Sept.12: The journalistic culture of lying by omission.

When Obama was first campaigning, he often quoted Martin Luther King's ringing words of the 1960s to end racial discrimination in the US. The words were "I have a dream..." What Obama did not say, and what the news media have never said in the more than 40 years since King spoke those words, is that FBI immediately mounted the biggest operation in its history. The purpose of the campaign was to discredit King, to smear, and to spread the impression he was a communist agent. And the man who ordered that that was smiling, cute, and cuddable Bobby Kennedy, the brother of John F. Nor has the TandT mentioned recent disclosures that the share of the wealth going to the top 1% im the US have reached its highest level since 1928. (The figures are much the same for Canada.) And the greater part of food stamps in the US no longer go to the slums of cities. They go the suburbs, to the homes of the shattered middle class. The TandT seems also to have missed the story that a Russian guided missile cruiser has entered the Mediterranian, and is headed toward Syria. It is designed primarily to sink aircraft carriers, the major weapons in most of America's overseas wars are aircraft carriers. So it should be no souprise that the TandT has still not mentioned yesterday's announcement that Irving Oil misrespresented the danger of the type of oil it was shipping, that such misrepresentation is illegal..And that 47 people died because of it. There is not a word about it in the paper. Got an explanation for that, Norbert? And will you now write one of you patent rants, but this time about the Irvings? There is still no mention of what is now an old story, though new information has been added the an original story that was bad enough. Prof. Lapierre, the man the shale gas industry used to discredit the warning of the province's Chief Medical Officer, Dr. Cleary, the man who has been named chair of committee to oversea Shale gas safety, the man praised by the TandT for his learning, has 'misinformed' his university and us about his qualifications. This man, whom the TandT described as a man or towering achievement and insight in science, does not have the doctroate in science he claimed to have. We know now --- sorry, we don't know now because lying Brunswick Press doesnt tell us....he does not have a doctorate in science. He has a doctorate in teaching from a university nobody has ever heard of. Yessirree. The man in charge of our health, perhaps our lives, and the safety of the land we walk on and the water we drink, has a teaching degree from some place in the boondocks. (For that matter, even a doctorate in ecology, if he had one, would scarcely justify favouring his word over that of a medical doctor on issues of threats to health.) Day after day, the TandT lies by omission. Everyone who works for that propaganda rag should be profoundly ashamed. The owner should be profoundly ashamed. (But I don't think he is. He seems to live by a beilef in that perversion of a real capitalism that says the capitalist should look after himself with no regard whatever on the effect it has on others. That's not capitalism. That's just greed, ignorance and irresponsibility. Preachers at the irving Chapel must have to do some considerable censoring of The Bible before their sermons.) _________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Section A, as usual, has almost nothing worth reading. Their is a story about the problems facing our lobster fiehery. But from there, it's a huge story about a sidewalk cafe in Sackville being closed, a free ad disguised as a story about a new shop in Moncton - and lots of pictures - such as a man psying golf with a hockey stick, and a big picture of two men who are organizing a brakfast to raise money for a worthy cause. A picture should add something to a story. a shot of two men in suits tells us nothing. ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ NewsToday has a story about how Canadian troops were victims of the first chemical attack in history,when Germans released poison gas on them. It's true that Canadians were major targets of the first GAS attack. It's also true that they handled it with a courage and discipline that saved the day for a whole section of the Allied front. But the first poison gas attack was not the first chemical attack. The poisoning of water and food has been going on for millenia. So has the deliberate spread of disease. The ancient Greeks used chumicals to make a weapon called "Greek Fire". And just three years after the poison gas attack on Canadians, Winston Churchill happily used it to bomb defenceless Kurd villagers. Inicidentally, in the international rules against chemical weapons, one of the offending weapons is tear gas. So all North American police forces are breaking the law. _______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ The front page of NewsToday, almost the only news we get of the world beyond Miramichi, features a story about New Yorkers gathering in memeory of the 3,000 killed by terrorist on the day of 9/11. No one could possible find fault with that. But have you never noticed that we never hear of the millions of Vietnamese killed by US terrorists? The half million killed in the bombing of a defenceless Cambodia? The native peoples killed in Guatemala? the more than a million killed in Iraq? The two hundred thousand killed so far in a Syrian war begun, financed and supplied by the US and its allies? The tremendous slaughter and abuse of native peoples in Canada and the US? The injunction to love one's neighbour does not refer simply to the people who live next door, and who look and talk like us. Syria makes it in a brief article that tells us nothing we didn't already know. Then there's a big story (with a blurry picture) about how jungle apes make their travel plans. A must-read. ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ The editorial is the usual gush about any development project in Moncton. This time, it's about a plan to install, among other things,a restaurant in the old Moncton High. It will, says the editor, attract people after games at the "events" centre. Right. I can see it now, thousands of people walking from Highfield Square, passing all the restaurants on Main St., then turning for the walk up to Moncton High for a meal. Look. This is trivial crap. Could we have an editorial on the Lapierre situation? Norbert continues on yesterday's rant - all politicians are stupid - but this time the focus is on Liberal leader Gallant. This is just childish. Way beyond childish. Of course, Gallant has nothing to offer. Neither does Alward. Neither did Graham. Typically, a premier of this province is owned and directed by Irving and other corporate bosses. Let that sink in, Norbert. The problem with this province is not dumb politicians. The problem is that they are owned by greedy and short-sighted corporation leaders. You should be able to understand that, Norbert. After all, these are the people who own you and your wretched newspapers - and who own wretched you. The great virtue of the other parties is that they have NOT been bought off - and are not likely to be. Rod Allen is Rod Allen with a quie pointless story that wildly overstates the role of the Cape Jouriman lighthouse in confederation. The only good stuff in the paper is Alec Bruce and Beth Lyons. _____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ I'm starting to enjoy letter to the editor by "Skip" Wallin. I've never seen letters that are so wildly illogical. Today's letter features an argument that Canada is just as dangerous with guns as the US is. A major piece of evidence? Nunavut has a higher rate of gun violence than Louisiana does.Think about it. This is, I believe, the same writer who proved conclusively that shale gas is absolutely harmless. ______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________