest Marine offensive since the Vietnam War. Over the weekend U.S. forces seized several key districts near the Afghan border with Pakistan.
Headlines for July 07, 2009
http://www.democracynow.org/2009/7/7/headlines
Uyghurs Widen Protests as Xinjiang Unrest Flares
New protests have erupted in China’s western Xinjiang region, two days after at least 156 people were killed and over 1,000 wounded in China’s worst ethnic violence in decades. Earlier today some 200 ethnic Uyghurs took to the streets to protest the mass arrest of more than 1,400 people following Sunday’s clashes. The two sides blame each other for the unrest. We’ll have more on the clashes in Xinjang after headlines.
7 U.S. Troops Killed in Afghanistan
In Afghanistan, seven U.S. troops were killed Monday in four separate attacks. It was the deadliest day for U.S. forces in Afghanistan in nearly a year. Meanwhile, a Taliban militant group is claiming it’s captured a U.S. soldier who went missing last week. The militants didn’t provide any proof but the U.S. military has said it thinks the soldier was captured. Meanwhile Monday, President Obama unveiled a new agreement with the Russia government to grant overflight rights to U.S. military shipments headed for Afghanistan.
President Obama: “I just want to thank again the Russian government for the agreement for military transit that will save U.S. troops both time and money, and it is, I think a gesture that indicates the degree to which in the future Russian U.S. cooperation can be extraordinary important to solving a whole host of this very important international issues.”
U.S., Russia Agree to Nuke Reductions
Obama was speaking in Russia, where he met with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev. The two announced a modest cut to American and Russian nuclear stockpiles of at least one quarter and as much as one third. Talks have centered on a new treaty to replace the START agreement on nuclear arms reduction which expires in December. Earlier today Obama held meetings with Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin for the first time.
12 Killed in U.S. Drone Attack in Pakistan
In Pakistan, at least twelve people have been killed in a U.S. drone strike in the South Waziristan region. Pakistani officials say the attack hit an alleged Taliban training camp. The U.S. has carried out more than 40 drone attacks in South Waziristan in the last year.
Zelaya to Meet Clinton in Washington
Ousted Honduran president Manuel Zelaya is in Washington today for meetings with Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton. It’s Zelaya’s highest-level meeting with a U.S. official since his overthrow last month. A group of right-wing Hondurans meanwhile have also arrived in the nation’s capital in an attempt to win U.S. support for the coup government. The group is expected to report back to the coup leaders on what kind of backing it can expect from Washington The unofficial delegation includes former Honduran president Ricardo Maduro.
Protests Continue as Funeral Held for Slain Honduran Protester
Meanwhile in Honduras, a funeral was held Monday for one of two people killed when Honduran forces opened fire on a crowd of peaceful demonstrators who had come to the airport to support Zelaya’s attempted return. The protester, Isis Murrillo, was nineteen years old. His sister, Rebeca Murrillo, vowed to champion the cause her brother died for.
Rebeca Murrillo: “With the death of my brother I want to move forward and keep fighting and supporting Manuel Zelaya. The people chose him not like [Roberto] Micheletti … My brother will give me strength, for him I will continue fighting for the homeland.”
Despite the threats of more government violence, protests continued in Honduras Monday with several thousand marching on the presidential palace.
Emmanuel: Obama Open to Dropping Public Health Plan
The Obama administration continues to downplay its stated commitment to a government-run public health insurance program. In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel said he think it’s more important to inject competition between insurance plans than it is to create a plan run by the government. Private insurers have opposed the public plan because they feel its cheaper costs would provide too much competition and potentially put them out of business. Emanuel’s comments echo recent statements from President Obama. At a White House news conference last month, Obama refused to call the public health proposal non-negotiable and said he hasn’t “drawn lines in the sand.”
President Obama, speaking June 23rd: “We are still early in this process. So, you know, we have not drawn lines in the sand, other than that reform has to control costs and that it has to provide relief to people who don’t have health insurance or are underinsured. You know, those are the broad parameters that we’ve discussed.”
Tabacco: To those of you, who think President Obama loves you as much as you love him, the preceding Article re “Public Option” disproves that erroneous concept. Obama loves Obama more and caters to BIG BIZ just as George W. Bush did. In economic issues, the difference between those two presidents is nothing more than distinction!
When push comes to shove, Obama, like Peter and Judas, is prepared to betray us for his own good!
These sorts of comments, directed at Barack Obama, are costing me Readers; but it is the Truth, the whole Truth and nothing but the Truth, so help me God!
I shall continue to write the Truth.
Hospital Payment Cuts $45B Less Than Figure Sought by Obama
The White House meanwhile has announced a deal with the nation’s hospital industry to cut $155 billion dollars in payments over ten years. The agreement comes as part of ongoing negotiations with the health care industry to help defray the costs of expanding medical coverage for the uninsured. The figure is $45 billion dollars less than President Obama recently called for. In a weekly address last month, Obama said his aides had identified $200 billion dollars in hospital reductions over ten years. An industry executive told the Washington Post*: “There was no way we could tolerate $200 billion.”
Justice Dept. Probes Wireless Carriers
The Justice Department has opened a preliminary probe into whether large U.S. telecommunications corporations are abusing their market power. According to the Wall Street Journal, investigators will look at whether firms are unfairly blocking users from such services such as the Internet calling program Skype. The probe will also focus on whether wireless giants such as AT&T and Verizon are stifling competition through exclusive deals with handset makers. On Monday, the chair of Senate Judiciary Committee’s antitrust subcommittee, Democratic Senator Herb Kohl, publicly called for an federal anti-trust probe of the wireless industry.
Financial Industry Lobbies Against Proposed Consumer Protection Agency
The financial industry is preparing to escalate a lobbying and public relations effort against the Obama administration’s proposal for a Consumer Financial Protection Agency. Lobbyists have begun meeting with members of the House Financial Services Committee ahead of the proposal’s expected introduction on Capital Hill later this month. The Washington Post reports industry groups are discussing a propaganda effort similar to the campaign that derailed health care reform efforts under President Clinton in the 1990s. Among the proposals include a campaign similar to the ‘Harry and Louise’ ads that depicted Clinton’s health plans as an attack on free consumer choice.
Study: Link Emission Cuts to Rich Populations
In environmental news, a new study is calling for targeting emission cuts at wealthy people since the wealthy account for the most pollution of greenhouse gases. In a study published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the authors write that emissions cuts should be higher not just for wealthier nations but for wealthier people, no matter where they live. Less than one billion people are believed to be responsible for half the world’s carbon dioxide emissions.
Vietnam War Architect Robert McNamara Dies at 93
And former Defense Secretary Robert McNamara has died at the age of 93. McNamara was one of the key architects of the Vietnam war, which killed at least three million Vietnamese, around one million Cambodians and Laotians, and 58,000 American soldiers.
Tabacco: I consider myself both a funnel and a filter. I funnel information, not readily available on the Mass Media, which is ignored and/or suppressed. I filter out the irrelevancies and trivialities to save both the time and effort of my Readers and bring consternation to the enemies of Truth & Fairness! When you read Tabacco, if you don’t learn something NEW, I’ve wasted your time.
Tabacco is not a blogger, who thinks; I am a Thinker, who blogs.
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